Postdivorce Adjustment Research Articles

Black Men's Perceptions of Divorce-Related Stressors and Strategies for Coping With Divorce

The divorce rate among Blacks in the United States has increased significantly in recent years. Consequently, an increasing number of Black men confront problems associated with adjusting to divorce. Using data from in-depth interviews, we identify factors that working-class/middle-class Black men perceive to cause significant stress following divorce and we examine strategies that they use to reestablish their lives. The results show that Black men confront the following divorce-related stressors: (a) financial strain, (b) noncustodial parenting, (c) child-support stressors, and (d) psychological as well as physiological distress. The findings suggest that divorced Black men experience profound postdivorce psychological distress. The data further indicate that Black men employ the following strategies to cope with the stress of marital dissolution: (a) reliance on family and friends, (b) involvement in church-related activities, (c) participation in social activities, and (d) establishment of intimate heterosexual relationships 1 year after divorce. These findings indicate that postdivorce adjustment should be scrutinized within relevant social-cultural contexts.

Preventive intervention with adolescents and divorced mothers: A conceptual framework for program design and evaluation

This article highlights the need for an empirically based, developmentally relevant program for adolescents and their divorced mothers. A conceptual framework for program development and evaluation is then proposed for preventive intervention efforts designed to reduce the prevalence of maladjustment in adolescents in single divorced-mother families and increase effective functioning of the mothers in those families. Attention is given to applied use of the growing literature on linkages between divorce and adolescent adjustment, and particularly to the role of several family processes in adolescents' postdivorce adjustment: maternal expectations, discipline, decision making, and parent-adolescent relationships.

Pre- and Post-Divorce Father-Child Relationships and Child Adjustment

Divorced noncustodial fathers (n = 106), often disre- garded in the literature, were s w e y e d regarding intluences on their parenting relationships with fheir children, and Ule effects of this relationship on their child's adjustment, prior to and following di- vorce. Social support for fahers' post-divorce parenting involvement and support for and cooperation with their parental role from their ex-wives were predictive of their post-divorce relationships with their children. Fathers' relationships with their children and support for their parental role from their ex-wives contributed significantly to fathers' evaluations of their child's adjustment. The methodologi- cal limitations of this survey approach, and related suggestions for future research, are indicated within the context of the exploration of fathers' continuing role in their child's life and in the study of di- vorce.

Understanding Children's Divorce Adjustment from an Ecological Perspective

Using an ecological perspective, the comprehensive effect of divorce variables on children's post-divorce adjustment was investigated. The microsystem, exosystem and overall composite scores accounted for significant proportions of variance in children's self-reported maladjustment and self-esteem, but not in parents' reports of children's maladjustment. The implications for preventive interventions are discussed.

The Effects of Guilt on Divorce Adjustment

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between guilt and adjustment after divorce. It was hypothesized divorced persons who experienced high levels of guilt will experience lower levels of post-divorce adjustment, as measured by depression, role strain, and continuing attachment after divorce. The sample consisted of 29 men and 44 women, all of whom were presently divorced and had not been married to one another. The sample was drawn from self-help organizations in the southeastern part of the United States. Data were analyzed using correlations and multiple regression. Guilt correlated with both depression and continuing attachment after divorce. Guilt was regressed against a linear combination of depression, role strain, and attachment, but only depression and attachment were significantly related to guilt.

Support and Advice from Married and Divorced Fathers: Linkages to Adolescent Adjustment

