Single-Parent Homes vs. Divorce: A Critical Comparison

Introduction

This paper critically compares the empirical arguments made by McLanahan and Sandefur, Cherlin et al., and Amato et al. regarding the effects of single-parent households and divorce on children's development, behavior, and academic achievement.

McLanahan and Sandefur: The Case for Two-Parent Homes

McLanahan and Sandefur view the two-parent home as a prerequisite for raising successful, well-adjusted children. They observe that income in a single-parent household is lower, meaning the child grows up economically disadvantaged and will subsequently face difficulties gaining access to higher education and finding stable employment.

A single-parent home also creates educational difficulties, leaving the child less able to adjust in school. Additional hardships include a sense of chaos, since the child's sense of family security has been disrupted, and no other family member — including grandparents — can fully replicate the stability of a two-parent household.

Furthermore, a single mother may withdraw from her community and social network as a result of depression or bitterness, or she may seek to build an entirely new social circle. Either outcome can increase the child's alienation and sense of aimlessness. Most significantly, the child may witness the mother engaging in behaviors prompted by the upheaval of separation, which may in turn encourage the child to engage in irresponsible behavior.

In short, McLanahan and Sandefur argue that children almost always face difficult transitions — completing school, finding employment, and forming their own families — and that children raised by both parents are better equipped to navigate these transitions than those raised by one parent alone. This disadvantage stems not only from the absence of a role model, but also from the cumulative effects of reduced resources, the loss of a father figure, maternal unavailability, poor family examples, and chronic stress — all of which undermine academic achievement, employment prospects, and social development.

On all counts, then, McLanahan and Sandefur view the single-parent family as an undesirable situation to be avoided. For a broader overview of research on this topic, see the Wikipedia article on single parenthood.

Cherlin et al.'s (2007) essay covers similar ground, though it focuses more specifically on the destructive effects of divorce on children. Their longitudinal cross-sectional studies, conducted in both Britain and the United States, were designed to evaluate the impact of divorce on children and to determine whether boys or girls were more affected.

Cherlin et al.: Divorce and Its Effects on Children

A subsample of children — aged 7 in the British sample and aged 7 to 11 in the American data — were surveyed before their parents divorced and again four years later, following the divorce (when they were 11 years old and 11 to 16, respectively). In both countries and at both time points, children were assessed: in the British sample, children were graded on their reading and mathematics achievement; in the American sample, parents rated their children's behavior before and after the divorce. Children whose parents divorced or separated during this period were compared with children from intact families. For both boys and girls, pre-existing marital conflict and its possible effect on behavior were taken into account.

The authors found that accounting for prior conditions — including achievement and behavior problems already evident before the divorce — sharply reduced the negative impact observed in boys' behavior following divorce and separation. For girls, a difference remained but was less pronounced.

Several limitations exist in this study. One significant weakness is the difficulty of comparing children from two countries with very different cultural atmospheres and values. Academic expectations, for instance, are considerably stricter in the United Kingdom than in the United States, and American results may have shown smaller differences than the British data did. Similarly, American and British families generally differ in their models of discipline and family structure. Given how different the two countries are in both behavioral norms and academic standards, applying findings from one national context directly to the other is problematic. Research on the effects of divorce on families consistently highlights the importance of cultural context in interpreting outcomes.

Additionally, while the authors were correct to include variables such as pre-divorce marital stress and prior conditions — a step that many other researchers have failed to take — they fall short by not accounting for other variables that may explain the disturbance observed in children's post-divorce or post-separation settings. Economic factors, as McLanahan and Sandefur demonstrate, or variables such as maternal social isolation or maternal depression may also affect children, potentially driving the outcomes the researchers observed rather than the divorce or separation itself being the determining factor.

In effect, what Cherlin et al. demonstrate is that children of both genders are negatively influenced by divorce and separation, though they had already been negatively affected by adverse conditions before the divorce or separation occurred.

Conclusion

McLanahan, Sara S., and Gary Sandefur. Growing Up with a Single Parent.