Divorce Outcome Research - CiteSeerX

TIfEeffects of divorce on adults are summarized and analyzed in terms of (a) practical problems. (b) the consequences for social life and intimate relationships, and (c) health and safety. The effects of parental divorce On children are reviewed in terms of (a) cognitive performance and school success, (b) personality, (c) interpersonal relationships, (d) health, and (e) juvenile delinquency. Due to methodological limitations, little can be concluded concerning the long-term effects of divorce. These limitations are discussed and an alternative research design is proposed. It appears that marital discord more than marital structure is an important determinant Of the effects with which we are concerned.

Divorce Outcome Research Issues and Perspectives

ANN GOETTlNG Western Kentucky University

The divorce rate in the United States has been rising almost continuously since data were first collected by the United States Census Bureau. It is estimated that about 37% of first marriages currently being contracted will end in divorce if present conditions affecting divorce continue (Glick, 1973: 71). Also, the number of children involved in divorces and annulments has increased yearly since 1960, exceeding one million per year since 1971 (National Center for tiealth Statistics, 1976). According to some estimates, over the next few decades perhaps one-third of all children in the United States will be directly affected by divorce (Bane, 1976: 103; Bumpass & Rindfuss, 1978).

Because so many individuals are and probably will continue to be involved in divorce, it is important to understand this phenomenon, including its effects. The purposes of this article are (a) to explore the possible long-term effects of divorce on the adults and children involved and (b) to identify what specifically it is about divorce that may bring on such effects.

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Although the article provides a review of recent research findings on the effects of divorce on divorcing men and women in the United States and on their children, no attempt is made to present a complete review of relevant research. Method- ologically superior studies employing “normal,” rather than clinical, subjects and appropriate control groups were selected. Psychoanalytically oriented and qualitative studies are ex- cluded,

THE EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON ADULTS

PRACTICAL PROBLEMS

In their two-year longitudinal study, Hetherington et al. (1977) studied the impact of divorce on family functioningand the development of children. Utilizing a multimethod, multi- measure approach, they concluded that the main practical Problems of everyday life encountered by divorced parents Were related to household maintenance and to economic and occupational difficulties. Many divorced men, particularly those from marriages in which conventional sex roles had been maintained and in which the wife had not been employed, initially experienced considerable difficulty and stress in maintaining a household routine. Regarding structure in Prescribed household roles, problems in coping with routine household tasks and the regulating and scheduling of events, divorced mothers and fathers were more disorganized than Parents in intact families, although this disorganization was most marked in the first year following divorce and had significantly decreased by the second year. Members of divorced households were more likely to eat erratically, and divorced mothers and their children (all members of the divorced sample were from homes in which custody had been granted to the mother) were less likely to eat together. Bedtime activity was more irregular; the children were read to less before bedtime, Also, they were more likely to arrive at school late. Divorced men were less likely to eat at home than were



3 s J O U R N A L OF FAMILY ISSUES I SEPTEMBER 1981

married men. They slept less, had more erratic sleep patterns, and had difficulty with shopping, cooking, laundry, and cleaning. Men also reported that they were coping poorly at work.

Financial affairs are often a problem when divorce occurs. Hetherington et al. (1977) observed greater economic stress in divorced couples than in married couples, Although the average income of their divorced families was equal to that of their intact families, they found that economic stress was clearly apparent in their divorced group. Because these couples had been one economic unit before divorce and now had to maintain two households, financial concerns and limitations became apparent. One usual consequence of this was that divorced fathers increased their work load in order to increase their income. These financial concerns also were instigators of conflict and greater stress between the divorced couple.

Divorced women also are affected financially by divorce. Since child custody is usually awarded to the women, and since men commonly fail to contribute to the financial support of their former wives and children (Brandwein et al., 1974), many divorced women who are not accustomed to supporting themselves and their children find themselves strapped with the burden of a family to support. Typically, the woman must sacrifice time usually spent with her children and pay for child care while she is at work. In summary, it is probably safe to say that typically individuals who attempt to maintain their financial responsibilities suffer economically from divorce and consequently their socioeconomic status and standard of living are lowered by it.

SOCIAL LIFE AND INTI31ATE RELATIONSIIIPS

The loss of old friends together with trying to establish new friendships is often difficult for divorced persons. Bohannan (1970) refers to the loss of old friendships as the “community divorce,” one of his six “stations” in the divorce process. Uecause society tends to organize social life on the basis of couples and two-parent families, divorced persons are often



Goetting / DIVORCE OUTCOME 3S3

viewed as being ill-suited for participation in social events and, therefore, eventually lose contact with, and support from, friends associated with their earlier married life.

Hetherington et al. (1977) reported that for two months following divorce, married friends remained supportive and spent considerable time with the divorced respondents. How- ever, these contacts rapidly declined. They found that the dissociation from marital friends was greater for women than for men, who were more often included in social activities and sometimes participated in joint family outings on visitation days.

