Current Status of Homosexual Marriages in America

Homosexual Parenting

Literature Review on homosexual parenting

For a period extending back to the last twenty years, the number of households headed by same-sex parents in the United States has subtly increased. According to a unanimous agreement in the U.S. In 2010, the number of same-sex couples who stay together was estimated to be 646,464, out of which 514,735 were unmarried couples of the same sex while 131,729 were married couples of similar sex. In another survey carried out in the U.S. In 2000, it was established that almost 163,879 households had children although they were headed by similar sex couples. With about 33% of households belonging to similar sex females, it was found out that bisexual or Lesbians had higher chances of being parents as compared to Bisexual or gays who accounted for just 22% although these male couples had at least a child below the age of 18 under their care (Gates, 2011). However, as pointed out by a social study conducted in 2008, there are 49% of bisexual women or lesbians parented children as opposed to 19% of bisexual men or gays (Massey et al., 2013).

Due to increased incidences of same-sex parenting, and as the number of similar sex couples also grew, there has been a gradual acceptance of this phenomenon. With general attitudes and degrees of tolerance remaining relatively stable from 2007-2011, there has also been a lessening of acts of condemnation of this strange spectacle from 50% to 35% (Pew Research Center, 2011).

One notable factor is that the prevalence of either negative or positive attitude still shows a strong partisan inclination with 28% of Democrats expressing distaste for this practice while 53% of Republicans maintains similar sex parenting was an abomination to society. And to make matters worse, Gates (2011) discovered that in the conservative parts of the country, the number of similar sex couples who parented was slightly on the higher side. These complexities post by divergent attitudes towards similar sex parenting has led to a perplexing panorama of prohibitions and limitations, not to mention anti-discrimination and protection laws associated with similar sex parenting (Massey et al., 2013).

Reviews

One interesting occurrence took place in Australia where a study published about similar sex parenting caused a major stir when it insinuated that the well-being of children parented by homosexuals was better if not as good as the welfare of children brought up by heterosexual guardians. If there was an indication of limitations or problems children under the guardianship of same-sex parents faced, then this was linked to the stigma attributed to same-sex parenting. The foremost researcher held firm in this dialogue that it was liberating for guardians to accept or adopt responsibilities that befitted their skills instead of clinging to stereotypes of gender in which the father was the breadwinner while the mother was the basic caregiver (Crouse, 2014)

In a non-random sample, the authors of this seemingly outrageous report put advertisements in homosexual publications and websites in order to attract participants. Those who took part participated in the survey with the foreknowledge of the fact that the ultimate goal of the study was to give homosexual parenting a veneer of respectability. The study's actual finding were therefore held in great doubt or altogether considered impossible due to these influencing factors (Crouse, 2014)

The research by Crouch known as The Australian Research of Child Health in Similar-sex Families carried out under the auspices of University of Melbourne was a sample of convenience of about 390 guardians from the South of Australia who willingly identified themselves as being attractive to people of similar sex and were rearing children between the ages of 0- to 17-year-olds. The parents indicated many dimensions relating to the health and welfare of the children and any links to assumed or suspected instances of stigma examined. Of the 315 parents who willingly identified themselves, representing 500 children, 18% of the total had male index parents while a whopping 80% had parents with female index. Again, by employing parental interviews, Couch related his research participants with those who took part in the Victorian Child Health and Wellbeing Survey or VCHWS in which 5,025 Victorian children below the age of 13 years were randomly chosen. He also used another research (the Health of Young Victorians Study) or HOYVS which was an epidemiological research of the well-being and health of 5,414 children ranging between the ages of 5-18 years (Crouse, 2014)

Crouch therefore said that children in similar couple families scored highly on percentages of how they generally behaved, in terms of family cohesion and in general health compared to the normative data of the population, furthermore, he discovered no remarkable difference for all other scale scores between the two groups. Linked to increased negative stigma were factors such as mental health, physical activities and family cohesion, and increased stigma was more so associated positively with incidences of emotional symptoms (Crouse, 2014)

