Exploring Communication Types: How Older European Parents Stay Connected with their Adult Children in the Digital Age

Abstract Staying connected is vital for parent–child relations, especially in later life when intergenerational ties provide essential support. Although digitalization has expanded opportunities for staying in touch and meeting social needs across distance, little is known about how the various communication methods commonly used in adult parent–child contact interact and combine. This study explores how older European parents engage with different communication modes when interacting with their adult children. Using data from the European Social Survey Round 10 (2020–2022), a latent class analysis approach identifies distinct communication types among 7,135 parents aged 50 and above based on the frequency and modes of contact. Four latent types of communication emerge: ‘medium traditional communication’, characterized by moderate face-to-face and telephone contact with limited use of modern media; ‘high overall communication’, reflecting intensive use of all available channels; ‘low overall communication’, marked by infrequent interaction across all modes; and ‘high modern communication’, centered around frequent video calls. Their prevalence in European countries is described, and multinomial logistic regression models examine the individual and family characteristics that shape each type. The findings suggest that conceptualizing later-life parent–child contact as a multidimensional phenomenon can advance our understanding of its heterogeneity in Europe’s aging societies.