Grandparents Raising Grandchildren: Perceived Neighborhood Risk as a Predictor of Emotional Well-Being

Abstract

Little is known about the living conditions of grandparents raising grandchildren and how such environments may impact their emotional well-being. Using a probability sample of 465 grandparent caregivers, multivariate analyses showed no statistically significant main effect between grandparents' perceived neighborhood conditions and their emotional well-being. However, a statistically significant interaction effect indicated that increasing levels of perceived neighborhood risk decreases grandparents' emotional well-being among permanent, rather than non-permanent, grandparent caregivers. Findings are discussed, and practice implications suggest neighborhood conditions should be addressed in psychosocial assessments protocols used to understand the needs of this underserved population.

KEYWORDS:

• Grandparents raising grandchildren
• neighborhoods
• emotional well-being

Notes

Note. ^aMissing data reduced the sample size by 18.5%. As follows, data collected from 379 grandparents were available for multivariate analysis.

^bRegression coefficients are unstandardized.

^cEach reference group shown is coded as 0.

^∧ p < .10

*p < .05

**p < .01; two–tailed statistical significance level used.