This study examined role of shared family context in understanding differential parenting. Findings indicated that child age was the strongest child-specific predictor of positivity and differential positivity. Lower SES, marital dissatisfaction, and larger family size related to higher differential positivity. Children's temperament related to parental negativity and differential negativity, moderated by SES. Mixed-gender sibships in families with marital dissatisfaction and children in single-parent families received highest differential negativity levels. (Author/KB)