Regarding social life in general, Hetherington et al. (1977) concluded that social activities were less frequent among the divorced than among married couples in the two years following divorce, especially for women. This finding is consistent with results of several other studies which suggest that divorced women are likely to have fewer friends, belong to fewer organizations and participate in fewer recreational activities than do married women (lietherington et al. 1978: 4). The trend suggests a very "slow" social life immediately following divorce and an increase in social involvement over the next two years, These results support those of Raschke (1976: 8-9) who found low social participation for both men and women during the first six months after separation, but Over the next two and one-half years participation for both increased, and men's social participation exceeded that of Women. lietherington et al. (1977) reported that divorced Women often commented on their sense of being locked into a child's world, though this was less true of working than nonworking mothers. Many nonworking mothers complained that most of their social contacts had been made through professional associates of their husband, and that with divorce these associations terminated, In contrast, the employed mothers had contact with their co-workers and these relations Often extended into after-hour social events. In contrast to divorced women who felt trapped, divorced men complained of feeling shut out, rootless and at loose ends, and of a need to engagc in social activities even if they often were not pleasur- able.



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Renne (1971) found in her 1965 questionnaire survey in Alameda County, California where she controlled for age, as did Hetherington et al. (1977) and others, that divorced and separated people were more likely to be socially isolated than married people. But she also found that unhappily married people tended to be even more socially isolated than those who were separated and divorced. Her data suggest that an unhappy marriage may be more socially confining than separation or divorce.

Several research inquiries have been conducted into intimate relationships and sexuality of the divorced, Gebhard (1970) conducted a study on sex behavior of divorced and widowed women between 1939 and 1956 and reported that these women achieved orgasm more often during intercourse than they had during marriage. Then, in 1966, Hunt reported in a study of the middle-class separated and divorced in America that divorced people find their sex life more intense, less inhibited and more satisfying than it had been in marriage. In 1974. Hunt reported the results of his national survey on human sexuality which indicated that divorced men and women had a slightly higher frequency of intercourse than did married men and women. The 1975 Redbook study (Levin, 1975) suggested that divorced women were more sexually assertive and more likely to initiate intercourseand to beactive partners than were married women. It should be noted here that both the 1974 Hunt study and the Redbookstudy failed to control for such important social variables as socioeconomic status, which, of course, makes interpretation and generaliza- tion of their results difficult.

The recent Hetherington et al. (1977) data are at variance with this general impression that divorce brings with it more and better sex. Their addition of the dimension of length-of- time-divorced contributes new insight into the sexuality of the divorced. They report that, at two months after the divorce, frequency of sexual intercourse was lower for their divorced respondents than for their married respondents at two months after divorce while frequency of intercourse among divorced women rose to about the same frequency as that of married men and women, it became significantly higher for divorced




men. Then, at two years after divorce the rate was about the Same for the divorced and married, both men and women. Divorced men showed a peak of sexual activity and a pattern of dating a variety of women in the first year following divorce. Many men but few women were pleased at the increased opportunity for sexual experiences with a variety of partners immediately following divorce. However, by theend of the first Year both divorced men and women were expressing a lack of satisfaction in casual sexual encounters and a desire for intimacy.

I I E A L T I I AND SAFETY

Data are consistent in demonstrating poorer health, higher mortality and more accidents among the divorced than among the married. The marital status of a person is one of the best Predictors of health, disease and death (Lynch, 1977: 38-39). But a word of caution is in order in interpreting this fact. Since both poor health and high mortality on the one hand, and divorce on the other, are more common among the lower than the higher socioeconomic classes, the relationship between health and divorce may be a least partly due to factors associated with social class. It follows that social class should be held constant when examining the relationship between divorce and health/mortality. Regrettably, such controls are not made on the available correlational data reviewed in this section. As a result the viability of a causal interpretation relating divorce and health/mortality is weakened.

Landbrook (1976) reports that a national probability study conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics on symptoms of psychological distress revealed that the divorced had more symptoms (such as “nervous breakdown” and Inertia”), and had thcm more seriously than did persons of

other marital statuses. Bloom et al. (1978: 869-87 1) provide an excellent summary of research relating psychopathy (mental

U’



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disorder) with marital status. Results consistently indicated that admission rates into psychiatric facilities are lowest among the married, intermediate among the widowed and never married, and highest among the divorced and separated. This relationship holds across different age groups for both sexes and is true for both blacks and whites, Not only are highest admission rates reported for persons with disrupted marriages but the differential between these rates and similarly calculated rates among the married is very substantial. Fur- thermore, admission rates are substantially higher for males with disrupted marriages than for females with disrupted marriages.

FIIYSICAL IIEALTII A N D ACCIDENTS

Data obtained from the National Center for Health Statis- tics from 1959 to 1961 demonstrated that, controlling for age, premature death rates (deaths between the ages of 15 and 64) for divorced men and women were significantly higher than for married individuals, with differences being significantly greater for men than for women (Carter and Glick, 1970). Specific causes of death where these relationships held included: cirrhosis of the liver, lung cancer, coronary heart disease. tuberculosis, diabetes, leukemia and aleukemia, suicide, homi- cide, motor accident deaths, pedestrian deaths, and all other accidental deaths. Consistent with these United States Govern- ment data is the fact that terminal cancer strikes divorced individuals, male, female, white and nonwhite, more frc- quently than it does people who are married (Lynch, 1977: 43). it should be noted that local data have been reported on suicide and on motor accidents as they relate to marital status, and the findings are consistent with the National Center for Ilealth Statistics data. Bloom et al. (1978: 873) review three reccnt studies on suicide and report that the suicide rate is higher among the divorced than among any other marital status category; and McMurray (1970) demonstrated that the auto- mobile accident rate of persons undergoing divorce in King County, Washington. in 1966 and 1967, doubled during the



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Period of time from six months before until six months after the divorce date.

