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The Interplay of Children’s and Parents’ Networks in Shaping Each Other’s Social Worlds

Project description

How child–parent social networks co-evolve

Social divisions based on ethnicity, religion and social class have given rise to segregated networks from childhood through adulthood. While research has emphasised the influence of parents on their children’s social networks, it has largely overlooked the fact that children also influence their parents’ social networks. The ERC-funded ChiParNet project aims to develop a theory about how child–parent networks co-evolve over time in educational settings with varying degrees of diversity, thus enhancing our understanding of mutual intergenerational boundary-setting. The project will collect unique data on children’s and parents’ networks from kindergarten to secondary school and use them to investigate how children’s and parents’ networks impact their social boundaries, particularly in diverse educational settings.

Objective

As our social worlds remain divided by categories such as ethnicity, religion, and social class, attenuating social boundaries is paramount to creating equal opportunities and building cohesive societies. Segregated networks mark boundaries from childhood on and persist through adolescence and beyond. Research stresses parents influence on childrens contacts, but it largely neglects that children also influence their parents contacts. If we do not account for the interplay of childrens and parents networks, we may draw wrong conclusions about how segregation emerges and under which conditions it persists or diminishes. Since younger generations are more diverse, we must understand whether children adopt their parents network structures or whether diversity in childrens social lives also diversifies the social worlds of their parents.
My project aims to advance our knowledge of mutual intergenerational boundary-making by developing and testing a theory of how childparent networks co-evolve over time in educational settings with varying degrees of diversity. I propose to collect an innovative panel dataset of childrens and parents networks for multiple cohorts from kindergarten to secondary school. These unique data will allow me to rigorously examine how the interplay of childrens and parents networks affects boundaries in each others social worlds and how this varies by childrens age and diversity in educational settings.
By showing how children and parents shape each others social worlds, the project will provide decisive new insights into the (bi)directionality and conditions of the intergenerational reproduction of social boundaries. This will change our understanding of segregation and break new ground in the interdisciplinary fields of intergroup relations, family studies, and network science. The results of the project will create a firm scientific basis on which policymakers can develop measures to reduce boundaries between future generations.

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Topic(s)

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HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants

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Call for proposal

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(opens in new window) ERC-2022-STG

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Host institution

JOHANN WOLFGANG GOETHE-UNIVERSITAET FRANKFURT AM MAIN
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 1 496 538,00
Address
THEODOR W ADORNO PLATZ 1
60323 FRANKFURT AM MAIN
Germany

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Region
Hessen Darmstadt Frankfurt am Main, Kreisfreie Stadt
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 1 496 538,00

Beneficiaries (2)

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