Transmission of Attitudes regarding Family Life from Parents to Adolescents in Israel

Abstract

This study dealt with intergenerational transmission of attitudes toward family life from parents to their adolescent children in Israel. Family life attitudes were examined in relation to 3 topics: gender roles, divorce, and homosexuality. The sample consisted of 300 participants: 15-year-old adolescents ( n = 51 girls and 49 boys), their fathers ( n = 100), and their mothers ( n = 100). Significant correlations were found between the attitudes of the children and those of their parents. However, fathers’ attitudes toward gender roles and divorce correlated more strongly with those of their sons than with those of their daughters. No significant differences were found in the correlations between the attitudes of mothers and those of their children, or between the attitudes of the daughters and those of the parents. However, sons’ attitudes toward divorce were more traditional than those of both parents, and sons’ gender role attitudes were more traditional than those of their mothers.