We propose that the Child Development Supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics be one of key databases in the network and that Sandra L. Hofferth, co-PI of the PSID and PI of its Child Development Supplement (PSID-CDS), be one of the network Pis. The PSID has collected detailed information on U.S. children's families over the past three decades and obtained detailed assessments of 3,500 children age 0-12 in 2,500 families in 1997, with additional data collection planned for 1999. Besides the PSID-CDS, we also propose to use the Survey of Program Dynamics (SPD), the proposed 10-year longitudinal follow-up of the 1992-1993 waves of the SIPP. We will employ a comprehensive strategy to obtain the best estimates of the effects of family change on children; in particular, the systematic use of a set of accepted methodological approaches to establish both the direction and size of causal effects of family behavior on children is proposed. When coupled with a data base on state level policies and area characteristics, these data will provide a powerful tool for examining the association among socioeconomic and policy context, family behavior and process, and the health, cognitive achievement, and social development of children. Consistent with the public policy focus of the network, the collaborative projects will examine the effects of social context and public policies on family behavior. The specific projects consist of a set of interrelated analyses of the PSID-CDS and the SIPP/SPD to examine how (1) living arrangements, (2) resources, and (3) maternal employment and children's care are related to contextual and policy changes in the United States since the early 1990s. Social indicators will also be developed. The individual projects will consist of an examination of these family behaviors on children's health and cognitive and social development and the part played by family process in mediating these outcomes, using the PSID/CDS. No other national data sets have the detailed outcome and family process data needed for a comprehensive study of the effects of changing family behavior on young children.