Parental separation and divorce have become common experiences for children in the United States. For the last three decades, there have been increasing numbers of divorced parent households, and at current rates, 50% to 60% of all children born in the early 1980s will live with only one parent for at least a year before reaching the age of 18 years (Furstenberg, Nord, Peterson, & Zill, 1983; Glick, 1984; Martin Bumpass, 1989). There has been a great deal of variability reported in the experiences of adolescents after parental divorce. For a substantial minority of children in divorced families, adolescence is a period of less than optimal growth characterized by increases in substance abuse, truancy, depression, anxiety, and aggressive behavior, and a decline in academic performance (see Amato & Keith, 1991; for a meta-analysis). However, for many others, it is a time of enhanced responsibility, mature self-reliance, and identification with positive goals and values (Barber & Eccles, 1992). hat characteristics of divorced families are associated with adjustment during adolescence? Despite the profusion of literature on divorce, the focus on the features of the family environment that lead to maladaptive outcomes or successful adjustment for adolescents is relatively recent. Early studies of divorce used a social address approach (Bronfenbrenner & Crouter, 1983), assuming that any adjustment differences were due to family structure. Currently, increasing attention is being placed on using process-focused approaches to explain adjustment differences between family types. In the past decade, processes such as interparental conflict, parent-adolescent relationships, family decision making, and parental monitoring and control have received increasing attention as mediators of divorce effects on adolescent adjustment (Buchanan, Maccoby, & Dornbusch, 1992; Dornbusch et al., 1985; Forgatch, Patterson, & Skinner, 1988; Forehand, McCombs, Long, Brody, & Fauber, 1988; Hetherington et al., 1992; Peterson & Zill, 1986; Steinberg, 1987; Steinberg, Mounts, Lamborn, & Dornbusch, 1991). Most of this process-oriented research has examined the parenting behaviors of the custodial parent. Although frequency of father visitation and its relation to adjustment has been examined (e.g., Amato, 1986; Furstenberg, Morgan, & Allison, 1987), the quality and content of paternal contact, in addition to the processes associated with that contact, have rarely been assessed. In particular, developmentally relevant d mains of father-adolescent relationships, such as discussions about future plans, merit attention in the search for family processes that are predictive of postdivorce adjustment. A further gap in divorce research is that within-group variability of divorced families is seldom considered. This study sought not only to examine whether differences in father-adolescent relationships between two-parent and divorced families accounted for differences in adolescent adjustment, but also to describe within-group variability in postdivorce fathering and in adolescent adjustment. Divorce and Adolescent Adjustment Divorce has been implicated in several areas of child and adolescent maladjustment, including social, emotional, behavioral, and scholastic problems (Amato & Keith, 1991). The negative effects of divorce are most common around the period of the divorce, and many children and families recover from the initial distress and resume normal functioning within a few years (Hetherington, Cox, & Cox, 1982). However, a substantial number of adolescents in divorced-mother families remain at a disadvantage even 4 to 6 years after the divorce when compared to their peers in two-parent families, particularly in the areas of self-processes and internalizing problems (Allison & Furstenberg, 1989; Hetherington et al., 1992). These two domains are briefly examined below. Self-processes. …

Fathers' Perspectives of Their Co-Parental Relationships Postdivorce: Implications for Family Practice and Legal Reform

Recent research on the effects of divorce indicates that the relationp between ex-spouses is a crucial, albeit often overlooked, factor in the postdivorce adjustment of mothers, fathers, and children (Ambert, 1989; Furstenburg & Cherlin, 1991; Masheter, 1991). Systems theory suggests that a divorce does not end the relationship between two individuals but transforms it (Elkin, 1982). It is important to recognize that ex-spouses continue to exert an influence on each other directly (e.g., payment of child support) and/or indirectly (e.g., through the children) well after a divorce (Ahrons, 1981; Kerr & Bowen, 1988). From a systemic perspective, the degree of interdependence is a central concept in understanding the way relationships are constructed and maintained and is based on mutual contingency (i.e., change in one person influences another) (Scanzoni, Polonko, Teachman, & Thompson, 1989). Subsequently, the notion of interdependence is extremely useful in conceptualizing family relationships postdivorce--for even when the formal husband/wife relationship ceases to exist, the continuing relationship between parents, vis-a-vis their children, usually necessitates some level of mutual involvement. Innovations in custody arrangements (i.e., joint custody and shared parenting) and increasing involvement of fathers in childrearing serve as links requiring divorced parents to engage in frequent interactions (Ahrons & Perlmutter, 1982). The notion of interdependence can also be reflected in research which has found that former spouses have functioned as a source of help to each other--either in the form of emotional support or instrumental assistance (Ahrons, 1980; Mitchell, 1981). Stack (1986) has suggested that this form of interdependence (using the former spouse as a source of social support) tends to be discouraged given the social attitude that it is best for divorcing couples to make a clean break. Contact between ex-spouses has typically been viewed in the past as pathological and an indication of separation distress (Kressel, Lopez-Morillas, Weinglass, & Deutsch, 1978). However, a growing body of evidence has pointed to the benefits of more harmonious co-parental relationships, given the detrimental effects of continued interparental conflict on children (Emery, 1988; Furstenburg & Cherlin, 1991; Hetherington, Cox, & Cox, 1989) and adults (Ambert, 1989; Kitson, 1992; Masheter, 1991). Research focusing on the co-parental relationship from the noncustodial father's perspective is relatively sparse in the divorce literature. Information about noncustodial fathers is all too often obtained from mothers and may not accurately describe fathers' postdivorce experiences. For example, discrepancies between mothers' and fathers' reports have arisen in the areas of father involvement postdivorce (Ahrons, 1983; Seltzer, 1991; Seltzer & Bianchi, 1988), child support payment (Beller & Graham, 1986; Wright & Price, 1986), and the quality of relations between ex-spouses (Ambert, 1989; Goldsmith, 1981; Spanier & Thompson, 1984). To truly understand the nature and implications of mens' and womens' interdependence postdivorce, inclusion of fathers' perspectives is essential. Both Ahrons (1981) and Clarke-Stewart and Bailey (1990) suggest that men and women are sensitive to different issues in developing postdivorce relationships with their former mates Masheter (1992) also emphasizes the importance of considering both spouses' interpretations of various episodes and discussions in understanding relationship dialectics in postdivorce relationships between ex-spouses. Her use of episode analysis highlighted differences between ex-spouses in interpreting recounted conversations that occurred before and after the divorce. Although we do not have data on both spouses' perceptions, we can at least provide some balance to the literature in this area by analyzing fathers' (vs. mothers') perceptions of their relationships postdivorce. …

