Is Blood Really Thicker than Water? Extrafamilial Social Supports as a Moderator in the Relationship between Family Distancing and Differentiation of Self

Is Blood Really Thicker than Water? 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Extrafamilial Social Supports as a Moderator in the Relationship between Family Distancing and Differentiation of Self David A. Adams This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-6822047/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract This study examined how family distancing was associated with differentiation of self, and how that relationship was moderated by sources of social support outside the family of origin. Research in family systems suggests that poorly differentiated individuals have unresolved emotional tensions with their family of origin, resulting in a diminished ability to balance emotional intimacy with personal autonomy. However, alternative research exploring family distancing has suggested that limiting or fully ending communication with one’s family of origin can sometimes be necessary and healthy for individuals, with research also suggesting that individuals may create their own sense of family in the face of distanced or estranged family relationships. Therefore, this study explored the extent to which individuals may rely on social relationships beyond the family of origin to maintain high levels of self-differentiation in the face of distanced relationships. A convenience sample of 122 individuals above the age of 18 was recruited for participation. Analysis of survey data revealed 1) that more family distancing predicted poorer DoS, and 2) that the relationship between family distancing and DoS was moderated by social supports depending on educational status; social supports buffered the negative relationship between family distancing and DoS for college/university students ( n = 89), but exacerbated this negative relationship for participants not attending college/university ( n = 33). Theoretical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed. Family distancing estrangement found family differentiation of self family systems social supports Introduction The phrase “blood runs thicker than water” has been interpreted in American culture to highlight the immense value of biological family. Today, many believe that the family of origin is held together by unconditional bonds stronger than those of any other interpersonal relationships. Trailing back as early as Freud’s (1900) conception of the Oedipus complex, theoretical and empirical work across the discipline of psychology has long been interested in how family ties are not only difficult to completely sever but also seem to play a key role in lifespan development. Murray Bowen ( 1978 ) followed this work by pioneering a systems-based approach to family functioning. This approach introduced the idea that an individual’s psychological functioning must be understood in context with interpersonal and emotional dynamics permeating the family unit. Bowen's family systems theory (BFST) therefore posits that humans, even while developing a solid sense of self and individuality, are nonetheless inexorably emotionally bound to the family of origin (Bowen, 1978 ). Despite BFST’s emphasis on a healthy family unit for positive psychological functioning in individuals, more recent attention has been allocated to models of family or kinship that do not rely on ties to the family of origin. Scholars have begun suggesting that family ties are conditional, and that family distancing can sometimes be necessary for an individual to preserve safety and well-being (Scharp, 2019 ). Family distancing pertains to the steps that one may take to weaken their level of involvement in the family (Scharp & Dorrance Hall, 2017 ), characterized by behaviors such as geographical distancing and excommunication. Individuals may distance themselves from the family of origin due to factors such as emotional tension and dissatisfaction with the relationship, among others. While research on the lived experiences of family distancing have suggested that the distancing process can be profoundly troubling for parents whose children have estranged them (Agllias, 2013 ), it has simultaneously suggested that the process can offer relief, healing, and growth for the adult children (Agllias, 2018 ). The work in family distancing research contrasts with theoretical claims made by BFST: when an individual engages in emotional cutoff with the family of origin, Bowen ( 1978 ) would suggest that they have left with an unresolved emotional attachment that “fuses” them to the family system, informing how they engage emotionally with others throughout the lifespan. The fused individual is said to then possess a less secure sense of their own emotions and emotional needs, resorting to deriving them from other individuals. This contrast demonstrates a complex and nuanced nature of family ties that has yet to be fully understood. Aiming to acquire a deeper understanding of these complex family ties, this study will investigate how family distancing is associated with individuals’ ability to develop a solid sense of self using principal constructs offered by BFST. Furthermore, it will examine whether extrafamilial social supports may aid the process of differentiation from the family of origin. Family Distancing A variety of terms have described individuals who establish emotional and/or physical distance between themselves and the family of origin, but not much is known about the psychological effects of family distancing. One review (Scharp & Dorrance Hall, 2017 ) presented three types of family distancing based on differences in the family dynamics that might contribute to a person's desire to distance themselves: first, "family member marginalization" describes a dynamic in which an individual feels excluded for being an outcast or a 'black sheep' in the family, often resulting in the individual distancing themselves to escape disapproval. Second, parent-child alienation occurs when parents directly or indirectly perform behaviors that make their child feel as though they were rejected by the parent, resulting in resentment or hatred felt towards the parent by the child. Third, parent-child estrangement denotes the event of a family member constructing boundaries to physically distance themself, oftentimes to escape emotional abuse. In this study, the term "family distancing" was chosen as the construct of interest to denote behaviors that define the strength of the physical and communicative boundaries that an individual may have with their family of origin. Previous research has revealed a complex relationship between family distancing and psychological well-being. Hank ( 2024 ) explored how a binary measurement of family estrangement was associated with participants’ scores of life satisfaction and depression for adults who distanced themselves from their parents and/or siblings. The study found that those who reported “Yes” to having estranged families reported lower levels of life satisfaction and higher levels of depression. This study emphasizes that one form of family distancing (estrangement) is linked to poorer mental health outcomes. Considering that this study was not longitudinal or experimental in design, the results cannot determine that distanced family relationships are causally related to poor psychological well-being. Further, the study only assessed family distancing on a binary measure, preventing nuanced exploration of family distancing as a construct. Other research has suggested that family distancing can potentially bring about positive outcomes for some individuals. A qualitative study (Agllias, 2018 ) looked at family distancing by performing in-depth interviews on participants who experienced estrangement from their parents throughout their lives. The interviews revealed that while estrangement can contribute to grief, ambiguous loss, or trauma, it can also provide a sense of relief, healing, and growth for individuals who feel estrangement is necessary. These results suggest that individuals who distance themselves from the family of origin experience a complex array of emotions through the distancing process. Differentiation of Self To better understand how family distancing informs relationships outside the family of origin, this study will also examine differentiation of self (DoS), a foundational concept within BFST that describes the extent to which individuals can psychologically distinguish themselves from the rest of the family unit (Titelman, 2014 ). DoS is believed to be a process extending across the lifespan, beginning with the idea that everyone grapples with the inherent tension between intimacy with others and independent autonomy. Individuals are said to be completely “fused” with their family at birth, becoming more solidly differentiated as they develop an emotionally distinct sense of self beyond their family, in part depending on how individual family members are able to resist responding to stress in the family system with destructive behaviors. Theoretical work has suggested that individuals obtain their DoS levels from the degree to which they are involved in their parents’ emotions through the lifespan, typically called the intergenerational family transmission process (Bowen, 1978 ; Calatrava et al., 2019; Józefczyk, 2023 ). Children who are more wrapped up in their parents’ emotions are said to develop poor differentiation because they struggle to develop their own sense of personal and emotional autonomy. However, only weak and inconclusive evidence supports the developmental and intergenerational aspects of DoS (Calatrava et al., 2019; Józefczyk, 2023 ). More clarity is thus needed regarding factors that contribute to an individual’s self-differentiation. Highly differentiated individuals are also believed to possess a stronger capability to distinguish between rational and emotional thoughts so that their emotions do not overtake their interpersonal behaviors (Bowen, 1978 ; Kerr & Bowen, 1988 ). Accordingly, research has conceptualized DoS to include both intrapsychic and interpersonal domains of functioning: intrapsychic functioning is exhibited by emotional reactivity (the degree to which an individual reacts based on emotions rather than rationality) and I-position (an individual’s ability to hold clear beliefs and convictions that are not overshadowed or dictated by others). Interpersonal functioning is exhibited by emotional cutoff (the degree to which one avoids expressing emotions to others) and fusion with others (the degree to which an individual’s emotions are overtaken or determined by others). While family distancing pertains to intentional actions related to family dynamics, DoS remains within the psychological domain, pertaining to individual psychological and emotional processes that influence family dynamics. Differentiation is ultimately about an individual’s capacity to develop a solid sense of self that can maintain intimate closeness with others without losing sight of their own emotional needs and personal agency. According to Bowen ( 1978 ), a highly differentiated self is needed for one’s ability to manage the stress of everyday life and adaptively navigate interpersonal tension. Much of the research in BFST has studied DoS by focusing on how it is associated with various measures of psychological well-being (e.g., Lampis et al., 2020 ; Murdock & Gore, Jr., 2004 ; Sandage et al., 2010). For example, Murdock & Gore, Jr. ( 2004 ) explored how individuals cope with life stress depending on their DoS levels, finding that highly differentiated participants used more effective coping strategies to manage perceived stress. Moreover, research has also explored how DoS is related to interpersonal dynamics (e.g., Choi & Murdock, 2017 ; Kaleta & Mróz, 2023 ; Skowron et al., 2009 ). One study (Choi & Murdock, 2017 ) evaluated how participants’ DoS levels were associated with expressions of anger and their tendencies to engage in interpersonal conflict, finding that anger expressed outwardly to others was a partial mediator in the relationship between low DoS and interpersonal conflict. These findings indicate that DoS contributes to individuals' ability to express their emotions during conflict in ways that are productive to the relationship. Several studies (e.g., Bartle-Haring & Lal, 2010 ; Peleg, 2008 ; Skowron, 2000 ) have also explored how DoS shapes marital relationships, suggesting that higher DoS levels among both partners in married couples are associated with higher marital satisfaction. These findings could mean that DoS plays a role in supporting positive intimate relationships. The sum of this research suggests that DoS is closely related to how individuals navigate emotional and interpersonal dynamics. Family Distancing and Differentiation of Self A theoretical tension between family distancing and DoS regards whether distancing can break someone free from a problematic family system. On the one hand, an individual who enacts family distancing displays a relatively high level of agency over their own emotional needs. On the other hand, the literature on DoS would suggest that leaving the family creates unresolved emotional tensions that keep the individual involved in the family system. One recent study (McKnight, 2024 ) reviewed the overlap between family estrangement and BFST. It evaluated the conceptual difference between family distancing practices and the dimension of self-differentiation related to emotional cutoff, which describes the degree to which one feels threatened by emotional intimacy with others, resorting to 'shutting down’ emotionally. The study concluded that the major paradigmatic differences lie in the fact that family distancing reflects the sometimes-necessary process of taking back agency in one’s family relationships through intentional actions, while emotional cutoff reflects the unavoidable psychological fusion that comes alongside responding to tension in one’s family unit via emotional avoidance. The study also identified that empirical research has yet to directly explore the relationship between the two constructs. Thus, while findings in family distancing research conceptualize severed family ties as potentially healthy, BFST conceptualizes them as a paradox in which emotional cutoff is a response to excessive fusion. It is clear from the literature that these distinctions lack empirical attention. Aligning with the conclusions of McKnight ( 2024 ), only one study (Rovers, 1998 ) has attempted to assess the relationship between family distancing and DoS. The study explored how Roman Catholic seminary students leave the family of origin by examining the relationship between DoS and a multiple-choice selection of reasons an individual might leave home. Results showed that individuals who selected that they left the home of their family of origin “just to get out of the house” reported significantly lower DoS levels than the other reasons which included going to university, seminary, or work. However, this study is significantly limited by the fact that it included a narrow sample and only considered a select few reasons why one might leave one’s family. It nonetheless suggests that DoS could play a role in how individuals distance themselves from the family of origin. The findings also offer a contrasting view to the research (Agllias, 