Once again, as was the case with our earlier analysis of social isolation, the work of Renne (1971) is relevant. Recall that she differentiated her sample of marrieds by marital satisfaction. In general, Renne found that health was associated with marital happiness more strongly than with marital status. In other words, greater differences in health were found between happily and unhappily married persons than between married Persons in general on the one hand and divorced and separated Persons on the other. Concerning self-reported physical dis- ability, chronic illness, neurosis and depression, then, marriage was associated with better health only when the marital relationship was satisfactory to the respondent. Renne's research Suggests that when marriage is unsatisfactory, divorce may be a Source of relief from health problems.

THE EFFECTS OF PARENTAL DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

Whereas there is an abundance of research on the effects of father absence on children, there is far too little information on the effects of divorce specifically. Whenever possible, studies employing samples that delineate divorce as a special kind of marital dissolution are described. In some sections, specifically those dealing with the issues of cognitive performance and school success, health, and delinquency, it was necessary to include studies which confound divorce with other types of broken homes because of the paucity of research that isolates divorce, and because the topics were considered too important to ignore.

COGNITIVE PERFORMANCE AND s c i I o o L SUCCESS

Although several methodologically sound and informative studies relating achievement and school behavior to broken homes are available, only two separated out children of divorce



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from children from other types of broken homes. Thosestudies were conducted by Crescimbeni (1965) and Levin et al. (1978)- The remaining studies reviewed here use confounded samples and therefore need to be interpreted with care.

An old but often cited study which is relevant here was conducted by Nye (1957) on Washington high school students. Nye compared school grades of children from happy intact, unhappy intact and divorced and separated homes. Ne found when comparing these three categories of adolescents who were similar in terms of other social traits, including socioeconomic status, that there were no significant differences in grade point averages among the members of the three groups.

Other more recent studies have found no significant effects of broken homes on school success. Burchinal (1964) studied and compared Iowa adolescents from intact homes, from homes headed only by the mother, and from reconstituted families-those headed by a natural parent and a stepparent* and found when controlling for socioeconomic status, that no significant differences existed among mean grade points and attitudes toward school. IIowever. he did find that the adolescents from intact homes were absent the fewest number of school days. Bales (1979) studied students enrolled in 23 northern Mississippi public schools, and concluded that when controlling for socioeconomic status there were no significant correlations between home stability and either academic aspiration or grade point average for both black and white males and females.

In their literature review, Walters and Stinnett (1971) concluded that there were no significant differences in achievement between children from one-parent and those from two- parent homes. Also in her more recent review, Bane (1976: 11) notes that studies which adequately control for economic status show few or no differences between children from one- and two-parent families on school achievement, social adjustment, and delinquent behaviors.

Several studies addressing this issue of the effect of marital disruption on cognitive performance and school success have concluded that such disruption does have consequences. For




example, Crescimbeni (1965) compared scores on standard- ized achievement tests for 92 Connecticut children from divorced homes in grades two through six with those of a comparison group from intact homes who were matched for several traits including socioeconomic status. He found that the children from divorced homes scored significantly lower on these achievement tests than did the children from intact homes. This was true in 1962 when the first achievement test was administered and at the end of one year of family disruption for the children from divorced homes, and again in 1963 when the second achievement test was administered and when the children of divorce had been such for two years.

Santrock (1972) observed third and sixth grade 1. Q. and achievement test scores for mostly lower-class children, finding that when controlling for socioeconomic status, fat her-absence due to divorce, desertion, or separation was debilitating when compared with father-presence. The most debilitating age for father-absence onsct was the first two years of the boy's life. For girls, onset of father-absence due to divorce, desertion or separation during the first five years of life also was detrimental to achievement when comparisons were made with father-present girls. But for the girls, no such detrimental effects became apparent when the break occurred later on.

Between 1973 and 1976, Conyers (1977) observed the absence rates, grade point averages, and truancy, suspension, expulsion and drop-out records of over 1000 ninth graders in a community of 40,000 people. She compared children from unconventionally structured homes (created by death and divorcc, mostly divorce) with children from conventionally structured homes. She found that (a) students from unconventionally structured homes had an average absence rate that was greatcr than those from conventionally structured homes, (b) students from unconventionally structured homes had an average grade point record that was lower than that associated with students from conventionally structured homes, and (c) students from unconventionally structured homes had higher incidences of truancy, suspension, expulsion, and drop-outs than those from conventionally structured homes. All differences were statistically significant.




