Moreover, even fewer studies have considered alcohol problems and parenting behaviors from both fathers and mothers as separate constructs and analyzed them simultaneously in the same model to examine whether and how one parent’s alcohol problems may influence the other parent’s parenting behaviors, which in turn can affect adolescent outcomes. This is a noteworthy gap, given that researchers have called for using a family systems perspective to better understand individual development (Cox & Paley, 2003). Family systems theory posits that individuals or subsystems (e.g., the parental or the parent-child subsystem) in the family are interdependent and influence one another through processes such as spillover and/or crossover effects (White & Kline, 2002). Spillover refers to the transfer of affect or behavior within one person across subsystems (e.g., father’s ADS influences father’s parenting behavior), whereas crossover refers to the transfer of affect or behavior between people in the family (e.g., father’s ADS influences mother’s parenting behavior). Here, we considered the unique contributions of fathers and mothers and the spillover and crossover effects between fathers’ and mothers’ ADS and parenting behaviors in relation to adolescent outcomes.