Surprisingly, Crouch still goes ahead to somehow contradict his final analysis by summarizing that it was clear there were certain aspects at play in their sample of similar-sex couples that permitted improved results in the general health, general behavior and particularly in family cohesion. He went ahead to suggest that while there was no evidence to indicate that any parental group would particularly respond in a given way on any chosen scale, such a conclusion could not be entirely discredited. He suggested that further studies should be predicated on reports from the children themselves as well as on contextual examination of qualitative data derived from interviews with families with the objective of eliminating any biases that might arise from the parents (Crouse, 2014)

Marks (2012) critically examines the American Psychological Association's conclusions on Gay and Lesbian parenting and contends that the conclusion's assertion that there were no differences between normal family settings and children from similar sex arrangements was not wholly supported by extant studies. This researcher focuses on 7 questions outlining the standards for the study of lesbian and gay couples, and he poses that researches that do not meet these criteria cannot reach general conclusions regarded this segment of society (Osborne, 2012).

Marks (2012) points out at the work of Sarantakos as an instance of a study that is scientifically viable which contradicts the findings that showed no differences. He states that the research by Sarantakos was more rigorous as compared to other researches in this arena because it was one of the most comprehensive researches about the outcome of children which gave a comparison of such results across heterosexual cohabiting or n=58, heterosexual married or n=58 and homosexual guardians or n=58 by employing data from diverse sources, and by using techniques of standard regression to indicate the differences between groups which might be linked with child outcomes and belonging to the group such as attainment in education (Osborne, 2012).

As Mark (2012) asserts, the challenges of extant studies about similar-sex parents is its inability to take a critical look on the societal fears about issues like labor force contribution, intergenerational poverty, incarceration, collegiate education, alcohol/drug abuse, early parenthood, or suicides which are mostly the fodder of national researches on young adults, adolescents and children (page 16 in manuscript). Furthermore, the study gives scanty information regarding the long-term results of children of gay or lesbian parents. He compares this lack of detailed information with the proliferation of studies carried out about children of remarriages, cohabitation, and increasingly divorces (Osborne, 2012).

He further contends that samples from less than 393 participants have no requisite statistical authenticity to reveal the minor differences in results. His evaluation of type two mistakes begets two essential issues namely: why does society want to ascertain the variances in results between children brought up by heterosexual parents and similar-sex parents, and secondly, why could anyone possible suppose these differences are there? By considering these questions from a different perspective and asking why there is undue interest shown in children of similar-sex parents, Mark (2012) asserts that nearly all the previous studies in this field revealed no variances in results between children brought up by similar-sex parents and those raised by biological and married parents. All the same, all nearly all studies comparing children of married or biological parents to any other type of family comes up with differences which are often accounted for by selection and are moderate but the differences in averages still remains clear (Osborne, 2012).

Using eight different types of childhood families, Regnerus (2012) examines outcomes in young adults. He focuses especially on the differences linked to being brought up in a formal biological-married parenthood that is intact as opposed to being brought up by parents in a similar-sex relationship. The question that needs to be asked at this stage is to what degree the study by Regnerus meets the criterion set by Mark? One of the most rigorous and comprehensive researches that has been carried out in this field to-date is the one by Regnerus. But even so, he still cautiously states that his evaluation comes up with differences in results, but does not substantiate why these variances take place. Again, his research does not distinguish the impacts of being parented by someone in a similar-sex union as opposed to the influences brought about by being in other types of families (Osborne, 2012).

Using a large random sample of nearly 3,000 American young adults aged between 19 to 39 years known as The New Family Structure Study, (Regnerus 2012) avoided certain main flaws of the previous researches on this subject, like biased sampling and small size samples approaches collectively referred to as convenience sampling where the set of data is got by soliciting for volunteers and placing adverts on homosexual publications. He also applied sets of data that were non-representative which normally included just lesbian guardians (Marks, 2012).

This research revealed that many consistent variances existed between children of guardians who had had similar-sex relationships and those with heterosexual or married parents. His study more specifically discovered that children with homosexual guardians were most likely to experience poor impulse control, suicidal tendencies, depression, view themselves as homosexuals, needed mental healthcare, were prone to unfaithfulness to their partners, easily contracted sexually transmitted diseases, had lower income levels, chose cohabitation, smoked marijuana and drunk to get drank and were sexually molested. Like a snapshot in time, the research employed a design that was cross-sectional thereby enabling the author to quickly point out that even though much dissimilarity were noted, the outcome did not in any way support the view that the negativities were as a result of only homosexual parenting. However, the research showed very well that the claim to dissimilarities in parenting results ought to be re-examined with more studies. It also raised the likelihood that parenting by homosexuals might in a way give rise to many negative results in adult stages as opposed to parenting by heterosexuals (Aist, 2014).

