Abstract
Data from High Court divorce records are used to investigate three themes relating to children and divorce in New Zealand. An attempt to test the hypothesis that, cross-sectionally, children act as a deterrent to divorce produces inconclusive results. A marked trend toward more frequent involvement of children in divorce during the late 1960s and 1970s is demonstrated, this reflecting both a rising divorce rate and a shift to higherparities in the distribution of divorcing couples by parity. Finally, it is shown that, as New Zealand's divorce rate has risen, the maternal monopoly on formal custody awards made in divorce cases has intensified. It is speculated that as divorce has become more acceptable and as women have become economically better able to opt out of unsatisfactory marriages, the core of divorce cases in which a mother is unwilling or demonstrably unfit to have custody has become a smaller proportion of all cases.
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