The Second Child: Family Transition and Adjustment

by Robert B. Stewart

The processes by which family members adjust to the birth of a second child are explored in this volume. Interviews with both parents and with toddler first-born children focused on how the birth of the second child affected the relationships between other family members, their roles within the family and their feelings about themselves. A major finding was that while mothers become active parents on the birth of the first child, it is often not until the second child is born that the father shows great interest in family life and assumes a significant part of the responsibility for household and childcare tasks.

256 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1990