2018 ) that has suggested family distancing is in some ways associated with positive well-being. The uncertainty surrounding these findings signals a need to more closely examine how family distancing is related to individuals’ DoS levels. Some research has suggested that poor quality family relationships themselves may predict poorer DoS levels. For example, Wei et al. ( 2005 ) explored how affect regulation differed in response to interpersonal problems, depending on attachment style. In this study, the types of affect regulation studied were the emotional cutoff and emotional reactivity subscales of DoS, although the study was not guided by a BFST framework. The relevant findings from this study were that attachment anxiety predicted poorer emotional reactivity, and attachment avoidance predicted emotional cutoff. Given that attachment research has suggested an individual's attachment styles are informed primarily by an individual's relationship with their caregivers through childhood (Ainsworth et al., 2015 ), these findings potentially reveal that an unstable relationship with the family of origin may be negatively associated with DoS. Social Supports beyond the Family: A Potential Moderator? It may be possible that individuals find ways to ‘replace’ their family of origin with other positive social relationships when family distancing is necessary to preserve physical and psychological safety. Previous writing has given this idea terms such as "found family" and "chosen family" (Schoenike & Schoenike, 2024 ). While the research seems to suggest that individuals who distance themselves from the family of origin may have lower DoS levels, the literature centers on a normative conception of nuclear family that does not consider other forms of kinship. Scholarship beyond psychology (e.g., Andreassen, 2017 ; Plaster, 2023 ; Shange, 2019 ) has documented stories and theorizations about non-normative families and intimacies, exploring the ways in which relationships can manifest outside the nuclear family model, typically consisting of two parents and multiple children living under one household. Notably, the conception of queer kinship (Weston, 1997) demarcates the fact that queer folks often form their own conceptions of family beyond the heteronormative nuclear family model that has been critiqued (Freeman, 2010) for enforcing a normative timeline of lifespan development on individuals and society. Therefore, the existence of sustainable alternative family models indicates that maintaining sustainable ties with the family-of-origin may not be absolutely necessary for an individual’s psychological development or well-being, despite claims made by BFST. In tandem with research exploring alternative models of social bonding, empirical studies have overwhelmingly supported peer social supports outside the family of origin as a source of positive well-being. This work began with a foundational study (Cohen & Wills, 1985 ) that introduced a buffering hypothesis of social supports, suggesting that social supports are not merely associated with positive well-being but instead protect individuals from the harmful effects of overly stressful events and circumstances. In this context, social supports are defined as extrafamilial interpersonal relationships which offer someone psychological and material support to promote their well-being. More recent research (e.g., Brunsting et al., 2021 ; Major et al., 2018 ; Richard et al., 2022 ; van der Horst & Coffé, 2011) has offered clear support of the buffering hypothesis. For example, one study (Richard et al., 2022 ) conducted a meta-analysis that explored the effects of peer support on the mental health of young adults. The study reviewed 17 articles after filtering via search criteria, finding that peer supports during young adulthood are positively associated with mental health benefits and negatively associated with loneliness, depression, and anxiety. This age group is particularly salient given that emerging adults have been viewed as undergoing a transition period away from the household (Arnett, 2000 ). Another study (van der Horst & Coffé, 2021) explored how friendship was associated with psychological well-being, finding that higher frequency of contact and number of friends were associated with decreased stress. Overall, this evidence suggests that social supports can contribute positively to an individual’s well-being. Family Distancing, Differentiation of Self, and Social Supports Since social supports have been shown to act as a buffer against the negative effects of stress on psychological well-being, it seems intuitive to believe social supports may also buffer against the hypothesized negative effect of family distancing on DoS. This additional hypothesis aligns with previous research (Parra et al., 2018 ; Smith et al., 2022 ) that suggested social supports play a role in the relationship between forms of distanced family relationships and psychological well-being. One relevant study (Parra et al., 2018 ) examined the influence of peer social support on the relationship between family rejection and psychosocial adjustment for lesbian, gay, and bisexual emerging adults. The results demonstrated a moderating effect, showing that individuals who had been rejected by their family reported poor psychosocial adjustment, but only when they lacked peer social supports. Rather than studying individuals who took intentional action to set up familial boundaries, this study only explored how individuals whose families had rejected their sexual orientation. In terms of outcomes, the study only examined measures of well-being such as depression, anxiety, and internalized homophobia. Still, these findings lend support to the hypothesized notion of a buffering effect of social supports on DoS, given that higher DoS has been linked to positive well-being (e.g., Murdock & Gore, 2004 ). A gap still exists, though, in understanding how social supports and DoS are related to the way individuals take agency in how they relate to their family of origin. The Present Study Taken together, this study aims to explore the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self (DoS). Based on the literature which suggests breaking family ties can be necessary yet emotionally expensive (Agllias, 2018 ), this study is guided by the hypothesis that individuals who are more highly distanced from their families may be more poorly differentiated. Furthermore, this study aims to test whether social supports moderate the relationship between family distancing and DoS, given its previous empirical support as protector against the psychological effects of problematic family relationships. The study hypothesizes that similar effects may be found for individuals’ DoS levels, such that social supports may buffer against poor self-differentiation. The overarching goal is to explore how relationships beyond the family of origin may assist individuals in forming a solid sense of self. Method Participants and Procedure A total of 122 individuals aged 18 and above ( M age = 21.61, SD age = 2.82) who currently resided in the United States were recruited to participate in this study. For racial identity, participants selected White (75%), Asian (10%), Hispanic or Latino/a/x, or originating from Latin American descent (9%), Other (4%), Black or African American (3%), Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (3%), and Native/Indigenous American or Alaska Native (1%). For gender identity, participants selected Male (21%), Female (64%), Genderqueer/Fluid/Non-binary (10%), Transgender (4%), and No Response (1%). For sexual orientation, participants selected Straight (25%), Bisexual (34%), Lesbian/Gay (17%), Pansexual (5%), Asexual (7%), Queer (17%), and No Response (1%). For each question related to identity markers, participants were able to select all that applied, meaning that percentages may sum to above 100%. For educational attainment, participants selected Completed High School (7%), In College (73%), Received a Trade Certificate/Associate's Degree (3%), and Received a Bachelor's or higher (17%). This study was granted ethical approval by the university's institutional review board (IRB #25010). A convenience sample of individuals was gathered from social media platforms and from flyers distributed at local colleges and universities in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. Individuals who agreed to participate were asked to follow a link to an online survey on Qualtrics.com. Participants were first prompted with an informed consent form that required checked verification that the individual consented to taking the survey. After providing informed consent, participants filled out demographic information and the survey measures used for this study, taking approximately 5–10 minutes to complete. A debrief page was presented at the end to inform participants of how their survey data would be used. Identifying information was not taken to maintain participant anonymity, and participants were not compensated but were thanked for their valuable contribution. Measures Family Distancing To date, no statistically validated quantitative measures exist that assess behaviors related to the steps individuals take to distance themselves from family members. Previous studies have used binarized measures, deducing from open-ended responses whether participants qualify as "estranged" (e.g., Gilligan et al., 2015; Hank, 2024 ), and have tended to include more items capturing emotional closeness than actions individuals take to distance themselves from family members. To develop a more robust understanding of actions and behaviors related to family distancing, this study created a set of 11 Likert-type questions that aimed to assess the degree to which an adult has distanced themselves from their family of origin (see Appendix A). The questions were modeled after the findings of a qualitative study (Scharp, 2017 ) that used a grounded theory approach to understand emergent themes in the lived experiences of family distancing. The mechanisms of family distancing according to Scharp ( 2017 ) are: Decreasing meaningful contact; Reducing amount of contact; Moving away; Staying away; Decreasing feeling; Increasing negative affect; Holding on to negative affect; Reducing relationship effort; Ignoring role expectations; Delegitimizing; Taking legal action. Each question reflects one of these distinct mechanisms of family distancing. Tests via factor analysis were used to ensure that each item fit within one construct (described in the results section). This measure asked participants to rate their agreement with each statement on a scale of 1 ( not at all ) to 4 ( completely ). The final measure used for analysis yielded strong internal consistency (𝛼 = .94). Differentiation of Self To measure DoS, the Differentiation of Self Inventory–Short Form (DSI-SF; Drake et al., 2015 ) was used. This survey measure intends to assess an individual's level of self-differentiation across four subscales: emotional cutoff (EC), emotional reactivity (ER), I-position (IP), and fusion with others (FO). See Skowron and Friedlander ( 1998 ) for a detailed theoretical account of each subscale's construct of interest. An example EC question includes, “When one of my relationships becomes very intense, I feel the urge to run away from it.” An example ER question includes, “At times my feelings get the best of me and I have trouble thinking clearly.” An example IP question includes, "I usually do not change my behavior simply to please another person." An example FO question includes, “When someone criticizes me, it bothers me for days.” Participants answered questions on a Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all true of me ) to 6 ( very true of me ). Cronbach's alpha coefficients were acceptable for each subscale (EC, 𝛼 = .76; ER, 𝛼 = .83; IP, 𝛼 = .78; FO, 𝛼 = .81), evidencing strong internal consistency. Social Supports To measure the quality and value of extrafamilial social supports that individuals currently have, a portion of the Adult Toolbox Social Relations Scales (ATSRS, Cyranowski et al., 2013 ) were used. These scales assess aspects of social support and companionship for adults. This scale originally contains three components: 1) Social Support; 2) Companionship; 3) Social Distress. To better fit the purposes of this study, only the Social Support subscale and the Friendship component of the Companionship subscale were used. The items were collapsed into one aggregate measure to assess overall levels of perceived social supports. In addition to the instructions provided in the measure, participants were asked to only consider non-family members when answering the questions. An example question includes, "I have friends I get together with to relax." Participants rated items on a 5-point frequency scale ranging from 1 ( never ) to 5 ( always ). Internal consistency was good for the overall scale (𝛼 = .92), indicating strong internal consistency for use. Results Preliminary Analysis Family Distancing Measure Validation Ten out of the 11 items created for use in the family distancing measure were assessed via factor analysis to explore the theoretical alignment of potential latent factors within the measure. One item (" Have you ever taken legal steps to distance yourself from certain household members? ) had to be preemptively dropped because only nine participants selected responses above 0, which distorted the measure's statistical validity. First, a preliminary Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin test for factor adequacy was performed and yielded a sampling adequacy score of .91, indicating measure covariance and hence strong suitability for factor analysis. Next, an exploratory factor analysis with oblique rotation was conducted to test the factor structure of the measure. Exploratory factor analysis was chosen as the first analytic step instead of confirmatory factor analysis to explore the open-ended possibility that additional latent factors were present, rather than testing the hypothesis that the measure is characterized by one single factor. The analysis revealed a three-factor structure (see Appendix A), explaining 76.1% of the measure's total variance (TLI = .965, RMSEA = .082, SRMR = .028, p = .003). Items 1–6 were placed under a factor of distancing actions (37.7% variance explained), items 7 and 8 were placed under a factor of emotional disconnect (18.8% variance explained), and items 9 and 10 were placed under a factor of rumination (17.6% variance explained). Since the primary aim of the measure was to capture behavioral aspects of family distancing, items under rumination were eliminated because they seemed to exist as a distinct theoretical concept from the distancing actions factor. Item 7 from the emotional disconnect factor was also eliminated for theoretical inconsistency, but item 8 was collapsed into the distancing actions factor because it still explained 37% of the factor's variance and seemed to be more theoretically aligned with distancing actions overall. