Project ChiParNet
The Interplay of Children’s and Parents’ Networks in Shaping Each Other’s Social Worlds
The ChiParNet project examines how children and parents mutually influence each other’s social networks. Instead of focusing solely on parental influence, ChiParNet explores how children’s friendships also shape their parents’ social worlds. For this purpose, children of various ages and their parents are surveyed a total of three times.
Our society is often divided along ethnic, religious, educational, or income lines. This social separation begins in childhood and continues into adulthood. But how exactly do such social boundaries emerge – and how can they be overcome?
To date, research has largely argued that parents pass their biases to their children and influence their social circles. The ChiParNet project goes a decisive step further by investigating the interplay: Don’t children also influence who their parents interact with? For example, when a classroom is very diverse, children form friendships across social boundaries. Does this lead to their parents becoming more open and building more diverse networks as well?
To answer this question, ChiParNet uses an innovative study design with different age groups – from early childhood to the transition into secondary school. Each group is followed over three annual survey waves. We interview both the children and adolescents as well as their parents and legal guardians. This combined perspective allows us to examine how the social worlds of parents and children co-evolve and influence one another across different life stages.
Funding
