Interparental Conflict, Support and Affection, and Coparenting Alliance Among Lower-Income, Unmarried Couples During the Transition to Parenthood

Abstract

Guided by family systems theory and the spillover hypothesis, data from the Building Strong Families project was used to test how mothers’ and fathers’ constructive conflict, destructive conflict, and support and affection were associated with mothers’ and fathers’ coparenting alliance by utilizing a strengths-based approach. The study consisted of 1,516 different-sex couples from the United States who were primarily low-income, unmarried and experiencing the transition to parenthood when their children were around 36 months of age. The current study results are reported here, while noting that multiple tests of model fit yielded poor model fit; thus, the findings reported here should be interpreted with caution. The study findings provided support for family systems and the spillover hypothesis, specifically in regard to instances of positive spillover, such that higher constructive conflict and support and affection (e.g., partner encouragement) for both mothers and fathers was associated with higher coparenting alliance for both mothers and fathers. However, the current study did not find support for negative spillover seeing as mothers’ and fathers’ destructive conflict was not significantly associated with coparenting alliance. These results underscore the importance of including a variety of constructs, and reports from both mothers and fathers, to understand more about coparenting alliances for these families. Further, the current study highlights key areas within romantic relationships that, when strengthened, have the potential to positively spillover into other areas of the family.