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted as a final step to ensure adequate validity when collapsing the measure into a final 7-item, single-factor structure. The results indicated that the measure increased in validity compared to the original 10-item, 3-factor structure (CFI = .987, RMSEA = .072, SRMR = .026, p < .001). Item fit for the final measure was also more consistent, ranging from .57 to .96, and yielded a final Cronbach's 𝛼 score of .934, indicating high internal consistency for a final 7-item measure. Demographic Covariates For demographic analysis, one-way ANOVAs were run to test whether there were significant mean differences in the study variables between groups per each demographic. For participant age, however, Pearson correlation coefficients were performed to examine the association between age and each study variable; age was found to be significantly associated with family distancing, r (110) = .261, p = .005 and was included as a covariate in the primary analysis. The only significantly varying demographic was educational attainment, in which the variable was binarized (currently in college vs. not currently in college) to narrow in on the unique social dynamics of college campuses. Two sample t-tests for each study variable were conducted for college vs. non-college students, findings significant results for each variable (Family Distancing, t (48.27) = -2.43, p = .019; DoS, t (54.17) = 2.83, p = .006; Social Supports, t (41.91) = 2.40, p = .021), suggesting that college students reported higher quality relationships overall with less family distancing, higher DoS levels, and more social supports. Given this substantial difference, the research questions were studied in the context of college students in addition to analysis of the full sample. Primary Analysis RQ1: “What is the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self?” To explore the first research question, regression analyses were performed to assess how family distancing would predict each DoS subscale. A summary of the study variables can be found in Appendix B. The correlations were generally significant as expected; each DoS subscale was significantly intercorrelated and higher family distancing was significantly associated with poorer differentiation of self for two subscales (EC, r = − .38; ER, r = − .29) and fewer social supports ( r = − .39). Higher differentiation was also significantly associated with more social supports (EC, r = .40; ER, r = .29; IP, r = .35). However, the fusion with others subscale was not associated with family distancing nor social supports, and I-position was only significantly associated with social supports. A series of linear regression models were constructed for each DoS subscale, with family distancing as the predictor and DoS as the outcome variable. The models for the full sample showed that family distancing negatively but weakly predicts emotional cutoff ( R 2 = .156, F (1,119) = 21.92, p < .001), emotional reactivity ( R 2 = .073, F (1,119) = 9.35, p = .002), and fusion with others ( R 2 = .034, F (1,119) = 4.22, p = .042). The model for I-position was not significant. One concern with these findings was that the family distancing variable was not normally distributed, given that its distribution was strongly right-skewed. While prior research on statistical bias in the outcomes of regression models using non-normally distributed data has suggested that non-normality does not influence linear regression model construction (Schmidt & Finan, 2018), non-normality did still raise concern about potential heteroscedasticity. Thus, a Breusch-Pagan test for heteroscedasticity was run to ensure that the variance was consistent for family distancing across all levels of each outcome variable. The test only yielded significant results for EC (Breusch-Pagan ꭓ 2 (2) = 14.86, p < .001). To account for heteroscedasticity in the EC model, the model was retested using bootstrapping with 1000 simulated resamples to test whether the model was biased. The results indicated that bias accounted for only a -0.002 shift in the EC model's beta coefficient (bootstrapped 95% CI = -0.788, -0.248), suggesting that heteroscedasticity did not skew the results in any meaningful way. When separating the sample based on educational status, family distancing only predicted emotional cutoff for college students ( R 2 = .110, F (1,87) = 11.86, p < .001). The same result was true for participants not attending college, such that family distancing only predicted emotional cutoff once again ( R 2 = .116, F (1,31) = 5.22, p < .01). Both models were tested for heteroscedasticity given that splitting participants into subgroups inevitably creates new sampling distributions, but non-significant results for the Breusch-Pagan tests indicated constant variance across both distributions. RQ2: “What role do social supports play in the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self?” To explore the role social supports play in the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self, moderation analysis was conducted with each DoS subscale. The moderation models tested a DoS subscale as the outcome variable, and family distancing, social supports, and a distancing ✕ supports interaction as the predictor variables. For the full sample, no significant moderation was observed for any of the four DoS subscales. However, adding educational status to the model to test a distancing ✕ supports ✕ college interaction yielded a significant result for the EC subscale ( R 2 = .412, F (7,114) = 11.43, p < .001). A nested model comparison was then performed using a one-way ANOVA to test whether the increase in R 2 was statistically significant compared to the EC subscale model using the two-way interaction. The result was significant ( F (115,114) = 22.92, ΔR 2 = .118, p < .001). Separate moderation models were constructed for college students versus non-college students to probe the direction of each effect since education was a binarized variable. For college students ( n = 89), social supports significantly moderated the relationship between family distancing and emotional cutoff (see Appendix C) between family distancing and social supports in the relationship between family distancing and emotional cutoff ( R 2 = .340, F (3,29) = 14.60, p = .017). The interaction was positive ( β = 0.437), such that those with higher social supports reported higher EC levels when distancing themselves from their families. For participants who were not currently attending college ( n = 33), the interaction (see Appendix D) was also significant ( R 2 = .432, F (3,29) = 7.35, p < .001). The beta coefficient for this interaction was negative ( β = -0.846), such that those with lower social supports reported higher EC levels when distancing themselves from their families. Simple slopes and Johnson-Neyman intervals were analyzed on the two moderation models separated by educational status to examine the effect of family distancing on DoS at low (-1 SD), average, and high (+ 1 SD) levels of social supports, as well as the significance of these effects. These analyses were conducted using the "interactions" package in R. For the model testing the moderation of social supports for college students, the only significant slope was − 1 SD ( b = -0.49, SE = 0.15, p < .01). The slope at the mean was marginally significant ( b = -0.22, SE = 0.12, p = .08). These findings indicate that the moderation for college students primarily takes place when social supports are particularly low. As for the model representing participants not attending college, the slopes for the mean ( b = -0.67, SE = 0.22, p = .01) and + 1 SD ( b = -1.50, SE = 0.33, p < .01) were significant. For non-college students, high social supports appeared to contribute the most to the moderation effect. Discussion This is the one of the first studies to quantitatively assess family distancing from a family-systemic perspective, exploring the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self (DoS). Additionally, this study examined how social supports beyond the family play a role in the relationship between family distancing and DoS. It is occasionally necessary for individuals to establish significant physical and emotional boundaries between themselves and the family of origin, especially when facing marginalization or abuse. However, very little research has explored the mechanisms by which individuals may still be able to maintain close, healthy relationships while remaining distanced from their families of origin. This study was guided by a buffering hypothesis to explore whether individuals with high social support would be able to remain highly differentiated while engaging in practices of family distancing. The study’s hypotheses were partially supported, and with caveats. The results offered evidence to support the first hypothesis that family distancing would predict lower self-differentiation; however, diverging from our original hypotheses, only the emotional cutoff, emotional reactivity, and fusion subscales yielded significance. As for the second hypothesis, the results offered evidence that social supports moderate the negative association between family distancing and differentiation of self; however, the direction of this moderation depended on educational status: for college students, as social supports increased, differentiation remained high in the face of family distancing, while those not in college saw significantly lower self-differentiation as they distanced themselves further from the family of origin. Support for the first hypothesis suggests that as individuals create more active physical boundaries between themselves and family members, they tend to exhibit poorer self-differentiation in the dimension of emotional cutoff. This finding aligns with prior research suggesting an association between family distancing and poor psychological well-being (Hank, 2024 ). DoS adds a layer of nuance, however, in suggesting that the emotional tension of family distancing may shape how individuals engage in close interpersonal relationships. Previous findings have suggested that poor differentiation is associated with more strenuous interpersonal relationships (e.g., Choi & Murdock, 2017 ; Skowron, 2000 ), and the findings from this study suggest that family distancing may be one mechanism by which poor differentiation manifests. Interestingly, emotional cutoff was the strongest predictor of DoS, suggesting further that individuals who are highly distanced from the family of origin most primarily act on high levels of distress by shutting down emotionally and disengaging from social relationships. The finding that family distancing may contribute to poorer differentiation also adds to current literature on family distancing by helping to explain the central tension of family distancing, that it is simultaneously emotionally expensive and necessary to reclaim a personal sense of identity. However, a couple theoretical considerations must be kept in mind. First, a reminder that family distancing does not necessarily cause low self-differentiation. Indeed, the low self-differentiation reported by those highly distanced from their family is more probable to have developed from a history of poor parent-child relationships throughout the individual’s childhood and adolescence, as per the research suggesting that poor parent-child bonds in younger years predict poor differentiation (e.g., Freeman & Almond, 2009, Lampis et al., 2025 ). Second, although differentiation of self is associated with poor psychological well-being, the construct alone is not a direct measure of psychological well-being. These considerations clarify that family distancing does not necessarily make a person more poorly differentiated, nor is family distancing necessarily psychologically damaging. Rather, we would speculate that the findings could indicate that the need for an individual to distance themselves from the family of origin may stem from some drive towards personal agency that has been stifled by their current family dynamics. That is, family distancing may present itself as an opportunity for some individuals to take conscious, deliberate steps to “force” a differentiated self, adding insight to the reasons why an individual may find it necessary to enact distanced family boundaries. This interpretation invites future research to explore differentiation of self longitudinally, beginning from the time when individuals decide to establish clear boundaries between themselves and their families of origin. As for the second research question, the study found that social supports moderate the relationship between family distancing and differentiation, but the nature of this moderation depends on educational status. As participants increasingly established family distance, social supports appeared to offer a buffering effect on emotional cutoff scores for individuals attending college but seemed to worsen emotional cutoff scores for individuals not attending college. From a sociocultural perspective, these findings make sense; a possible explanation for this finding is the fact that this study’s full sample was from the United States. Individuals belonging to Western society have become increasingly dependent on educational institutions to develop and sustain strong and emotionally close relationships with others. Research in educational studies (e.g., Diaz-Diaz, 2023 ; Richerme, 2022 ) has suggested that, over the past couple of decades, students have been socialized by a variety of policy measures pertaining to emotional intelligence and competencies geared towards developing social skills (often termed “21st century skills”). However these developmental goals are often shaped by individualistic values of academic and economic success, what scholars have called "cognitive capitalism" (e.g., Morgan, 2016 ). It makes sense, then, that close emotional relationships only buffer the potential effects of family distancing on self-differentiation within educational institutions, and that individuals who may no longer access these institutions could struggle to sustain emotionally-close relationships. If this is the case, these findings perhaps suggest that the capacity to sustain non-familial close relationships has become institutionalized, signaling an urgent demand for psychological discourse to acknowledge how social relationships are conceptualized within and shaped by institutional contexts from a critical perspective. Another explanation for this multiple-level moderation effect is the likely fact that individuals distance themselves from their families of origin for a variety of reasons. Recognizing the lack of causal evidence in this study, it is indeed possible that individuals who are highly differentiated may have enacted family distancing due to problems less closely related to stressful or abusive relationships, such as political disagreement or lack of identity-based acceptance. In this case, the individuals who were highly distanced from their families yet highly differentiated may have been raised in a healthy family environment yet still felt the need to establish robust boundaries, and this higher differentiation may explain why these individuals reported higher social supports. However, this explanation is not particularly helpful for the non-college sample. Perhaps non-college students were more likely to be married or cohabitating, which the social supports measure did not explicitly test. Of course, it is also possible that this result was caused by the large difference in sample size for college students ( n = 89) versus non-college students ( n = 33), leading to a higher likelihood of random variability in the non-college sample. While the bootstrapped regression models helped reduce the possibility of skewed results due to low sample size, random variability is still a possibility and should be recognized in future research. Regardless, more research is needed to explore the ways social supports assist individuals who are highly distanced from their families. An important consideration when interpreting these results is whether it is appropriate to claim that social supports buffer “poor differentiation” despite yielding significance for only one DoS subscale, emotional cutoff. One speculation is that the specific types of conflict within the family system could contribute to the ways in which poor self-differentiation manifests. In this context, the findings would suggest that individuals who enact and sustain physical or communicative boundaries between themselves and their family of origin may respond to interpersonal conflict with others in similar ways. Scant writing has discussed the unique ways certain aspects of poor differentiation arise, and this is one avenue for future research. What types of behaviors within the family system could contribute to, for example, higher emotional cutoff but less emotional reactivity? How does DoS as a personality construct help us understand individual differences in emotional temperament? Research has already suggested gendered and cultural differences in the experience of poor differentiation (e.g., Chung & Gale, 2006 ; Peleg, 2008 ; Skowron & Friedlander, 1998 ), thus evidencing a contextual nature of DoS that little theorization has explained. In fact, this idea contrasts starkly from Murray Bowen's (1978) original claims that DoS universally describes the psychological operations facilitating intimate social relationships. In any case, more work could engage with this claim that conflict behaviors in the family of origin may shape how individuals manage conflict in relationships outside the family system. Unrelated to the hypotheses, a highlight of this study was the good reliability of the family distancing measure. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that each item fit quite well and did not create an abundance of multicollinearity. Moreover, the internal consistency score of the final measure indicated a high level of consistent intercorrelations across each item, which is ideal for a single-scale measure. Replication of this measure for more diverse samples is recommended, although in its current state it is best served for individuals who would say that, on average, they are distanced or estranged from their families to begin with. To increase generalizability, counterbalancing items may be recommended to offset the measure's observed right-skewness and increase normality. While this study’s use of bootstrapping in the regression analysis reduced the potential impact of skewness, future studies should consider modifying the measure to increase its reliability. Despite the study's revelations, limitations were certainly present. Most primarily, over three quarters of the sample consisted of college students with relatively little diversity. Specifically, the large presence of college students limited the analysis of the study variables due to the lower variance overall of each variable compared to non-college students. While this sample characteristic was helpful for studying college students specifically, analysis of non-college students was limited. Future research should consider the wider variability in lifestyles of individuals outside of college, including age, employment status and type, educational attainment, etc. The measure used for assessing social supports in this study also presented itself as a limitation when it came to interpretation of the findings. While the measure used for this study (ATSRS, Cyranowski et al., 2013 ) was helpful for general insight into individuals' networks of social support beyond the family of origin, the scale's scope was limited in its capacity to understand the structure of those social networks. A limitation for interpretation of the findings is that this study did not examine any explicit measures of psychological well-being. While differentiation of self is associated with well-being, it is not a standalone measure of well-being. Given this limitation, the lived experiences of family distancing very well may be that of healing and progress, and this study does not capture this nuance directly. With these limitations in mind, future research ought to consider a more granular approach to exploring the role social supports play in how individuals handle poor family functioning—qualitative approaches may continue to excel here, at least until a more comprehensive narrative of individuals' experiences with family distancing is documented. Moreover, future research must continue to consider analyses of kinship that take up non-heteronormative conceptions of family as well as an analysis guided by Kimberlé Crenshaw's (1991) writings on the intersectional identities and marginalization of black women. These analyses are especially crucial for a comprehensive account of the asymmetrical power differentials that arise out of contemporary kinship practices documented by writers in queer-of-color critique (e.g., Muñoz, 2009 ). This future work is imperative for theorizing new ways to support individuals of whom the nuclear model of family functioning has failed. To return to the age-old phrase, “blood runs thicker than water,” it seems that this sentiment does not always hold up. While family distancing was found to be associated with lower self-differentiation, social supports appeared to be a moderator in this relationship. Given that this moderator only acts as a buffer for individuals in college, the findings suggest that not everybody has access to the types of social supports that would seem necessary when one embarks on the emotionally tumultuous process of family distancing or estrangement. This revelation is important to keep in mind when developing clinical, organizational, and community level interventions for those who have strained relationships with their family of origin. Declarations Author Contribution D.A. was the sole author for this article and performed all authorship contributions. Acknowledgement A special thank you to my senior thesis advisor, Keira B. Leneman, for letting me run wild with this project. 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Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-6822047","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":466712445,"identity":"38bd18fe-05bf-4cb2-a1a7-9e0d312d9d51","order_by":0,"name":"David A. 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Extrafamilial Social Supports as a Moderator in the Relationship between Family Distancing and Differentiation of Self","fulltext":[{"header":"Introduction","content":"\u003cp\u003eThe phrase \u0026ldquo;blood runs thicker than water\u0026rdquo; has been interpreted in American culture to highlight the immense value of biological family. Today, many believe that the family of origin is held together by unconditional bonds stronger than those of any other interpersonal relationships. Trailing back as early as Freud\u0026rsquo;s (1900) conception of the Oedipus complex, theoretical and empirical work across the discipline of psychology has long been interested in how family ties are not only difficult to completely sever but also seem to play a key role in lifespan development. Murray Bowen (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e) followed this work by pioneering a systems-based approach to family functioning. This approach introduced the idea that an individual\u0026rsquo;s psychological functioning must be understood in context with interpersonal and emotional dynamics permeating the family unit. Bowen's family systems theory (BFST) therefore posits that humans, even while developing a solid sense of self and individuality, are nonetheless inexorably emotionally bound to the family of origin (Bowen, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eDespite BFST\u0026rsquo;s emphasis on a healthy family unit for positive psychological functioning in individuals, more recent attention has been allocated to models of family or kinship that do not rely on ties to the family of origin. Scholars have begun suggesting that family ties are conditional, and that family distancing can sometimes be necessary for an individual to preserve safety and well-being (Scharp, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR38\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2019\u003c/span\u003e). Family distancing pertains to the steps that one may take to weaken their level of involvement in the family (Scharp \u0026amp; Dorrance Hall, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e), characterized by behaviors such as geographical distancing and excommunication. Individuals may distance themselves from the family of origin due to factors such as emotional tension and dissatisfaction with the relationship, among others. While research on the lived experiences of family distancing have suggested that the distancing process can be profoundly troubling for parents whose children have estranged them (Agllias, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR1\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2013\u003c/span\u003e), it has simultaneously suggested that the process can offer relief, healing, and growth for the adult children (Agllias, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe work in family distancing research contrasts with theoretical claims made by BFST: when an individual engages in emotional cutoff with the family of origin, Bowen (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e) would suggest that they have left with an unresolved emotional attachment that \u0026ldquo;fuses\u0026rdquo; them to the family system, informing how they engage emotionally with others throughout the lifespan. The fused individual is said to then possess a less secure sense of their own emotions and emotional needs, resorting to deriving them from other individuals. This contrast demonstrates a complex and nuanced nature of family ties that has yet to be fully understood. Aiming to acquire a deeper understanding of these complex family ties, this study will investigate how family distancing is associated with individuals\u0026rsquo; ability to develop a solid sense of self using principal constructs offered by BFST. Furthermore, it will examine whether extrafamilial social supports may aid the process of differentiation from the family of origin.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eFamily Distancing\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA variety of terms have described individuals who establish emotional and/or physical distance between themselves and the family of origin, but not much is known about the psychological effects of family distancing. One review (Scharp \u0026amp; Dorrance Hall, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e) presented three types of family distancing based on differences in the family dynamics that might contribute to a person's desire to distance themselves: first, \"family member marginalization\" describes a dynamic in which an individual feels excluded for being an outcast or a 'black sheep' in the family, often resulting in the individual distancing themselves to escape disapproval. Second, parent-child alienation occurs when parents directly or indirectly perform behaviors that make their child feel as though they were rejected by the parent, resulting in resentment or hatred felt towards the parent by the child. Third, parent-child estrangement denotes the event of a family member constructing boundaries to physically distance themself, oftentimes to escape emotional abuse. In this study, the term \"family distancing\" was chosen as the construct of interest to denote behaviors that define the strength of the physical and communicative boundaries that an individual may have with their family of origin.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003ePrevious research has revealed a complex relationship between family distancing and psychological well-being. Hank (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e) explored how a binary measurement of family estrangement was associated with participants\u0026rsquo; scores of life satisfaction and depression for adults who distanced themselves from their parents and/or siblings. The study found that those who reported \u0026ldquo;Yes\u0026rdquo; to having estranged families reported lower levels of life satisfaction and higher levels of depression. This study emphasizes that one form of family distancing (estrangement) is linked to poorer mental health outcomes. Considering that this study was not longitudinal or experimental in design, the results cannot determine that distanced family relationships are causally related to poor psychological well-being. Further, the study only assessed family distancing on a binary measure, preventing nuanced exploration of family distancing as a construct. Other research has suggested that family distancing can potentially bring about positive outcomes for some individuals. A qualitative study (Agllias, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e) looked at family distancing by performing in-depth interviews on participants who experienced estrangement from their parents throughout their lives. The interviews revealed that while estrangement can contribute to grief, ambiguous loss, or trauma, it can also provide a sense of relief, healing, and growth for individuals who feel estrangement is necessary. These results suggest that individuals who distance themselves from the family of origin experience a complex array of emotions through the distancing process.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec3\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eDifferentiation of Self\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo better understand how family distancing informs relationships outside the family of origin, this study will also examine differentiation of self (DoS), a foundational concept within BFST that describes the extent to which individuals can psychologically distinguish themselves from the rest of the family unit (Titelman, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR47\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2014\u003c/span\u003e). DoS is believed to be a process extending across the lifespan, beginning with the idea that everyone grapples with the inherent tension between intimacy with others and independent autonomy. Individuals are said to be completely \u0026ldquo;fused\u0026rdquo; with their family at birth, becoming more solidly differentiated as they develop an emotionally distinct sense of self beyond their family, in part depending on how individual family members are able to resist responding to stress in the family system with destructive behaviors. Theoretical work has suggested that individuals obtain their DoS levels from the degree to which they are involved in their parents\u0026rsquo; emotions through the lifespan, typically called the intergenerational family transmission process (Bowen, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e; Calatrava et al., 2019; J\u0026oacute;zefczyk, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e). Children who are more wrapped up in their parents\u0026rsquo; emotions are said to develop poor differentiation because they struggle to develop their own sense of personal and emotional autonomy. However, only weak and inconclusive evidence supports the developmental and intergenerational aspects of DoS (Calatrava et al., 2019; J\u0026oacute;zefczyk, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e). More clarity is thus needed regarding factors that contribute to an individual\u0026rsquo;s self-differentiation.