The Disengaged Noncustodial Father: Implications for Social Work Practice with the Divorced Family

The dramatic increase in rates during the past 25 years has shifted social work research and clinical practice to a newly emerged population considered to be at risk: parents and children affected by marital divorce. The rapidly expanding literature, an array of social services organizations, and legal and policymaking bodies have clearly identified as a major social phenomenon and family transition during as an important mental health issue. At the same time men's issues, and particularly the father-child relationship, have become a source of considerable public discussion and have received high priority for methodological inquiry. An emergent trend of fatherhood has been identified and androgynous fathering promoted, generating much speculation and controversy in the literature. Despite varying levels of child care involvement among fathers, who are far from a homogeneous group in this regard, fathers' emotional investment in their children prevails over other aspects of their lives, and fathers' attachment bonds with their children can no longer be regarded as secondary. Thus, in social work, the importance of engaging fathers in the therapeutic endeavor is a priority. Although and fatherhood research is now flourishing, fathers remain a largely neglected population in the professional literature. Similarly, despite the emergence of therapeutic practice models based on the involvement of all family system members in the therapeutic endeavor, social work practice with families largely continues to exclude fathers. The contribution that social workers can make to families in transition and to the adjustment of family members to the consequences of is considerable. Family mediation and counseling are emerging as important fields of practice for the profession. With the paucity of empirically grounded and systematic information about this one member of the postdivorce family system, particularly in light of data stressing the importance of ongoing meaningful relationships between both parents and their children for the postdivorce adjustment of all family members (Hetherington, Cox, & Cox, 1985; Wallerstein & Kelly, 1980), social work practitioners remain limited in regard to engaging fathers in their work with family systems. This article reports the results of a research study of the impact of on noncustodial fathers and the phenomenon of noncustodial fathers' disengagement from their children's lives, discusses the implications of the study for social work practice with families in transition, and begins to develop an alternative conceptualization to prevailing stereotypes of fatherhood. The goal of the research was to identify and integrate the missing elements in the literature and to contribute to an empirically based understanding of fatherhood. It is hoped that this in turn will lead to more informed practice with and divorcing populations. The study gathered data directly from fathers, with a primary emphasis on their perception of changes in their relationships with their children before, during, and after divorce. The point of final parental separation was considered to be the salient event in the process. As Wallerstein and Kelly (1980) found, although the legal ratifies child custody and access arrangements, the transition period from the point of separation to about six months to one year afterward is most critical in establishing and consolidating postdivorce patterns and relationships among family members. Thus, divorce here refers to the final parental separation, not the legal decree, and the transition period six months to one year after. The term divorced father also requires clarification. In light of the heterogeneity of patterns of fatherhood existing within two-parent families, fathers should not be assumed to constitute a homogeneous group. …

PLANNING FOR POSTDIVORCE FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

This article proposes that the focus of child custody evaluation and mediation needs to be broadened beyond custody arrangement to consideration of the range of factors that may impact on postdivorce relationships. A review of current social science literature shows that factors such as quality of parent‐child relationships and level of parental conflict may be as important as residence schedule in influencing children's postdivorce adjustment. The article offers strategies for involving parents in drafting agreements to guide relationships with each other and with the children. The goal is for parents to thoughtfully tailor relationships and parenting practices to children's needs during the transition from a one‐household family to a new family plan.

Post-Divorce Adjustment of Black and White Single Parents

This study addressed the post-divorce adjustment of black and white single parents. It improved upon previous studies by assessing the adjustment of nationally-representative samples of black and white divorced parents, by focusing exclusively on divorced single parents, and by assessing adjustment in several life domains. The National Survey of Families and Households was used, with 486 white divorced parents and 126 black divorced parents in the sample. Results indicated that, as hypothesized, after controlling for socioeconomic status and time since divorce, black divorced parents were more satisfied with being parents than were white respondents, black females were less likely than white females to indicate that someone in the home had a substance abuse problem, and black males were more likely than other groups to be satisfied with their work both in and out of their homes. There were no significant racial differences on measures assessing depression, health, life satisfaction, and quality of life si...

