The role of great-grandparents in modern families is evolving as longer lifespans make four-generation households increasingly common. While this intergenerational closeness offers emotional richness and historical continuity, it also intensifies caregiving burdens on the “club-sandwich generation,” who support children, grandchildren and aging parents simultaneously.

Despite limited cultural scripts for great-grandparenthood, many older adults are becoming key emotional anchors, passing down stories, values, and a sense of legacy to younger generations.

Great-grandparents are  “the peak of the family pyramid,” says Merril Silverstein, professor and chair of sociology. And because today’s grandparents are so involved with family life on the whole, both logistically and emotionally, we might expect that great-grandparents will keep becoming more tied in as well, he says.

Read more in The Atlantic article, “The Rise of the ‘Club-Sandwich Generation.’”