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eHighly differentiated individuals are also believed to possess a stronger capability to distinguish between rational and emotional thoughts so that their emotions do not overtake their interpersonal behaviors (Bowen, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e; Kerr \u0026amp; Bowen, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR23\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1988\u003c/span\u003e). Accordingly, research has conceptualized DoS to include both intrapsychic and interpersonal domains of functioning: intrapsychic functioning is exhibited by emotional reactivity (the degree to which an individual reacts based on emotions rather than rationality) and I-position (an individual\u0026rsquo;s ability to hold clear beliefs and convictions that are not overshadowed or dictated by others). Interpersonal functioning is exhibited by emotional cutoff (the degree to which one avoids expressing emotions to others) and fusion with others (the degree to which an individual\u0026rsquo;s emotions are overtaken or determined by others). While family distancing pertains to intentional actions related to family dynamics, DoS remains within the psychological domain, pertaining to individual psychological and emotional processes that influence family dynamics. Differentiation is ultimately about an individual\u0026rsquo;s capacity to develop a solid sense of self that can maintain intimate closeness with others without losing sight of their own emotional needs and personal agency.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAccording to Bowen (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1978\u003c/span\u003e), a highly differentiated self is needed for one\u0026rsquo;s ability to manage the stress of everyday life and adaptively navigate interpersonal tension. Much of the research in BFST has studied DoS by focusing on how it is associated with various measures of psychological well-being (e.g., Lampis et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR24\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e; Murdock \u0026amp; Gore, Jr., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR30\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2004\u003c/span\u003e; Sandage et al., 2010). For example, Murdock \u0026amp; Gore, Jr. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR30\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2004\u003c/span\u003e) explored how individuals cope with life stress depending on their DoS levels, finding that highly differentiated participants used more effective coping strategies to manage perceived stress. Moreover, research has also explored how DoS is related to interpersonal dynamics (e.g., Choi \u0026amp; Murdock, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e; Kaleta \u0026amp; Mr\u0026oacute;z, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR22\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e; Skowron et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR45\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2009\u003c/span\u003e). One study (Choi \u0026amp; Murdock, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e) evaluated how participants\u0026rsquo; DoS levels were associated with expressions of anger and their tendencies to engage in interpersonal conflict, finding that anger expressed outwardly to others was a partial mediator in the relationship between low DoS and interpersonal conflict. These findings indicate that DoS contributes to individuals' ability to express their emotions during conflict in ways that are productive to the relationship. Several studies (e.g., Bartle-Haring \u0026amp; Lal, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR6\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2010\u003c/span\u003e; Peleg, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR32\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2008\u003c/span\u003e; Skowron, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR43\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2000\u003c/span\u003e) have also explored how DoS shapes marital relationships, suggesting that higher DoS levels among both partners in married couples are associated with higher marital satisfaction. These findings could mean that DoS plays a role in supporting positive intimate relationships. The sum of this research suggests that DoS is closely related to how individuals navigate emotional and interpersonal dynamics.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eFamily Distancing and Differentiation of Self\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA theoretical tension between family distancing and DoS regards whether distancing can break someone free from a problematic family system. On the one hand, an individual who enacts family distancing displays a relatively high level of agency over their own emotional needs. On the other hand, the literature on DoS would suggest that leaving the family creates unresolved emotional tensions that keep the individual involved in the family system. One recent study (McKnight, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e) reviewed the overlap between family estrangement and BFST. It evaluated the conceptual difference between family distancing practices and the dimension of self-differentiation related to emotional cutoff, which describes the degree to which one feels threatened by emotional intimacy with others, resorting to 'shutting down\u0026rsquo; emotionally. The study concluded that the major paradigmatic differences lie in the fact that family distancing reflects the sometimes-necessary process of taking back agency in one\u0026rsquo;s family relationships through intentional actions, while emotional cutoff reflects the unavoidable psychological fusion that comes alongside responding to tension in one\u0026rsquo;s family unit via emotional avoidance. The study also identified that empirical research has yet to directly explore the relationship between the two constructs. Thus, while findings in family distancing research conceptualize severed family ties as potentially healthy, BFST conceptualizes them as a paradox in which emotional cutoff is a response to excessive fusion. It is clear from the literature that these distinctions lack empirical attention.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAligning with the conclusions of McKnight (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e), only one study (Rovers, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR36\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1998\u003c/span\u003e) has attempted to assess the relationship between family distancing and DoS. The study explored how Roman Catholic seminary students leave the family of origin by examining the relationship between DoS and a multiple-choice selection of reasons an individual might leave home. Results showed that individuals who selected that they left the home of their family of origin \u0026ldquo;just to get out of the house\u0026rdquo; reported significantly lower DoS levels than the other reasons which included going to university, seminary, or work. However, this study is significantly limited by the fact that it included a narrow sample and only considered a select few reasons why one might leave one\u0026rsquo;s family. It nonetheless suggests that DoS could play a role in how individuals distance themselves from the family of origin. The findings also offer a contrasting view to the research (Agllias, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e) that has suggested family distancing is in some ways associated with positive well-being. The uncertainty surrounding these findings signals a need to more closely examine how family distancing is related to individuals\u0026rsquo; DoS levels.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eSome research has suggested that poor quality family relationships themselves may predict poorer DoS levels. For example, Wei et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR49\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2005\u003c/span\u003e) explored how affect regulation differed in response to interpersonal problems, depending on attachment style. In this study, the types of affect regulation studied were the emotional cutoff and emotional reactivity subscales of DoS, although the study was not guided by a BFST framework. The relevant findings from this study were that attachment anxiety predicted poorer emotional reactivity, and attachment avoidance predicted emotional cutoff. Given that attachment research has suggested an individual's attachment styles are informed primarily by an individual's relationship with their caregivers through childhood (Ainsworth et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2015\u003c/span\u003e), these findings potentially reveal that an unstable relationship with the family of origin may be negatively associated with DoS.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eSocial Supports beyond the Family: A Potential Moderator?\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt may be possible that individuals find ways to \u0026lsquo;replace\u0026rsquo; their family of origin with other positive social relationships when family distancing is necessary to preserve physical and psychological safety. Previous writing has given this idea terms such as \"found family\" and \"chosen family\" (Schoenike \u0026amp; Schoenike, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR41\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). While the research seems to suggest that individuals who distance themselves from the family of origin may have lower DoS levels, the literature centers on a normative conception of nuclear family that does not consider other forms of kinship. Scholarship beyond psychology (e.g., Andreassen, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR4\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e; Plaster, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR33\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e; Shange, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR42\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2019\u003c/span\u003e) has documented stories and theorizations about non-normative families and intimacies, exploring the ways in which relationships can manifest outside the nuclear family model, typically consisting of two parents and multiple children living under one household. Notably, the conception of queer kinship (Weston, 1997) demarcates the fact that queer folks often form their own conceptions of family beyond the heteronormative nuclear family model that has been critiqued (Freeman, 2010) for enforcing a normative timeline of lifespan development on individuals and society. Therefore, the existence of sustainable alternative family models indicates that maintaining sustainable ties with the family-of-origin may not be absolutely necessary for an individual\u0026rsquo;s psychological development or well-being, despite claims made by BFST.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn tandem with research exploring alternative models of social bonding, empirical studies have overwhelmingly supported peer social supports outside the family of origin as a source of positive well-being. This work began with a foundational study (Cohen \u0026amp; Wills, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR12\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1985\u003c/span\u003e) that introduced a buffering hypothesis of social supports, suggesting that social supports are not merely associated with positive well-being but instead protect individuals from the harmful effects of overly stressful events and circumstances. In this context, social supports are defined as extrafamilial interpersonal relationships which offer someone psychological and material support to promote their well-being. More recent research (e.g., Brunsting et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR9\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e; Major et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR26\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e; Richard et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR34\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e; van der Horst \u0026amp; Coff\u0026eacute;, 2011) has offered clear support of the buffering hypothesis. For example, one study (Richard et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR34\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e) conducted a meta-analysis that explored the effects of peer support on the mental health of young adults. The study reviewed 17 articles after filtering via search criteria, finding that peer supports during young adulthood are positively associated with mental health benefits and negatively associated with loneliness, depression, and anxiety. This age group is particularly salient given that emerging adults have been viewed as undergoing a transition period away from the household (Arnett, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR5\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2000\u003c/span\u003e). Another study (van der Horst \u0026amp; Coff\u0026eacute;, 2021) explored how friendship was associated with psychological well-being, finding that higher frequency of contact and number of friends were associated with decreased stress. Overall, this evidence suggests that social supports can contribute positively to an individual\u0026rsquo;s well-being.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eFamily Distancing, Differentiation of Self, and Social Supports\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSince social supports have been shown to act as a buffer against the negative effects of stress on psychological well-being, it seems intuitive to believe social supports may also buffer against the hypothesized negative effect of family distancing on DoS. This additional hypothesis aligns with previous research (Parra et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR31\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e; Smith et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR46\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e) that suggested social supports play a role in the relationship between forms of distanced family relationships and psychological well-being. One relevant study (Parra et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR31\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e) examined the influence of peer social support on the relationship between family rejection and psychosocial adjustment for lesbian, gay, and bisexual emerging adults. The results demonstrated a moderating effect, showing that individuals who had been rejected by their family reported poor psychosocial adjustment, but only when they lacked peer social supports. Rather than studying individuals who took intentional action to set up familial boundaries, this study only explored how individuals whose families had rejected their sexual orientation. In terms of outcomes, the study only examined measures of well-being such as depression, anxiety, and internalized homophobia. Still, these findings lend support to the hypothesized notion of a buffering effect of social supports on DoS, given that higher DoS has been linked to positive well-being (e.g., Murdock \u0026amp; Gore, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR30\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2004\u003c/span\u003e). A gap still exists, though, in understanding how social supports and DoS are related to the way individuals take agency in how they relate to their family of origin.