Multiple Predictors of Satisfactory Post-Divorce Adjustment of Single Custodial Parents

The study examined multiple factors related to satisfactory post-divorce adjustment of 204 single custodial parents. One hundred eighty-seven women and seventeen men were administered four instruments: Fisher Divorce Adjustment Scale; General Well Being Schedule; Single Parent Questionnaire; and a Single Parent Interview developed for the study. A survey format with delivery and pick up of test packets at participants' homes was used. Multiple regression statistical analysis was conducted. Findings indicate the strongest single predictor of divorce adjustment was the custodial parent's own subjective sense of well-being. Other significant factors included sense of social status and economic position, initiating the divorce, quantity and quality of friends, and employment satisfaction. Two other factors significant in a general equation were single parenting skills and overall relationship with the noncustodial parent.

The Consequences of Divorce Proceedings for Divorced Fathers

A critical issue for research is to determine why so many divorced fathers have little or no contact with their children. This study of 255 divorced fathers investigated the influence of divorce proceedings on divorced fathers' parental role and on several indicators of their post-divorce adjustment. The intervening influence of the custody arrangement was also considered. The study found that fathers reported spending less time with their children in divorce cases that were litigated than in cases involving out-of-court settlements. Also, fathers who litigated wanted more time with their children, reported less cooperativeness from their former spouse, and were more likely to relitigate than the other fathers in the study. Suggestions are offered for minimizing the need for litigation.

Interventions for children of divorce: toward greater integration of research and action.

A number of child-, family-, and system-focused interventions have been designed to prevent or reduce the negative effects of divorce on children. This article critically evaluates these intervention efforts by examining (a) their relation to basic research on the processes proposed to mediate children's postdivorce adjustment and (b) evaluation studies assessing the effectiveness of various programs. Although interventions address some of the factors proposed to mediate children's adaptation to divorce, the interplay between interventions and basic research on children's postdivorce adaptation is limited. Moreover, some intervention efforts appear to be beneficial, but most lack empirical documentation of their efficacy. This analysis leads to several recommendations for basic and applied research and for improving the response of the mental health field to the problems experienced by many children from divorcing families.

Family functions and children's postdivorce adjustment.

Data on school-age children of divorced parents were examined to determine which dimensions of family dynamics were most associated with the children's socioemotional adjustment. Those factors found to be most significant were family roles, behavior control, and affective involvement, as well as children's reaction to and insight into the divorce, and conflict in the home after the divorce. Implications for parent education and early intervention are discussed.

Caught Between Parents: Adolescents' Experience in Divorced Homes

This study examined adolescents' feelings of being caught between parents to see whether this construct helps to explain (1) variability in their postdivorce adjustment and (2) associations between family/child characteristics and adolescent adjustment. Adolescents 10 to 18 years old (N = 522) were interviewed by telephone 4 1/2 years after their parents' separation. Feeling caught between parents was related to high parental conflict and hostility and low parental cooperation. Being close to both parents was associated with low feelings of being caught. The relation between time spent with each parent and feeling caught depended on the coparenting relationship. Adolescents in dual residence were especially likely to feel caught when parents were in high conflict, and especially unlikely to feel caught when parents cooperated. Feeling caught was related to poor adjustment outcomes. Parental conflict was only related to adjustment outcomes indirectly, through adolescents' feelings of being caught.

Children of divorce: Predictors of change following preventive intervention.

Fifty-three fourth- and fifth grade children were tested on postdivorce adjustment immediately before and six months after participation in an eight-week preventive intervention program. At follow-up, most showed positive change, with those at special risk for adjustment problems showing substantial gains. Results did not vary with sociodemographic or divorce circumstances.

FACTORS THAT ENHANCE OR CURTAIL THE SOCIAL FUNCTIONING OF FEMALE SINGLE PARENTS

Explored in this study of 67 women who have been divorced for 2 or more years are the factors enhancing or limiting the social functioning of these individuals. The path analysis identifies such factors as duration of marriage, number of children, involvement of ex‐spouse, and family support as determinants of postdivorce adjustment.

Economics and Well-Being of Older Divorced Persons

The purpose of this research was to compare gender differences in postdivorce cconomic factors and in the well-being of older persons who were in long-term marital relationships. Although more women were depressed, overall there were no significant gender differences in postdivorce adjustment. Data suggest present income is the best predictor of well-being for both genders, and reliance on types of gender related income have a negative impact on women. Findings are discussed in terms of implications for structural changes, policy modifications, and direct practice issues.

The Long Shadow of Marital Conflict: A Model of Children's Postdivorce Adjustment

The Long Shadow of Marital Conflict: A Model of Children's Postdivorce Adjustment

Postdivorce Adjustment:

Presentation des facteurs de support social affectant l'ajustement post-divorce des personnes mariees depuis 15 ans ou plus. N=111 personnes d'un âge moyen de 56 ans. Evaluations par echelles