Hunt and Hunt (1975; 1977) reanalyzed data collected by Rosenberg and Simmons on 907Junior and senior high school students attending the public school system of Baltimore, Maryland. In the earlier of their two article (1979, they report the effects of father absence on achievement-related variables for white and black boys, Their data suggest that whereas family structure has marked detrimental consequences on school performance and educational aspirations for white boys, it has no such important effect for black boys. The Hunts explain these findings by suggesting that costs of father- absence are greater in higher status levels (which are disproportionately represented by whites) because in such homes the father (along with other family members) serves as a socialization agent emphasizing achievement and success to his son. But in lower-status homes (which are disproportionately represented by blacks) the father does not typically represent an important resource for achievement and success because he often is not at home and also may not so highly value achievement, and therefore his loss has little effect.’Although this “high status” hypothesis is confirmed by the father absence effects by race, its failure to describe class patterns within the two racial groups is problematic. The Hunts suggest that the resolution to this problem may lie in the refinement of the definition and measurement of high and low social status. In the second of their two articles, the Hunts (1977) report the effects of father-absence on academic performance for white and black girls. They found that among white girls father- absence was associated with high grades, whereas among the black girls the presence or absence of a father seemingly had no impact on academic performance. The Hunts reason that in our white society where girls are socialized into a female role which discourages instrumentality in general and achievement specifically, father-absence may leave girls without a key parental resource for normal sex-role adjustment, which may have the effect of disposing them toward greater instrumentality. But in black homes sex role differentiation is lessstrong; women have historically been expected to perform the key instrumental role in the family. That fact coupled with the fact that the black father may spend less time as a socializer




suggests that father loss to the black girl should be expected to have less effect on achievement than father loss to the white girl.

Levin et al. (1978) analyzed a large national sample of data collected between 1963 and 1970 on the cognitive development (measured by the vocabulary and block design subtest of the JVechsler Intelligence Scale for Children), school achievement (measured by the reading and arithmetic subtests of the Wide Range Achievement Test), and parental marital status of United States children aged 6 through 17. Having controlled for several social variables including socioeconomic status, they concluded that whereas the children living with divorced mothers showed no significant differences in cognitive development when compared with children from intact homes, they did score significantly lower on the measures of cognitive achievement.

PERSONALITY

In their longitudinal research referred to earlier, Hethering- ton et al. (1977) studied 24 boys and 24 girls from white middle-class Virginia families in which divorce had occurred. These nursery school age subjects were matched for socioeconomic status with children from intact homes. Based on a checklist of home behavior, the children of divorced parents demonstrated significantly more negative behaviors than did children in intact families, the differences being greater for boys than for girls, At the end of two years the differences had significantly declined among the boys and had largely disap- peared among the girls.

)lodges et al. (1979) conducted a study somewhat similar to that of Iretherington et al., but obtained results inconsistent with theirs. They compared 26 preschool children whose parents had divorced and who were living with their mothers with 26 matched preschool children from intact families. Results showed few statistically significant differences on aggression, withdrawal, dependency, and other signs of im- maturity and emotional upset. The data suggested that there




was no relationship between time since separation (which ranged from 5 to 48 months) and any behavioral differences. Contact with the noncustodial father increased aggression in the child, and preseparation discord did not predict maladjust- ment for children of divorce. Finally, they found that limited resources and relative youth of parents did predict negative adjustment for children, as expected.

Santrock (1977) studied the effects of father-absence on sex- typed behavior in 45 predominantly lower class white boys between 10 and 12 years of age; IS were from divorced homes, 15 from widowed homes and 15 from intact homes. He found that having matched for I.Q., age and school, both categories of fat her-absent boys were significantly more masculine, physi- cally aggressive, disobedient and likely to "try things out on their own" than boys from father-present homes. Similarly, Patterson et al., (1973) found a high degree of out-of-control behavior in boys from divorced families when compared to boys from intact homes, especially immediately following the divorce. These data do not support the common fear that divorce may lead to masculinity deficiencies in boys.

The work of Raschke and Raschke (1979) and of Zill(1978) are of special importance here because they, as did Renne (1971). considered the variable of marital discord. In their study of 289 third, sixth, and eighth graders who were homogeneous in socioeconomic status, the Raschkes (1979) measured self-concept using the Piers-Uarris Children's Seg Concept Scule and family structure (e.g., divorced, intact, and the like) and presence of home conflict using self-report measures. They found no significant differences in the self- concept of children from intact, single-parent, reconstituted or other types of family structure. They did find, however, that self-concept of children was significantly lower where conflict in the home was high, regardless of family structure.

As did the Raschkes, Zill (1978) found a component of personality to be more highly related to marital discord than to family structure. Using a national level sample of 2,258 children between seven and eleven years of age, he found that when education and income were controlled, the children in




divorced, unhappily married and separated groups were significantly more aggressive than were the children of parents who were very happily and fairly happily married.

