A Proposal to Reduce Unnecessary Divorce - Razorplanet

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10 1. RESEARCH 1. RESEARCH FINDINGS MANY DIVORCES MAY BE UNNECESSARY No one advocates for keeping destructive marriages together. Divorce is a necessary safety valve in some cases. But in recent years scholars have gained a deeper understanding of the problems felt by couples who divorce, as well as the impact of divorce on children. Longitudinal research over the past decade has shown that the majority of divorces (from 50 to 66 percent, depending on the study) occur in couples who had average happiness and low levels of conflict in the years prior to the divorce. These couples generally look quite similar to continuously married couples, but they have risk factors such as having grown up in a divorced family, lower levels of commitment to marriage, and less knowledge of the effects of divorce on children. The other group (from 33 to 50 percent of divorcing couples) shows a pattern of high conflict, alienation, and sometimes abuse. As for the effects of the divorce on children, the research consensus is that children who live with chronic high levels of conflict and hostility between their parents will likely benefit from a divorce. But children in the average marriages that break up—those that constitute the majority of divorces—are likely to be harmed by the divorce. They do not understand why their parents broke up. They may blame themselves. And they are propelled from a relatively stable family life into a post-divorce world that offers little relief and brings many challenges. 1 There is a popular assumption among professionals and the public that divorce happens only after a long process of misery and conflict finally drives the spouses to end the marriage. One set of scholars summarized this common but mistaken assumption in this way: Many people assume that a trajectory of relationship deterioration typically underlies this decision. According to this scenario, couples disagree and fight frequently, partners become increasingly disengaged from one another emotionally, and each partner’s marital happiness declines.
Eventually, one or both partners decide that the marriage has eroded to the point where it cannot be salvaged. As a result, one partner, often with the consent of the other, files for marital dissolution. 2 This scenario turns out to be inaccurate for many couples confronting divorce. Sociologist Paul Amato of Pennsylvania State University and his colleagues found that most couples who divorce actually look quite similar to most couples who do not divorce. Most divorced couples report average happiness and low levels of conflict in their marriages in the years prior to the divorce. It is the minority of divorcing couples who, during their marriages, experienced high conflict, alienation, and sometimes abuse. In a separate paper, Professor Amato and sociologist Alan Booth offer this promising conclusion: “Our results suggest that divorces with the greatest potential to harm children occur in marriages that have the greatest potential for reconciliation” (emphasis added). 3 A LOWER DIVORCE RATE WOULD BENEFIT MANY CHILDREN We now know that divorce on average has dramatic effects on children’s lives, across the life course. Research shows that divorced fathers and mothers are less likely to have high-quality relationships with their children. Children with divorced or unmarried parents are more likely to be poor, while married couples on average build more wealth than those who are not married, even accounting for the observation that well-off people are more likely to get married. Parental divorce or failure to marry appears to increase children’s risk of failure in school. Such children are less likely to finish high school, complete college, or attain high-status jobs. Infant mortality is higher among children whose parents do not get or stay married, and such children on average have poorer physical health compared to their peers with married parents. Teens from divorced families are more likely to abuse drugs or alcohol, get in trouble with the law, and experience a teen pregnancy. Numerous studies also document that children living in homes with unrelated men are at much higher risk of childhood physical or sexual abuse. 4 These studies generally adjust for parental education and income, which means that the negative effects cannot be explained by these demographic factors. 11
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A Proposal to Reduce Unnecessary Divorce - Razorplanet

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