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eThe Present Study\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTaken together, this study aims to explore the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self (DoS). Based on the literature which suggests breaking family ties can be necessary yet emotionally expensive (Agllias, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e), this study is guided by the hypothesis that individuals who are more highly distanced from their families may be more poorly differentiated. Furthermore, this study aims to test whether social supports moderate the relationship between family distancing and DoS, given its previous empirical support as protector against the psychological effects of problematic family relationships. The study hypothesizes that similar effects may be found for individuals\u0026rsquo; DoS levels, such that social supports may buffer against poor self-differentiation. The overarching goal is to explore how relationships beyond the family of origin may assist individuals in forming a solid sense of self.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Method","content":"\u003cdiv id=\"Sec8\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec9\" class=\"Section3\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eParticipants and Procedure\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eA total of 122 individuals aged 18 and above (\u003cem\u003eM\u003c/em\u003e\u003csub\u003eage\u003c/sub\u003e = 21.61, \u003cem\u003eSD\u003c/em\u003e\u003csub\u003eage\u003c/sub\u003e = 2.82) who currently resided in the United States were recruited to participate in this study. For racial identity, participants selected White (75%), Asian (10%), Hispanic or Latino/a/x, or originating from Latin American descent (9%), Other (4%), Black or African American (3%), Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (3%), and Native/Indigenous American or Alaska Native (1%). For gender identity, participants selected Male (21%), Female (64%), Genderqueer/Fluid/Non-binary (10%), Transgender (4%), and No Response (1%). For sexual orientation, participants selected Straight (25%), Bisexual (34%), Lesbian/Gay (17%), Pansexual (5%), Asexual (7%), Queer (17%), and No Response (1%). For each question related to identity markers, participants were able to select all that applied, meaning that percentages may sum to above 100%. For educational attainment, participants selected Completed High School (7%), In College (73%), Received a Trade Certificate/Associate's Degree (3%), and Received a Bachelor's or higher (17%).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e This study was granted ethical approval by the university's institutional review board (IRB #25010). A convenience sample of individuals was gathered from social media platforms and from flyers distributed at local colleges and universities in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. Individuals who agreed to participate were asked to follow a link to an online survey on Qualtrics.com. Participants were first prompted with an informed consent form that required checked verification that the individual consented to taking the survey. After providing informed consent, participants filled out demographic information and the survey measures used for this study, taking approximately 5\u0026ndash;10 minutes to complete. A debrief page was presented at the end to inform participants of how their survey data would be used. Identifying information was not taken to maintain participant anonymity, and participants were not compensated but were thanked for their valuable contribution.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \n\u003ch3\u003eMeasures\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cdiv id=\"Sec11\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eFamily Distancing\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo date, no statistically validated quantitative measures exist that assess behaviors related to the steps individuals take to distance themselves from family members. Previous studies have used binarized measures, deducing from open-ended responses whether participants qualify as \"estranged\" (e.g., Gilligan et al., 2015; Hank, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e), and have tended to include more items capturing emotional closeness than actions individuals take to distance themselves from family members. To develop a more robust understanding of actions and behaviors related to family distancing, this study created a set of 11 Likert-type questions that aimed to assess the degree to which an adult has distanced themselves from their family of origin (see Appendix A). The questions were modeled after the findings of a qualitative study (Scharp, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e) that used a grounded theory approach to understand emergent themes in the lived experiences of family distancing. The mechanisms of family distancing according to Scharp (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e) are: Decreasing meaningful contact; Reducing amount of contact; Moving away; Staying away; Decreasing feeling; Increasing negative affect; Holding on to negative affect; Reducing relationship effort; Ignoring role expectations; Delegitimizing; Taking legal action. Each question reflects one of these distinct mechanisms of family distancing. Tests via factor analysis were used to ensure that each item fit within one construct (described in the results section). This measure asked participants to rate their agreement with each statement on a scale of 1 (\u003cem\u003enot at all\u003c/em\u003e) to 4 (\u003cem\u003ecompletely\u003c/em\u003e). The final measure used for analysis yielded strong internal consistency (\u0026#120572; = .94).\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec12\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eDifferentiation of Self\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo measure DoS, the Differentiation of Self Inventory\u0026ndash;Short Form (DSI-SF; Drake et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR17\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2015\u003c/span\u003e) was used. This survey measure intends to assess an individual's level of self-differentiation across four subscales: emotional cutoff (EC), emotional reactivity (ER), I-position (IP), and fusion with others (FO). See Skowron and Friedlander (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR44\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1998\u003c/span\u003e) for a detailed theoretical account of each subscale's construct of interest. An example EC question includes, \u0026ldquo;When one of my relationships becomes very intense, I feel the urge to run away from it.\u0026rdquo; An example ER question includes, \u0026ldquo;At times my feelings get the best of me and I have trouble thinking clearly.\u0026rdquo; An example IP question includes, \"I usually do not change my behavior simply to please another person.\" An example FO question includes, \u0026ldquo;When someone criticizes me, it bothers me for days.\u0026rdquo; Participants answered questions on a Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (\u003cem\u003enot at all true of me\u003c/em\u003e) to 6 (\u003cem\u003every true of me\u003c/em\u003e). Cronbach's alpha coefficients were acceptable for each subscale (EC, \u0026#120572; = .76; ER, \u0026#120572; = .83; IP, \u0026#120572; = .78; FO, \u0026#120572; = .81), evidencing strong internal consistency.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec13\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eSocial Supports\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo measure the quality and value of extrafamilial social supports that individuals currently have, a portion of the Adult Toolbox Social Relations Scales (ATSRS, Cyranowski et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR15\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2013\u003c/span\u003e) were used. These scales assess aspects of social support and companionship for adults. This scale originally contains three components: 1) Social Support; 2) Companionship; 3) Social Distress. To better fit the purposes of this study, only the Social Support subscale and the Friendship component of the Companionship subscale were used. The items were collapsed into one aggregate measure to assess overall levels of perceived social supports. In addition to the instructions provided in the measure, participants were asked to only consider non-family members when answering the questions. An example question includes, \"I have friends I get together with to relax.\" Participants rated items on a 5-point frequency scale ranging from 1 (\u003cem\u003enever\u003c/em\u003e) to 5 (\u003cem\u003ealways\u003c/em\u003e). Internal consistency was good for the overall scale (\u0026#120572; = .92), indicating strong internal consistency for use.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Results","content":"\u003cdiv id=\"Sec15\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003ePreliminary Analysis\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec16\" class=\"Section3\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eFamily Distancing Measure Validation\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTen out of the 11 items created for use in the family distancing measure were assessed via factor analysis to explore the theoretical alignment of potential latent factors within the measure. One item (\"\u003cem\u003eHave you ever taken legal steps to distance yourself from certain household members?\u003c/em\u003e) had to be preemptively dropped because only nine participants selected responses above 0, which distorted the measure's statistical validity.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eFirst, a preliminary Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin test for factor adequacy was performed and yielded a sampling adequacy score of .91, indicating measure covariance and hence strong suitability for factor analysis. Next, an exploratory factor analysis with oblique rotation was conducted to test the factor structure of the measure. Exploratory factor analysis was chosen as the first analytic step instead of confirmatory factor analysis to explore the open-ended possibility that additional latent factors were present, rather than testing the hypothesis that the measure is characterized by one single factor. The analysis revealed a three-factor structure (see Appendix A), explaining 76.1% of the measure's total variance (TLI\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.965, RMSEA\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.082, SRMR\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.028, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.003). Items 1\u0026ndash;6 were placed under a factor of \u003cem\u003edistancing actions\u003c/em\u003e (37.7% variance explained), items 7 and 8 were placed under a factor of \u003cem\u003eemotional disconnect\u003c/em\u003e (18.8% variance explained), and items 9 and 10 were placed under a factor of \u003cem\u003erumination\u003c/em\u003e (17.6% variance explained). Since the primary aim of the measure was to capture behavioral aspects of family distancing, items under \u003cem\u003erumination\u003c/em\u003e were eliminated because they seemed to exist as a distinct theoretical concept from the \u003cem\u003edistancing actions\u003c/em\u003e factor. Item 7 from the \u003cem\u003eemotional disconnect\u003c/em\u003e factor was also eliminated for theoretical inconsistency, but item 8 was collapsed into the \u003cem\u003edistancing actions\u003c/em\u003e factor because it still explained 37% of the factor's variance and seemed to be more theoretically aligned with distancing actions overall.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eConfirmatory factor analysis was conducted as a final step to ensure adequate validity when collapsing the measure into a final 7-item, single-factor structure. The results indicated that the measure increased in validity compared to the original 10-item, 3-factor structure (CFI\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.987, RMSEA\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.072, SRMR\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.026, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001). Item fit for the final measure was also more consistent, ranging from .57 to .96, and yielded a final Cronbach's \u0026#120572; score of .934, indicating high internal consistency for a final 7-item measure.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec17\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eDemographic Covariates\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eFor demographic analysis, one-way ANOVAs were run to test whether there were significant mean differences in the study variables between groups per each demographic. For participant age, however, Pearson correlation coefficients were performed to examine the association between age and each study variable; age was found to be significantly associated with family distancing, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e(110)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.261, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.005 and was included as a covariate in the primary analysis. The only significantly varying demographic was educational attainment, in which the variable was binarized (currently in college vs. \u003cem\u003enot\u003c/em\u003e currently in college) to narrow in on the unique social dynamics of college campuses. Two sample t-tests for each study variable were conducted for college vs. non-college students, findings significant results for each variable (Family Distancing, \u003cem\u003et\u003c/em\u003e(48.27) = -2.43, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.019; DoS, \u003cem\u003et\u003c/em\u003e(54.17)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;2.83, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.006; Social Supports, \u003cem\u003et\u003c/em\u003e(41.91)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;2.40, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.021), suggesting that college students reported higher quality relationships overall with less family distancing, higher DoS levels, and more social supports. Given this substantial difference, the research questions were studied in the context of college students in addition to analysis of the full sample.