ABSTRACT
From genetic contributions to the selection of contexts in which their children are reared, parents play a fundamental role in shaping children’s development. This chapter discusses research on parenting and child development in the neighborhood context to make theoretically and empirically based recommendations for future research. To achieve this goal, it first outlines research linking neighborhoods, parenting, and child development in historical context. The chapter describes particular challenges for defining and studying the overlapping contexts of neighborhoods and parenting, with a focus on research methodology around neighborhoods. It addresses direct links between neighborhoods and parents' well-being and parenting behaviors before turning to mediated and moderated models that link neighborhoods and parenting with children's outcomes. The challenges around consistently defining neighborhoods and obtaining rigorous neighborhood-level measurements compound the difficulties of conducting research on the importance of neighborhoods for parenting.