The studies considered thus far in the area of personality have dealt with young children. Since our interest here is in determining long-term effects of divorce, we will look at the work of Young and Parish (1977), Hetherington (1972). Kulka and Weingarten (1980), and Landis (1962) who studied adolescents, college students, and adults. Young and Parish (1977) administered attitude measures to 98 college women and concluded that father loss due to both divorce and death has detrimental effects on personality development for young women. Both groups of women who had lost fathers thought much more unfavorably of themselves and thought of themselves as being more insecure than the women who had not lost fathers. These statistically significant findings held only for Women whose mothers had not remarried. The women whose mothers had remarried tended to check more unfavorable adjectives and indicate more insecurity than the women who had not lost fathers, but the difference was not significant. This Suggests that the presence of stepfathers may attenuate and compensate for some effects of father loss.

Hetherington (1972) also researched women in late adolescence, but reported very little difference in personality structure between the daughters of divorce, daughters who had lost their fathers due to death, and the women from intact homes. Exceptions to this general finding were that daughters of divorce and daughters whose fathers had died were lower on internalization on personal control items and were also more anxious.

Kulka and Weingarten (1980). using two national cross- sectional surveys of adults conducted in 1957 and 1976, concluded that long-term negative effects on psychological adjustment (happiness, distress) associated with parental divorce and separation are both minimal and. consistent with the lietherington et al. nursery school-age subjects, modifiable over time.



364 JOURNAL OF FAMILY lSSUES 1 SEPTEMBER 1981

Though the Landis (1962) study is quite dated now (the data were collected in the early 1950's). it is worthy of consideration here because of the samples which were used. Comparisons were made among subjects from happy unbroken homes, unhappy unbroken homes, and homes broken by divorce. Landis studied self-concept among college students and found that while there was very little difference between the responses from the two categories of unhappy marriages, the respondents from happy marriages gave a significantly higher self-evalua- tion on nine of the twelve questionnaire items. These data suggest that while marital stress may lower the self-concept of the children, parental divorce has no effect once severe tension has set in on the marriage.

INTERPERSONAL HELATIONSIIIPS

Landis (1962) also explored the reported relationships of college students with their parents at the time of the study and the dating histories of the college students. Regarding relationships with parents, he found that respondents from happy homes reported having closer relationships with their parents than adolescents from both unhappy intact homes and homes where the parents had divorced. Furthermore, he found that both men and women reported that their relationship was more distant with the divorced father than it was with the unhappily married father. Although there were no significant differences for the men concerning their relationships with their mothers, the women from divorced homes reported closer relationships with their mothers than did the women from unhappy nondivorced marriages. Landis' data suggest that happy homes produce the closest relationships, and that since the children usually go with the mother after divorce, relationships with the mother become closer while relationships with the father become more distant.

Regarding dating history, Landis found significant differences between students from happy homes on one hand and students from two categories of unhappy homes on the other




hand on 11 of the I2 variables tested. But he found a significant difference on only one variable when he compared students from unhappy intact marriages with students from divorced marriages, and that one difference showed up for men only. hent ia l ly what Landis concluded was that children from unhappy marriages (whether or not the parents divorced) tend to begin dating later, date fewer different people and date less frequently than do children from happy marriages, but they go steady with and have as many private understanding engage- ments as do those from happy marriages. Landis' study suggests that it is marital conflict, not divorce, that influences dating behavior.

In her study on women in late adolescence cited earlier, khe r ing ton (1972) examined differences in heterosexual behavior of white lower and lower-middle class women from divorced, widowed and nuclear families. She found that when compared in a number ofsettings with women from both intact and widowed homes, the women from divorced families exhibited sexually precocious and inappropriately assertive behavior with male but not female peers and adults, and that the effects of early separation were usually greater than those of late separation. Furthermore, this greater receptiveness to men by the women whose fathers were absent due to divorce is supported by their interview reports of earlier and moredating and sexual intercourse. These findings on dating are, of course, in opposition to Landis' findings.

A follow-up study was conducted on lietherington's women one year following their marriages to determine how long- lasting the effects of father absence were, as reflected in the Women's subsequent marital relationships (Hetherington et al. 1978: 22-24). Daughters of the divorced married younger and a greater number were pregnant at the time of marriage than were daughters from intact homes. N o differences in frequency of marital intercourse were reported among the three groups of women, but orgasmic satisfaction was lower in women from single-parent families. It is of interest to note that the husbands of daughters of divorcees were less educated, had less stable employment records and were more frequently involved in




problems with the law than were the other two groups of husbands. In addition they felt more ambivalent or hostile toward their wives and infants and were less emotionally mature, more impulsive, and self-centered. All of this suggests that the effects of divorce on daughters' interaction with men may be long-lasting and even influence marital choices.

Young and Parish (1977). in their attitude study cited earlier on college women, found that divorcees' daughters showed no differences in stated willingness to associate with the opposite sex when compared with the women from intact homes. All of this suggests that whereas divorce may not affect women's desire to interact with men, it may affect the rnonner in which they do so and this difference in manner can, in turn, affect mate selection and marital success.