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec18\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003ePrimary Analysis\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec19\" class=\"Section3\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eRQ1: \u0026ldquo;What is the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo explore the first research question, regression analyses were performed to assess how family distancing would predict each DoS subscale. A summary of the study variables can be found in Appendix B. The correlations were generally significant as expected; each DoS subscale was significantly intercorrelated and higher family distancing was significantly associated with poorer differentiation of self for two subscales (EC, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.38; ER, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.29) and fewer social supports (\u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.39). Higher differentiation was also significantly associated with more social supports (EC, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.40; ER, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.29; IP, \u003cem\u003er\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.35). However, the fusion with others subscale was not associated with family distancing nor social supports, and I-position was only significantly associated with social supports.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eA series of linear regression models were constructed for each DoS subscale, with family distancing as the predictor and DoS as the outcome variable. The models for the full sample showed that family distancing negatively but weakly predicts emotional cutoff (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.156, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,119)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;21.92, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001), emotional reactivity (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.073, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,119)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;9.35, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.002), and fusion with others (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.034, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,119)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;4.22, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.042). The model for I-position was not significant.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOne concern with these findings was that the family distancing variable was not normally distributed, given that its distribution was strongly right-skewed. While prior research on statistical bias in the outcomes of regression models using non-normally distributed data has suggested that non-normality does not influence linear regression model construction (Schmidt \u0026amp; Finan, 2018), non-normality did still raise concern about potential heteroscedasticity. Thus, a Breusch-Pagan test for heteroscedasticity was run to ensure that the variance was consistent for family distancing across all levels of each outcome variable. The test only yielded significant results for EC (Breusch-Pagan ꭓ\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e(2)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;14.86, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001). To account for heteroscedasticity in the EC model, the model was retested using bootstrapping with 1000 simulated resamples to test whether the model was biased. The results indicated that bias accounted for only a -0.002 shift in the EC model's beta coefficient (bootstrapped 95% CI = -0.788, -0.248), suggesting that heteroscedasticity did not skew the results in any meaningful way.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eWhen separating the sample based on educational status, family distancing only predicted emotional cutoff for college students (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.110, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,87)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;11.86, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001). The same result was true for participants not attending college, such that family distancing only predicted emotional cutoff once again (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.116, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,31)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;5.22, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.01). Both models were tested for heteroscedasticity given that splitting participants into subgroups inevitably creates new sampling distributions, but non-significant results for the Breusch-Pagan tests indicated constant variance across both distributions.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cb\u003eRQ2: \u0026ldquo;What role do social supports play in the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self?\u0026rdquo;\u003c/b\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo explore the role social supports play in the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self, moderation analysis was conducted with each DoS subscale. The moderation models tested a DoS subscale as the outcome variable, and family distancing, social supports, and a distancing ✕ supports interaction as the predictor variables. For the full sample, no significant moderation was observed for any of the four DoS subscales. However, adding educational status to the model to test a distancing ✕ supports ✕ college interaction yielded a significant result for the EC subscale (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.412, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(7,114)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;11.43, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001). A nested model comparison was then performed using a one-way ANOVA to test whether the increase in \u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e was statistically significant compared to the EC subscale model using the two-way interaction. The result was significant (\u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(115,114)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;22.92, \u003cem\u003eΔR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.118, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eSeparate moderation models were constructed for college students versus non-college students to probe the direction of each effect since education was a binarized variable. For college students (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;89), social supports significantly moderated the relationship between family distancing and emotional cutoff (see Appendix C) between family distancing and social supports in the relationship between family distancing and emotional cutoff (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.340, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(3,29)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;14.60, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.017). The interaction was positive (\u003cem\u003eβ\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;0.437), such that those with higher social supports reported higher EC levels when distancing themselves from their families. For participants who were not currently attending college (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;33), the interaction (see Appendix D) was also significant (\u003cem\u003eR\u003c/em\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cem\u003e2\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.432, \u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(3,29)\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;7.35, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.001). The beta coefficient for this interaction was negative (\u003cem\u003eβ\u003c/em\u003e = -0.846), such that those with lower social supports reported higher EC levels when distancing themselves from their families.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eSimple slopes and Johnson-Neyman intervals were analyzed on the two moderation models separated by educational status to examine the effect of family distancing on DoS at low (-1 SD), average, and high (+\u0026thinsp;1 SD) levels of social supports, as well as the significance of these effects. These analyses were conducted using the \"interactions\" package in R. For the model testing the moderation of social supports for college students, the only significant slope was \u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;1 SD (\u003cem\u003eb\u003c/em\u003e = -0.49, SE\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;0.15, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.01). The slope at the mean was marginally significant (\u003cem\u003eb\u003c/em\u003e = -0.22, SE\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;0.12, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.08). These findings indicate that the moderation for college students primarily takes place when social supports are particularly low. As for the model representing participants not attending college, the slopes for the mean (\u003cem\u003eb\u003c/em\u003e = -0.67, SE\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;0.22, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.01) and +\u0026thinsp;1 SD (\u003cem\u003eb\u003c/em\u003e = -1.50, SE\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;0.33, \u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.01) were significant. For non-college students, high social supports appeared to contribute the most to the moderation effect.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Discussion","content":"\u003cp\u003eThis is the one of the first studies to quantitatively assess family distancing from a family-systemic perspective, exploring the relationship between family distancing and differentiation of self (DoS). Additionally, this study examined how social supports beyond the family play a role in the relationship between family distancing and DoS. It is occasionally necessary for individuals to establish significant physical and emotional boundaries between themselves and the family of origin, especially when facing marginalization or abuse. However, very little research has explored the mechanisms by which individuals may still be able to maintain close, healthy relationships while remaining distanced from their families of origin. This study was guided by a buffering hypothesis to explore whether individuals with high social support would be able to remain highly differentiated while engaging in practices of family distancing.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe study\u0026rsquo;s hypotheses were partially supported, and with caveats. The results offered evidence to support the first hypothesis that family distancing would predict lower self-differentiation; however, diverging from our original hypotheses, only the emotional cutoff, emotional reactivity, and fusion subscales yielded significance. As for the second hypothesis, the results offered evidence that social supports moderate the negative association between family distancing and differentiation of self; however, the direction of this moderation depended on educational status: for college students, as social supports increased, differentiation remained high in the face of family distancing, while those not in college saw significantly lower self-differentiation as they distanced themselves further from the family of origin.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eSupport for the first hypothesis suggests that as individuals create more active physical boundaries between themselves and family members, they tend to exhibit poorer self-differentiation in the dimension of emotional cutoff. This finding aligns with prior research suggesting an association between family distancing and poor psychological well-being (Hank, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). DoS adds a layer of nuance, however, in suggesting that the emotional tension of family distancing may shape how individuals engage in close interpersonal relationships. Previous findings have suggested that poor differentiation is associated with more strenuous interpersonal relationships (e.g., Choi \u0026amp; Murdock, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e; Skowron, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR43\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2000\u003c/span\u003e), and the findings from this study suggest that family distancing may be one mechanism by which poor differentiation manifests. Interestingly, emotional cutoff was the strongest predictor of DoS, suggesting further that individuals who are highly distanced from the family of origin most primarily act on high levels of distress by shutting down emotionally and disengaging from social relationships.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe finding that family distancing may contribute to poorer differentiation also adds to current literature on family distancing by helping to explain the central tension of family distancing, that it is simultaneously emotionally expensive and necessary to reclaim a personal sense of identity. However, a couple theoretical considerations must be kept in mind. First, a reminder that family distancing does not necessarily \u003cem\u003ecause\u003c/em\u003e low self-differentiation. Indeed, the low self-differentiation reported by those highly distanced from their family is more probable to have developed from a history of poor parent-child relationships throughout the individual\u0026rsquo;s childhood and adolescence, as per the research suggesting that poor parent-child bonds in younger years predict poor differentiation (e.g., Freeman \u0026amp; Almond, 2009, Lampis et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR25\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2025\u003c/span\u003e). Second, although differentiation of self is associated with poor psychological well-being, the construct alone is not a direct measure of psychological well-being. These considerations clarify that family distancing does not necessarily make a person more poorly differentiated, nor is family distancing necessarily psychologically damaging. Rather, we would speculate that the findings could indicate that the need for an individual to distance themselves from the family of origin may stem from some drive towards personal agency that has been stifled by their current family dynamics. That is, family distancing may present itself as an opportunity for some individuals to take conscious, deliberate steps to \u0026ldquo;force\u0026rdquo; a differentiated self, adding insight to the reasons why an individual may find it necessary to enact distanced family boundaries. This interpretation invites future research to explore differentiation of self longitudinally, beginning from the time when individuals decide to establish clear boundaries between themselves and their families of origin.