Divorced Single Parents' Perceptions of Child-Related Problems

Sex differences in children’s response to parental divorce: 1. Research methodology and postdivorce family forms.

“…For example, we cannot determine from such a finding whether the variables chosen for study are insensitive in general in distinguishing between children of divorced and intact marriages, or sensitive—but equally so—across sexes. Kurdek and Berg noted such variable characteristics as one possible explanation for the finding of a sex difference in their 1983 study, but not in the earlier reports of Kurdek, Blisk, and Siesky (1981) or of Kurdek and Siesky (1978). The measures used by Kurdek and Berg had the best internal consistency and may simply have been more sensitive in picking up divorce reactions.…”

“…In some instances, this strategy of comparison was necessitated by the nature of the dependent measures. The work of Kurdek and colleagues (Kurdek & Berg, 1983; Kurdek et al, 1981; Kurdek & Siesky, 1978) and of Reinhard (1977) involved measures of children’s response specifically to divorce, and only children of divorced parents were appropriate for inclusion in the study. There are also research reports in Table 1 in which data from intact family children were available, but the contrast chosen for examining the sex difference hypothesis was that of divorce family boys with divorce family girls (Hodges, Wechsler, & Ballantine, 1979; Rosen, 1979).…”

“…It was a problem in the literature that some (specifically, four) studies included extremely broad age ranges. Thus, for example, Rosen (1979) reported on a sample of “children” ranging in age from nine to28, and Kurdek and Siesky’s (1978) study involved parents of children between eight months and 31 years old. With some researchers stressing the age-related nature of children’s response to divorce (Kurdek and colleagues, and Wallerstein and Kelly), it would seem an important recommendation that future research should involve narrow and specified age groups or, alternatively, sufficiently large samples to examine subgroups or control for age.…”

“…The fourth prediction to be examined is that when studies include a mix as to custody (e.g., Kurdek, Blisk, & Siesky, 1981; Kurdek & Siesky, 1978), do not specify the remarriage status of the custodial mother or that the divorce was recent (Kinard & Reinhen, 1984; Reinhard, 1977), or do not hold constant or specify either custody or remarriage (Furstenberg & Allison, 1985; Kulka & Weingarten, 1979; Tuckman & Regan, 1966), we are most likely to find a report of no sex difference in children’s development following divorce. The hypothesis here is that with father custody or maternal remarriage subgroups present though unspecified in these samples, findings of outcomes for daughters vs sons of divorce will be mixed.…”

Sex differences in children’s response to parental divorce: 2. Samples, variables, ages, and sources.

“…There is a concentration of results in this group that report an absence of differences according to child sex. Five of the eight studies fall into this category (Gregory, 1965; Kurdek, Blisk, & Siesky, 1981, initial and follow-up data ; Kurdek & Siesky, 1978; Reinhard, 1977; Rosen, 1979).…”