There is evidence that children of divorced or separated parents are at somewhat greater risk of having their own first marriages end in divorce or separation than are children from intact homes, Pope and Mueller (1976), using five data sets and controlling for socioeconomic status and rural-urban origin, suaes t that the correlation does not appear to be attributable solely to a single-parent upbringing sincc it is more likely to occur among children who have lived with their mothers than those who have lived with their fathers and in situations where separation has been caused by divorce rather than death. It may be that different child-rearing patterns, stresses, values and lifestyles are associated with living with a single mother than with a single father and with parents having been divorced rather than widowed. Kulka and Weingarten (1980) found similar modest differences between their subjects from volun- tarily disrupted and intact homes.

IIEALTII

Very little research has been done relating health and parental marital status. In the area of mental health the few data available offer conflicting and, therefore, inconclusive results. Some researchers have investigated the representation of children of divorce in psychiatric clinics. Despert (1962) and



Gociting DIVORCE OUTCOME 367

Westman (1970) found an underrepresentation of children of divorce in their clinics, while others (McDermott, 1970; Tuckman & Regan, 1966; Kalter, 1977) reported an over- representation of children of divorce in t heir clinics.

Arey (1978) analyzed interview data from a general population of adults residing in four Florida counties. Controlling for race, sex, and age of the respondent at the time of the interview, she found that on three measures of adult mental health (depression, anxiety, and psychosocial dysfunction), children of divorce reflected statistically significant lower scores than children from intact families and from families broken by death of a parent, but that in all cases the differences were attributed to an unhappy childhood rather than to a broken family structure.

Zill(1978), cited in the earlier section on personality, found when using his Psychological IIelp Index that children from %ot too happy marriages" scored close to children from divorced households, and that both groups showed significantly higher average scores than did the children from "very happy" marriages. Furthermore, the average score for children from "fairly happy" marriages fell between these extremes, significantly lower than the mean score for children of divorce and from "not too happy" marriages, significantly higher than the mean score for children from "very happy" marriages.

In the area of physical heal'?, only one recent study is reported here. Leatherton located 35 children with insulin- dependent diabetes living in Sacramento, California (Diabetes Via Divorce, 1977). This sample was matched by age, sex, race, and socioeconomic status with a randomly selected control group from the same community. He found that 40% of the children with diabetes had lost a parent through divorce or separation (mostly divorce) prior to the onset of the disease, and only 17% of the control group had lost a parent. Of the 14 children from broken homes who had diabetes 12 had not shown symptoms until 3 to I0 years after the marital breakup. All of this supports the contention of Thomas Willis who believed that diabetes is caused by "prolonged sorrow" (Dia- betes Via Divorce, in Ifunian Dchavior, 1977).



368 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / SEPTEMBER I981

Nye (1957) compared children from happy intact, unhappy intact, and divorced and separated homes. Among his sample of Washington high school students he found less psychosomatic illness for children of divorce and separation than for those in unhappy intact homes. Furthermore, he found the least psychosomatic illness among children from happy intact homes. Nye's data suggest one advantage for children to divorcing or separating when there is marital tension.

DELINQUENCY

The impact of family structure on delinquency rates is a concern which no longer carries the enthusiasm that it did in the early part of this century (Sykes, 1980: 19-22). At that time, when the trend toward industrialization and urbanization in the United States was affecting drastically the lives of the masses, the idea that the broken family was a major source of delinquency was much influenced by the rural and traditional perspective of many sociologists who were inclined to place a high value on kinship bonds, the role of tradition and the need for stability. At that time theories concerning broken homes viewed the child as being prepared for delinquency by defective socialization in a pathological family. Since divorce, along with other anomalies of family structure, was most frequent in the lower class, the correlation between poverty and delinquency was considered to be a function of the more significant relationship between divorce and delinquency. Then in the early 1930s. the influential work of Shaw and McKay at the University of Chicago challenged this pervasiveview. At a time when divorce and working mothers were becoming commonplace and more socially acceptable, their work indicated that broken homes were not an important cause of crime. In subsequent decades the work of Thrasher, Merton, Suther- land, Cohen, and the Gluecks decmphasized the role that divorce plays in delinquent behavior. Sykes (1980) points out that while the early sentimental view of "normal" family life may have biased the perception ofdelinquency causes, it is also possible that the broken family was in fact an important cause




of crime and delinquency prior to 1930. In subsequent decades, as public schooling and mass media began to play a larger role in child socialization, the importance of the family as an agency of socialization may have declined sharply.

Since there is a paucity of recent data relating divorce as a specific cause of marital disruption with delinquency in the United States, indirect evidence is reported here to shed light on the issue. Consistent with his results regarding psychosomatic illness, Nye (1957) found that among his sample of high school students, delinquency was most common among the children from unhappy intact homes and least common for the children from happy intact homes, with the proportion of delinquent children from homes broken by divorce and separation falling between the two extremes.

Three recently conducted literature reviews are relevant here. Recall that in her recent review of the effects of marital disruption on children, Bane (1976) concluded that studies which adequately control for economic status show few or no differences between children from one- and two-parent homes in terms of delinquent behaviors. Herzog and Sudia (1971: 19) and Rutter and Madge (1976 183) reviewed studies of broken homes in the United States and other countries and agreed that the broken home, per se, is less salient among relevant factors associated with delinquency than are the climate and tone of the home.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUDING STATEMENTS

T h i s article is an attempt to explore the possible long-term effects of divorce on the adults and children involved, and to address the issue of what specifically it is about divorce that may bring on such effects. For selected areas of concern the relevant literature has been reviewed, and thc following statements can be made.

