The purpose of the present study was to investigate gender-related socialization within the family, focusing on: (1) whether parents' discipline to their children differed depending on children's sex, and parents' sex-typed disciplines were related of children's sex-typed disciplines, (2) parents' gender-related view of child-raising differed, and (3) parents' expectations to their every child differed depending on the sibling structure. A questionnaire was administered to 119 mothers and 79 fathers. The main results of the analyses were as follows: (1) Both of grandmothers and parents expected their sons to have agentic traits, and their daughters to have communal traits, and their children almost realized their parents' expectations. In contrast, if their grandmothers expected their sons to have communal traits, and their daughters to have agentic traits, their children hardly met their parents' expectations. (2) Fathers expected that mothers should carry more burden of child-raising than them. (3) Parents’ sex-typed disciplines were influenced by patriarchy, and sex-typed disciplines were salient in sex-mixed sibling structures.

　　In Japan, aisatsu ─ the distinctive manners and customs that Japanese people do in the form of ritual communication, such as greetings in daily life ─ are considered very important for children and families. The purpose of this study was to clarify the relationship between the use of aisatsu behavior and marital relationships, their feelings in daily life among married couples raising children. A questionnaire was administered and 100 couples participated. The main findings follow. First, factor analysis of aisatsu behavior revealed two factors: rituals of daily life, such as saying “Good morning”; being considerate to each other, such as saying “Thank you”. Second, wives did rituals of daily life more than their husbands, whereas husbands, by contrast, did more non-verbal aisatsu. Third, aisatsu and marital satisfaction, non-verbal communication was correlated. Fourth, husbands’ being considerate to their wives was related to their wives' daily stress of childcare. Finally, the results of this study suggest the aisatsu that wives and husbands did were functional as an important aspect of family communication.

　　Family structure was investigated with cohesion, power, interest relation, and openness for three dyadic relationships (marital, father-adolescent, mother-adolescent). The author examined family structure with communication between each subsystem and family stress perceived by adolescent. Participants were 283 adolescents (104 men and 179 women). Given the results that showed difference on variables for child gender, cluster analyses were conducted separately for men and women to type family structure. The most frequent open communication between each family members and positive mother-mediated communication by and the lowest family stress perceived by child were found in families with male adolescent where high cohesion and low interest, balanced power among family members exist and in families with female adolescent where low interest and balanced power among family members with high cohesive marital relationship exist. We also confirmed the association between family structure and communication for the most part. Implications for the relation between family structure and family communication in adolescence are discussed.

　　Previous studies found that nicknames among family members reflected family problems and functions. However, these studies did not suggest any specific relationships between any two family members. The present study focused on parent-child relationships represented by Children's Nicknames for their Parents (CNPs). We aim to show relevancy between the parentchild relationships represented by CNPs and children's attachment styles. We especially focused on whether CNPs including kinship terms [e.g., father or mother] affect on children’s attachment styles or not. This is because Japanese kinship terms reportedly reflected a certain level of parentchild relationships. A certain level of parent-child relationships commonly makes children's attachment styles more secure, less anxious and avoidant. Therefore, we hypothesized that children who addressed their parents with kinship term(s) would have more secure and less anxious and avoidant attachment styles than those who did not. Participants were 422 college or university students including 268 female students. Questionnaire consisted of the questionnaire of adult internal attachment style and questions regarding CNPs. The results suggested that participants who addressed their fathers with kinship term(s) significantly had more secure and less anxious attachment styles than those who did not. On the other hand, attachment styles were not differed significantly between those who addressed their mother with kinship term(s) and those who did not. These results were interpreted from the perspective of different parent roles between fathers and mothers. Clinical implications of these results were also discussed.

　　Focusing on mothers' internal working model (IWM), this study examined the relationship between mothers' IWM and the difficulty of raising children. In other words, the aim was to investigate how a mother's IWM type is related to her perception of how difficult it is to raise children. The study was conducted on 102 mothers (mean age 32.8 years) of 3-year-old children, who answered written questionnaires consisting of questions about their IWM (18 items) and questions about the difficulty of raising children (53 items).

　　Factor analysis of the results of the questionnaire regarding the difficulty of raising children produced 3 factors, namely “cranky/dependence”, “bad mood” and “unstable relationships”, which comprised the “difficulty of raising children scale”. Furthermore, when results were examined in relation to the mothers' IWM, it appeared that mothers with a secure type IWM were able to accept their children’s crankiness and cope with it easily. Mothers with an avoidant type IWM tended to consciously recognize that their children were easy to raise, but showed many instances of finding it difficult to connect to them, and had a tendency to try not to see these situations.

　　The results of this study showed that there is a relationship between a secure IWM and the mother's perception of children being easy to raise. Furthermore, the results also indicated that there is a relationship between avoidant IWM and difficulty in connecting to children, although it is possible that mothers are not aware of this. These results suggest the need for support for avoidant mothers in raising children, as well as the difficulty of providing such support.

　　Problems related to child rearing by single fathers and the fathers' development as a parent was investigated. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with single fathers (n=22). The results indicated that single fathers had multiple problems, such as simultaneously earning a living, doing housework and childcare. Moreover, they get insufficient financial support. The necessity for social and mental support for such fathers was indicated, because they felt anxiety about child rearing as a single parent and worried about the influence of the divorce on children. It was also indicated they were trying to communicate with concerned people and make relationships with those around them. Moreover, their loss experience had a serious psychological influence on them. Acquiring generativity that includes recognizing the meaning of child rearing through making parental relationships, taking responsibility as a parent, learning and rebuilding the self through child rearing was observed in these fathers, indicative of their development as a parent. Moreover, development of single fathers as human beings was achieved by increasing selfefficacy through experiencing conflicts in the separation from their spouse, work, housekeeping, and child rearing.