Regnerus (2012) to a large extent examines these fears and the data by NFSS gives a good platform for more exploration. He evaluates 40 results such as educational and employment attainment and demographic characteristics, risk behavior, quality of relationship and physical and emotional health among young adults. He discovers that out of the 40 results, 25 children whose mothers were in a similar-sex relationship or LM are in young adulthood remarkably different as compared to the ones whose entire childhood was spent in solid families with their biological or married parents. But after statistical controls, many of these differences still persist (Osborne, 2012).

That many significant variances exist between groups after correct controls is confirmed by Regnerus (2012) even though he fails to give a theoretical framework as to why these dissimilarities occur (Osborne, 2012).

Allen et al. (2013) re-evaluated an earlier research carried out by Rosenfeld that employed a limited sub-sample of a huge data base known as the Public-Use U.S. micro-data sample from the census of 2000, and he arrived at the conclusion that when one uses control for parental SES and the behavior of the students it is hard to isolate children from similar-sex parents with any statistical accuracy from those in married or heterosexual unions. Employing the same set of data but with alternative control groups and by incorporating controls of sub-groups left out in the Rosenfeld study and using unrestricted data, Allen et al., discovered that children brought up by couples in similar-sex unions were unlikely to progress normally in school by 35% in comparison to those from married parents in heterosexual union. In the second of the two researches (Allen, 2013) employed a much larger random sample of Canadian census of 2006 to evaluate the graduation rates of high school students. The outcome indicated that children staying with lesbian or gay families were just 65% as capable of graduating from high school as compared to children raised in married or heterosexual unions. In this study, daughters raised by homosexual parents performed a lot worse than their brother counterparts. These two studies taken together cast aspersions on the various claims that no variances existed, and this paper is a confirmation of the revelations of Allen et al., that it is indeed true that children from similar-sex parentage performed poorly in academic work in comparison to those from married or heterosexual unions (Allen, 2013).

Conclusions or cause-and-effect inferences as to why these differences occur cannot be made because even these two studies also employed cross-sectional designs. However, the outcomes raise the probability that parenting by homosexuals might in itself lead to dismal academic performance in comparison with parenting by heterosexuals (Aist, 2014).

Concerning this matter, Schumm (2010) carried out two evaluations or meta-analyses of the outcomes from the earlier researches. The reason for using meta-analysis is simply because it analyzes after combination data from chosen published researches with a view to sufficiently increasing the size of the sample in order to detect minor variances and enhance the power of the statistics in order to compensate for the small size of the sample and lack of major statistical differences in the chosen researches. The key thrust of his findings includes analyses of statistics of the outcomes of ten researches that brought together family backgrounds of adult children having parents who are homosexuals. The findings of these analyses indicated that almost 45% of grown up children with parents who were homosexuals were also themselves homosexuals.

Employing a figure that could be verified of just about 3% as an indication of the prevalence of lesbians, gays, bisexuals or homosexuals in the entire population, I estimated that grown up children from homosexual backgrounds are almost 15 times likely to develop homosexual inclinations than grown up children from heterosexual unions. This difference is not just of a major magnitude, but it is also of remarkable statistical significance. Instead of leaving matters at this point, Schumm still went on to use data drawn from 26 other researches that had reached the conclusion that there are no dissimilarities and he used a similar analysis. When he limited that data to only the children who were aged 17 years or those who were older at the instance when the data was gathered so that the matter of adult results per se could be addressed, he discovered that 28% of the grown up children from homosexual unions were actually the same - homosexuals. In contrast, just a mere 2.3% of the grown up children from heterosexual unions were actually homosexuals themselves. Therefore, from this meta-analysis, grown up children from homosexual unions were 12 times as likely to be homosexuals as compared to grown up children from heterosexual unions.