I . Problems of household maintenance and of economic and occupational difficulties may accompany divorce.

2. Social participation may decrease when marriage becomes unsatisfactory. and then increase somewhat eventually after divorce.



370 JOURNAL OF FAMlLY ISSUES / SEPTEMBER 1981

3. While, at least temporarily, divorce may lead to an enhanced sex life, especially in men. casual sex among the divorced seemingly leaves something to be desired.

4. Both physical and mental health are best among the happily married, worst among the unhappily married, and somewhere between these two extremes among the divorced.

5. Data relating parental divorce with cognitive performance and school success are indirect, inconsistent and, therefore, inconclusive. The only related finding that reflects any consistency is the higher rate of school absence for children from broken homes when compared with children from intact homes.

6. Data are conflicting and, therefore, inconclusive in terms of the relationship between parental marital status and personality structure. However, there may be a relationship between parental marital happiness and personality structure. Children from happy marriages may display more desirable personality traits (particularly in terms of self-esteem and aggression) than either children from unhappy intact marriages or divorced marriages.

7. Adolescents from happy homes appear to have closer relationships with their parents than adolescents from both unhappy intact homes and homes where the parents have divorced. Furthermore, adolescents from divorced homes may have more distant relationships with their fathers, probably due to the father's absence, than do adolescents from unhappy intact homes. Also, adolescent women, but not men, from divorced homes may have closer relationships with their mothers than do adolescent women from unhappy homes.

8. Data arc conflicting and, therefore, inconclusive regarding differences between children from intact homes and children from divorced homes in dating behavior and in heterosexual interaction and "presentation-of-self."

9. Women whose parents have divorced may marry younger and are more likely to be pregnant at the time of marriage than women from intact homes. They may have lower orgasmic satisfaction in marriage, their husbands may be less desirable along some dimensions, and they (along with men from divorced homes) may be more likely to end their own marriages in divorce.




10. Mental health and psychosomatic illness appear to be related to parental family structure, but are more likely related to happiness in the family in terms of parental marital happiness and/ or childhood happiness.

11. Diabetes may be more common among children of divorce than among children from intact homes.

12. If there is a positive relationship between parental divorce and delinquency, divorce, per se, may be of no greater importance to the incidence of delinquency than family discord,

When considering the research reviewed here and the summary statements listed directly above, two facts are suggested. The first is that little can be concluded about the long-term effects of divorce with any certainty. This is not due Simply to lack of research efforts expended in this direction, but to the conceptual and methodological limitations of the work that has been done. Specifically these limitations are:

1. In many studies divorce is not singled out from other types of marital dissolution and other types of father-absence. Divorce represents a unique process to those involved when compared with death and separation. For this reason research is needed which deals specifically with divorced individuals and their children if we are to make statements about the effects of divorce.

2. The demonstration of statistical association between marital status and outcome variables would be more meaning- ful if studies did not systematically ignore remarried persons. Outcome studies on divorce typically utilize current marital Status rather than marital history; in other words, they compare subjects in their first marriage with currently divorced subjects. Since most of the divorced remarry and do so within a very few years after divorce, the sample of the divorced subjects is heavily biased in favor of those select cases who remarry late or fail to remarry at all. Overall (1971), in his study of Psychiatric patients, concludes that marital history is a stronger Predictor of psychopathology than is current marital status. Those who remarry after divorce have experienced divorce, and should experience the effects of divorce, unless, of course, such effects are nullified by remarriage.



372 J O U R N A L OF FAMILY ISSUES / SEPTEMBER 1981

3. There is, in general, inadequate control for important variables. Research has suggested that some factors affect the impact of divorce on parents and children. For example, Santrock's (1972) work suggests that sex and age of onset determine achievement outcomes for children, and Bale's work (1979) suggests that race is an important factor in the relationship between parental divorce and achievement. Con- sidering adults, several studies suggest that sex affects the consequences of divorce. For example, the Hetherington et al. (1977) study suggested different effects of divorce on social life and sexual behavior for men and women. In addition to these variables of sex, age of onset, and race, others should be controlled because they are believed to affect social life in general (i.e,, socioeconomic status and religion) or because they logically might affect the consequences of divorce (e.g., severity of marital discord and postdivorcc relationships.)

4. Most studies utilize samples drawn from local populations. While such studies are useful, wealso need studies which are national in scope, whose findings can be generalized to the entire United States population.

5. The research design commonly used to address the issue of divorce effects is less than ideal for that purpose. Since most studies use correlational data, we can never be certain about the reasons for the statistical relationships. In other words, what are often assumed to be effects may not be effects at all and, in fact, may be causes. For example, data consistently show a strong relationship between psychopathy and marital status; persons who are divorced are overrepresented among psychiatric patients, and persons who are married and living with their spouses arc underrepresented. There are several possible explanations for this type of relationship: (a) the psychopathy may have preceded or occurred during the marriage and constituted a select' n factor leading to divorce, (b) the lifestyle associated with marriage may be a protective agent from psychopathy, (c) divorce may be a stressor that can precipitate psychopathy, and (d) a third set of variables may predispose persons both to divorce and to psychopathy.

