George Holden and Amanda Harrist embrace the idea that parenting is a dynamic process: children affect parents just as much as parents affect children. A multi-level, ecological approach to parenting and childrearing allows a full range of parenting styles, covering topics from co-parenting, evolutionary views, human behavioral genetics, to religious influences, and addressing challenges to be encountered across parenting courses, such as family violence, behavior problems, and the role of pathology in the family. The completely updated Parenting: A Dynamic Process, Fourth Edition presents research in a way that is accessible and interesting but also accurate, current, and intellectually rich. Although written from a psychological perspective, views and applications from other disciplines - including sociology, criminology, anthropology, and pediatrics - are also discussed where appropriate. The text discusses contemporary issues, such as fertility problems, daycare, marital conflict, whether or not to use physical punishment, divorce, remarriage and step-parents, LBGTQ parents, the effects of poverty, risks and benefits of media use among children, and family violence. Additionally, Holden and Harrist include selected studies from developing and non-Western countries as well as recent statistics on such topics as US & world birthrate, birth problems, adolescent pregnancy, child injury, divorce and remarriage, child maltreatment, and certain social policy issues.
Author Biography:
GEORGE W. HOLDEN, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX. He received his B.A. from Yale University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After earning his degree in developmental psychology with a minor in social psychology, he was a member of the psychology faculty at the University of Texas for 23 years. While at U.T., he was head of the developmental area from 1990 to 1996 and the Director of the Institute of Human Development and Family Studies from 1995 to 1997. For five years (1999 to 2004) he served as Associate Chair of the Psychology Department. He is a fellow of the American Psychological Society and a member of the Society for Research in Child Development, the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children, and the Society for Research in Human Development, where he is currently President. He has been or is on the editorial boards of Child Development, Developmental Psychology, Journal of Family Psychology, Parenting, and the Journal of Emotional Abuse. Dr. Holden's research interests are in the area of social development, with a focus on parent-child relationships. He is especially interested in understanding the determinants of parental behavior, parental social cognition, and the causes and consequences of family violence. For example, he has investigated how parenting is affected and children are impacted by marital violence. Another topic he has investigated in several studies is parental use of physical punishment and children's perception of it. His research has been supported by grants from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Justice, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Hogg Foundation for Mental Health. He is the author of numerous scientific articles and chapters, and the books Parenting: A dynamic perspective (Sage, 2010) and Parents and the Dynamics of Child Rearing (Westview, 1997). In addition he co-edited Children Exposed to Marital Violence (American Psychological Association, 1998) and the Handbook of Family Measurement Techniques, Vol. 2 & 3 (Sage, 2001). He is married and has three children.