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAs for the second research question, the study found that social supports moderate the relationship between family distancing and differentiation, but the nature of this moderation depends on educational status. As participants increasingly established family distance, social supports appeared to offer a buffering effect on emotional cutoff scores for individuals attending college but seemed to worsen emotional cutoff scores for individuals not attending college. From a sociocultural perspective, these findings make sense; a possible explanation for this finding is the fact that this study\u0026rsquo;s full sample was from the United States. Individuals belonging to Western society have become increasingly dependent on educational institutions to develop and sustain strong and emotionally close relationships with others. Research in educational studies (e.g., Diaz-Diaz, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR16\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e; Richerme, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR35\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e) has suggested that, over the past couple of decades, students have been socialized by a variety of policy measures pertaining to emotional intelligence and competencies geared towards developing social skills (often termed \u0026ldquo;21st century skills\u0026rdquo;). However these developmental goals are often shaped by individualistic values of academic and economic success, what scholars have called \"cognitive capitalism\" (e.g., Morgan, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR28\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2016\u003c/span\u003e). It makes sense, then, that close emotional relationships only buffer the potential effects of family distancing on self-differentiation within educational institutions, and that individuals who may no longer access these institutions could struggle to sustain emotionally-close relationships. If this is the case, these findings perhaps suggest that the capacity to sustain non-familial close relationships has become institutionalized, signaling an urgent demand for psychological discourse to acknowledge how social relationships are conceptualized within and shaped by institutional contexts from a critical perspective.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAnother explanation for this multiple-level moderation effect is the likely fact that individuals distance themselves from their families of origin for a variety of reasons. Recognizing the lack of causal evidence in this study, it is indeed possible that individuals who are highly differentiated may have enacted family distancing due to problems less closely related to stressful or abusive relationships, such as political disagreement or lack of identity-based acceptance. In this case, the individuals who were highly distanced from their families yet highly differentiated may have been raised in a healthy family environment yet still felt the need to establish robust boundaries, and this higher differentiation may explain why these individuals reported higher social supports. However, this explanation is not particularly helpful for the non-college sample. Perhaps non-college students were more likely to be married or cohabitating, which the social supports measure did not explicitly test. Of course, it is also possible that this result was caused by the large difference in sample size for college students (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;89) versus non-college students (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;33), leading to a higher likelihood of random variability in the non-college sample. While the bootstrapped regression models helped reduce the possibility of skewed results due to low sample size, random variability is still a possibility and should be recognized in future research. Regardless, more research is needed to explore the ways social supports assist individuals who are highly distanced from their families.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAn important consideration when interpreting these results is whether it is appropriate to claim that social supports buffer \u0026ldquo;poor differentiation\u0026rdquo; despite yielding significance for only one DoS subscale, emotional cutoff. One speculation is that the specific types of conflict within the family system could contribute to the ways in which poor self-differentiation manifests. In this context, the findings would suggest that individuals who enact and sustain physical or communicative boundaries between themselves and their family of origin may respond to interpersonal conflict with others in similar ways. Scant writing has discussed the unique ways certain aspects of poor differentiation arise, and this is one avenue for future research. What types of behaviors within the family system could contribute to, for example, higher emotional cutoff but less emotional reactivity? How does DoS as a personality construct help us understand individual differences in emotional temperament? Research has already suggested gendered and cultural differences in the experience of poor differentiation (e.g., Chung \u0026amp; Gale, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR13\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2006\u003c/span\u003e; Peleg, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR32\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2008\u003c/span\u003e; Skowron \u0026amp; Friedlander, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR44\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1998\u003c/span\u003e), thus evidencing a contextual nature of DoS that little theorization has explained. In fact, this idea contrasts starkly from Murray Bowen's (1978) original claims that DoS universally describes the psychological operations facilitating intimate social relationships. In any case, more work could engage with this claim that conflict behaviors in the family of origin may shape how individuals manage conflict in relationships outside the family system.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eUnrelated to the hypotheses, a highlight of this study was the good reliability of the family distancing measure. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that each item fit quite well and did not create an abundance of multicollinearity. Moreover, the internal consistency score of the final measure indicated a high level of consistent intercorrelations across each item, which is ideal for a single-scale measure. Replication of this measure for more diverse samples is recommended, although in its current state it is best served for individuals who would say that, on average, they are distanced or estranged from their families to begin with. To increase generalizability, counterbalancing items may be recommended to offset the measure's observed right-skewness and increase normality. While this study\u0026rsquo;s use of bootstrapping in the regression analysis reduced the potential impact of skewness, future studies should consider modifying the measure to increase its reliability.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eDespite the study's revelations, limitations were certainly present. Most primarily, over three quarters of the sample consisted of college students with relatively little diversity. Specifically, the large presence of college students limited the analysis of the study variables due to the lower variance overall of each variable compared to non-college students. While this sample characteristic was helpful for studying college students specifically, analysis of non-college students was limited. Future research should consider the wider variability in lifestyles of individuals outside of college, including age, employment status and type, educational attainment, etc. The measure used for assessing social supports in this study also presented itself as a limitation when it came to interpretation of the findings. While the measure used for this study (ATSRS, Cyranowski et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR15\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2013\u003c/span\u003e) was helpful for general insight into individuals' networks of social support beyond the family of origin, the scale's scope was limited in its capacity to understand the structure of those social networks. A limitation for interpretation of the findings is that this study did not examine any explicit measures of psychological well-being. While differentiation of self is associated with well-being, it is not a standalone measure of well-being. Given this limitation, the lived experiences of family distancing very well may be that of healing and progress, and this study does not capture this nuance directly. With these limitations in mind, future research ought to consider a more granular approach to exploring the role social supports play in how individuals handle poor family functioning\u0026mdash;qualitative approaches may continue to excel here, at least until a more comprehensive narrative of individuals' experiences with family distancing is documented. Moreover, future research must continue to consider analyses of kinship that take up non-heteronormative conceptions of family as well as an analysis guided by Kimberl\u0026eacute; Crenshaw's (1991) writings on the intersectional identities and marginalization of black women. These analyses are especially crucial for a comprehensive account of the asymmetrical power differentials that arise out of contemporary kinship practices documented by writers in queer-of-color critique (e.g., Mu\u0026ntilde;oz, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR29\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2009\u003c/span\u003e). This future work is imperative for theorizing new ways to support individuals of whom the nuclear model of family functioning has failed.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eTo return to the age-old phrase, \u0026ldquo;blood runs thicker than water,\u0026rdquo; it seems that this sentiment does not always hold up. While family distancing was found to be associated with lower self-differentiation, social supports appeared to be a moderator in this relationship. Given that this moderator only acts as a buffer for individuals in college, the findings suggest that not everybody has access to the types of social supports that would seem necessary when one embarks on the emotionally tumultuous process of family distancing or estrangement. This revelation is important to keep in mind when developing clinical, organizational, and community level interventions for those who have strained relationships with their family of origin.\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"Declarations","content":"\u003ch2\u003eAuthor Contribution\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eD.A. was the sole author for this article and performed all authorship contributions.\u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eAcknowledgement\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eA special thank you to my senior thesis advisor, Keira B. Leneman, for letting me run wild with this project.\u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eData Availability\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eData is provided within the manuscript or supplementary information files.\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"References","content":"\u003col\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAgllias, K. (2013). The Gendered Experience of Family Estrangement in Later Life. \u003cem\u003eAffilia\u003c/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003e28\u003c/em\u003e(3), 309\u0026ndash;321. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886109913495727\u003c/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAgllias, K. (2018). Missing family: The adult child\u0026rsquo;s experience of parental estrangement. \u003cem\u003eJournal of Social Work Practice\u003c/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003e32\u003c/em\u003e(1), 59\u0026ndash;72. https://doi.org/10.1080/02650533.2017.1326471\u003c/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAinsworth, M. D. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., \u0026amp; Wall, S. N. 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Columbia University Press.\u003cbr\u003e \u003c/li\u003e\n\u003c/ol\u003e"}],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":true,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":false,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":false,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"Family distancing, estrangement, found family, differentiation of self, family systems, social supports","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-6822047/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-6822047/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003eThis study examined how family distancing was associated with differentiation of self, and how that relationship was moderated by sources of social support outside the family of origin. Research in family systems suggests that poorly differentiated individuals have unresolved emotional tensions with their family of origin, resulting in a diminished ability to balance emotional intimacy with personal autonomy. However, alternative research exploring family distancing has suggested that limiting or fully ending communication with one\u0026rsquo;s family of origin can sometimes be necessary and healthy for individuals, with research also suggesting that individuals may create their own sense of family in the face of distanced or estranged family relationships. Therefore, this study explored the extent to which individuals may rely on social relationships beyond the family of origin to maintain high levels of self-differentiation in the face of distanced relationships. A convenience sample of 122 individuals above the age of 18 was recruited for participation. Analysis of survey data revealed 1) that more family distancing predicted poorer DoS, and 2) that the relationship between family distancing and DoS was moderated by social supports depending on educational status; social supports buffered the negative relationship between family distancing and DoS for college/university students (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;89), but exacerbated this negative relationship for participants not attending college/university (\u003cem\u003en\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;33). Theoretical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed.\u003c/p\u003e","manuscriptTitle":"Is Blood Really Thicker than Water? Extrafamilial Social Supports as a Moderator in the Relationship between Family Distancing and Differentiation of Self","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2025-06-11 06:29:26","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-6822047/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"d85e2bc3-1770-4644-9069-1c5f28ea1221","owner":[],"postedDate":"June 11th, 2025","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2025-06-14T15:38:27+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2025-06-11 06:29:26","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-6822047","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-6822047","identity":"rs-6822047","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"8U1c8b4HqxoKbykW_rLl7","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}