All Joy and No Fun

The Paradox of Modern Parenthood

Jennifer Senior

• Publisher: Ecco
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780062072245
• eBook ISBN: 9780062072269
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Social History
• Index: History

Thousands of books have examined the effects of parents on their children. In All Joy and No Fun, award-winning journalist Jennifer Senior now asks: what are the effects of children on their parents?

In All Joy and No Fun, award-winning journalist Jennifer Senior tries to tackle this question, isolating and analyzing the many ways in which children reshape their parents' lives, whether it's their marriages, their jobs, their habits, their hobbies, their friendships, or their internal senses of self. She argues that changes in the last half century have radically altered the roles of today's mothers and fathers, making their mandates at once more complex and far less clear.

Recruiting from a wide variety of sources—in history, sociology, economics, psychology, philosophy, and anthropology—she dissects both the timeless strains of parenting and the ones that are brand new, and then brings her research to life in the homes of ordinary parents around the country. The result is an unforgettable series of family portraits, starting with parents of young children and progressing to parents of teens. Through lively and accessible storytelling, Senior follows these mothers and fathers as they wrestle with some of parenthood's deepest vexations—and luxuriate in some of its finest rewards.

Meticulously researched yet imbued with emotional intelligence, All Joy and No Fun makes us reconsider some of our culture's most basic beliefs about parenthood, all while illuminating the profound ways children deepen and add purpose to our lives. By focusing on parenthood, rather than parenting, the book is original and essential reading for mothers and fathers of today—and tomorrow.

notes

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introduction

4 “fragile and mysterious” Alice S. Rossi, “Transition to Parenthood,” Journal of Marriage and Family 30, no. 1 (1968): 35.

4 What was the effect of parenthood on adults? Ibid., 26.

4 “We knew where babies came from” E. E. LeMasters, “Parenthood as Crisis,” Marriage and Family Living 19, no. 4 (1957): 352–55, 353.

4 “Loss of sleep” Ibid., 353–54.

5 economic pressure, less sex, and “general disenchantment” Ibid., 354.

5 another landmark paper Norval D. Glenn, “Psychological Well-being in the Postparental Stage: Some Evidence from National Surveys,” Journal of Marriage and Family 37, no. 1 (1975): 105–10.

5 children tended to negate its effects Paul D. Cleary and David Mechanic, “Sex Differences in Psychological Distress Among Married People,” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 24 (1983): 111–21; Sara McLanahan and Julia Adams, “Parenthood and Psychological Well-being,” Annual Review of Sociology 13 (1983): 237–57.

5 Throughout the next two decades Recent papers showing this phenomenon include: David G. Blanchflower and Andrew J. Oswald, “International Happiness: A New View on the Measure of Performance,” Academy of Management Perspectives 25, no. 1 (2011): 6–22; Robin W. Simon, “The Joys of Parenthood Reconsidered,” Contexts 7, no. 2 (2008): 40–45; Kei M. Nomaguchi and Melissa A. Milkie, “Costs and Rewards of Children: The Effects of Becoming a Parent on Adults’ Lives,” Journal of Marriage and Family 65 (May 2003): 356–74.

5 ranked sixteenth out of nineteen Daniel Kahneman et al., “Toward National Well-being Accounts,” American Economic Review 94, no. 2 (2004): 432.

5 In an ongoing study Killingsworth uses an iPhone app to track people’s emotions as they go about their daily lives. For more details about his project, see http://www.trackyourhappiness.org; to see published material derived from this data set, see Matthew A. Killingsworth and Daniel T. Gilbert, “A Wandering Mind Is an Unhappy Mind,” Science 330, no. 6006 (November 2010): 932.

5 “Interacting with your friends is better” Daniel A. Killingsworth, interview with the author, February 6, 2013.

6 more highs as well as more lows Arthur Stone, Distinguished Professor, Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Science, Stony Brook University, communication with the author, May 30, 2013.

6 greater feelings of meaning and reward The most comprehensive and forward-thinking of these studies is by Debra Umberson and Walter Gove, “Parenthood and Psychological Well-being: Theory, Measurement, and Stage in the Family Life Course,” Journal of Family Issues 10, no. 4 (1989): 440–62.

6 “high-cost/high-reward activity” William Doherty, interview with the author, January 26, 2011.

6 as much as being legally drunk Michael H. Bonnet, interview with the author, November 17, 2011.

7 adults often view children as one of life’s crowning achievements See, for example, Andrew J. Cherlin, The Marriage Go-Round: The State o...

Table of contents

• dedication
• introduction
• contents
• one - autonomy
• two - marriage
• three - simple gifts
• four - concerted cultivation
• five - adolescence
• six - joy
• acknowledgments
• notes
• index
• about the author
• copyright
• about the publisher