Of course, an alternative research design to be employed to determine the effects of divorce would be longitudinal in




nature involving a large national sample the members of which would be observed from birth until death. They would be checked periodically, possibly annually, for marital structure (intact, separated, divorced, dissolved by death and reconstituted after divorce and death) and for factors representing Possible effects of marital structure (practical problems of living, social life and intimate behavior, health and safety, cognitive performance and school success, personality, juvenile delinquency). Essentially the sample members would divide themselves into the six categories of marital structure, the intact family serving as the control group. Within these six Groups would be subgroups according to selected variables: sex, age at onset of dissolution (where applicable), socioeconomic status, religion and race, and results would be computed in terms of these variables. Such a design would allow observation of the process of change in marital structure as it relates to change in those factors representing possible effects. It could turn out that some factors believed to be effects actually precede divorce. But if they were to follow divorce and to fail to appear in the other categories of marital structure at the same point in time, we could with some certainty attributea causal relationship to the change.

Such a longitudinal design represents an idealistic approach to the problem at hand. Practical considerations surrounding its implementation include the prohibitive cost involved in conducting research over the span of a human lifetime of subjects in a highly mobile society. Also, inherent in such an extended time frame are problems of discontinuity (contin- uous replacement) of research personnel, retest biases and subject attrition. Finally, our methodological sophistication is not as yet sufficiently developed to effectively disentangle the confounding effects of the numerous unanticipated and un- defined intervening factors or variables which would come into Play over the period of a lifetime.

A realistic compromise to this idealistic design would be a Correlational study using representative samples of useful populations, appropriate comparison groups and controlling for relevant social variables. Another more practical design Would be retrospective in nature, where a sample of married




subjects and a sample of divorced subjects, stratified by age, would be compared on self-reported information describing, from their personal perceptions, which factors influenced which outcomes at various stages in their life cycles.

The second major observation which emerges from a review of the research cited here is that family discord may be a more important determinant of the effects with which we are concerned than marital structure. Research conducted by Renne (1971), Raschke and Raschke( 1977). Zill(1978), Landis (1962). Nye (1957), Herzog and Sudia (1971: 19) and Rutter and Madge (1976: 183) indicate that the adverse effects sometimes associated with divorce actually may result from the marital discord which preceded the divorce. In general these researchers found that detrimental characteristics were least prevalent for individuals from intact happy homes and most prevalent for those from unhappy intact homes, with the prevalence of those from divorced homes falling somewhere between these two extremes. These findings suggest that divorce may serve to relieve stress and to neutralize the debilitating effects of marital discord.

It is suggested here that future research should explore this possibility that the marital discord associated with divorce is at least partially responsible for the adversity sometimes associated with it. Such research would require a design, ideally longitudinal but realistically correlational or retrospective in nature that would compare il divorced sample with samples of subjects from intact homes with high and low degrees of marital discord.

What current research suggests is that it is the emotional climate of the home that is critical to our well-being rather than actual family structure. A discouraging 9spect of this review is the realization that most research on this topic is conducted in an intellectual vacuum. For decades serious writers have unanimously adopted the premise that discord rather than divorce is the critical variable, yet research designs which incorporate this assumption are few. Commenting on this state of affairs Turner (1980) states, "One is led almost to despair over the noncumulative nature of research in this area,"




Another discouraging consideration brought to the fore in this review is the seemingly commonplace nature of marital and family discord and the devastating effects it may have on those involved. The information reviewed here suggests the need to be less concerned withdivorce prevention than with the cornpatability of marital partners, But cornpatability is difficult partly because men and women have been socialized to be different from one another, to have different, and in some cases, opposing interests and life goals. Furthermore, we all learn as we are socialized into dating and mating procedures and norms to view members of the opposite sex as commodi- ties instead of companions and friends. If Lynch (1977) and others are correct in their assertion that the human mind and body thrive on the comfort of a warm accepting intimate human relationship, then in these contemporary times where emphasis is on flexibility and change, competition and achievement and social and geographical mobility rather than on stability and commitment, was must take special care to see that needed intimacy is attainable. It makes sense then to alter our socialization patterns in such a way that the inevitable conflict of interests between husbands and wives, while being recognized, can remain manageable. We need to teach our children social skills in interacting with theoppositesex so that somewhere in the future men and women will be able to enjoy the companionship of one another and consequently be able to Provide for one another the needed benefits of human intimacy.

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Ann Goerring is Assisrani Professor yf Soriology a1 Western f inturkg Universiiy. Shr was awarded her bachelor's and masrtr's degrees at Central AIlchiRan Uniwrslry. in 1965 and I967 resprrively, and her Ph. D. at Wesrern Michigan Universliy in 1978, She has presented and published several papers on rlivorce and remarriage in the Uniirtl Slates. Currrnrly. her research inreresrs lie in rross-culrural/amil~ pracrires in prbons. and in furnil), Ian.



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