School-based Groups for Children of Divorce

Cantor, Dorothy W.

doi:10.1300/j279v01n02_09

Cited by 28 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…However important a supportive environment is in helping children to identify, express, and deal with salient feelings about their parents' divorce, it may not by itself be enough to produce positive program outcomes (Cantor, 1977). Acquiring specific competencies for dealing with the concrete challenges that parental divorce poses is a co-equal need.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Children of Divorce Intervention Program: An investigation of the efficacy of a school-based prevention program.

Pedro-Carroll¹,

Cowen²

1985

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

163

124

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This study evaluates the effectiveness of the Children of Divorce Intervention Program (CODIP), a school-based, preventively oriented 10-week group program for fourth-grade through sixth-grade children of divorce. CODIP creates a supportive group atmosphere in which children can share divorce-related feelings, clarify common misconceptions, and reduce feelings of isolation and builds competence by teaching problem-solving, communication, and anger control skills to help children cope adaptively with challenges posed by parental divorce. Seventy-two children of divorce, in demographically matched groups, were assigned randomly to an immediate intervention (experimental) or a delayed intervention (control) group. The experimental group improved significantly more on teacher ratings of problem behaviors and competence and parent ratings of adjustment and self-reported anxiety. Group leaders also rated experimental group children as having improved significantly.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Children of Divorce Intervention Program: An investigation of the efficacy of a school-based prevention program.

Pedro-Carroll¹,

Cowen²

1985

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

163

124

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“…In particular, individuals who perceive themselves as having little control over outcomes are likely to develop situationally based explanations of causality to maintain a sense of personal esteem and competence (Gurin & Epps, 1975). Along similar lines, several authors have speculated that children's experience of their parents' divorce might lead to the development of external frames of reference (e.g., focusing on the problematic nature of the divorce rather than on one's coping skills) because major changes in family composition, residence, and income are occurring outside of the child's control and perhaps in direct conflict with his or her own wishes (Cantor, 1977;Duke & Lancaster, 1976;Kulka & Weingarten, 1979;Rotter, 1966;Wallerstein & Kelly, 1980). Children with an internal frame of reference, then, might be less likely to consider the divorce per se as a primary determinant of personal outcomes and, consequently, to experience few divorce-related problems.…”

Section: Wright State Universitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The finding that both locus of control and interpersonal reasoning were predictive of children's divorce adjustment independent of age has practical therapeutic implications. Themes related to these two contructs can be incorporated into the design of children's divorce groups, which currently seem to lack a coherent conceptual framework (e.g., Cantor, 1977;Green, 1978;Guerney & Jordan, 1979;Masid, 1977;Wilkinson & Bleck, 1977). These findings provide a persuasive rationale for including a strong cognitive component in services designed to help children understand and accept their parents' divorce.…”

Section: Correlates Of Children's Divorce Adjustmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Correlates of children's long-term adjustment to their parents' divorce.

Kurdek

Blisk²,

Siesky³

1981

Developmental Psychology

111

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Consideration of current divorce rates leads to the conclusion that an appreciable number of chilclren will be growing up in single-parent-headed households. Hetherington (1979), for example, reports that 40 to 50 percent of children born in the 1970s will spend some time living in a single-parent family. The sheer number of children affected by divorce warrants a close examination of how children's development is affected by dramatic changes in the family system, a:; well as of what factors are involved in optimal adjustment to these changes.The literature relevant both to children's divorce experiences and to factors related to children's divorce adjustment is scattered in journals across the areas of developmental psychology, clinical psychology, family law, social work, and family sociology. Recently, Kurdek (1981) attempted to summarize this information from an integrative perspective. A major premise of this perspective was that children's divorce-related experiences need to be understoodThe authors would like to thank Marilyn Baumer, Nancy Hickey, and Donna Krile for their assistance in data collection and analysis. L. A Kurdek (Ed) Chddrm ond Ilzuorct New Directions for Child De\,elopmen!. no. 19 San Franiisco Jnrscy-Bass. March 1903 47 48in terms of hierarchically embedded cultural, social, familial, and psychological contexts. Respectively, these contexts focus attention on (1) cultural beliefs, values, and attitudes regarding modern family life, (2) both the stability of the postdivorce environment and the social supports available to the restructured single-parent family, (3) the nature of family interaction in the preand postseparation periods, and (4) the child's individual competencies for dealing with stress.While progress has been made in the integration of existing studies on the nature and correlates of children's adjustment to parental divorce, little attention has been directed to the congruence among different sources of information on children's divorce adjustment. Parents typically have provided assessments of children's divorce reactions, while children themselves have not been interviewed routinely. Given evidence that parents and children's sources of information may not be concordant (Fulton, 1979; Kurdek, Blisk, and Siesky, 1981; Wallerstein and Kelly, 1980), our efforts have been directed toward developing self-report divorce adjustment measures for children.How children themselves appraise divorce-related events may be an integral component of their adjustment (compare Dohrenwend and Dohrenwend, 1974). Previous studies of children's divorce reactions (for example, Wallerstein and Kelly, 1980) have identified several areas of concern for children whose parents have separated or divorced. These include children's understanding of divorce as an interpersonal process, their hopes for parental reconciliation, their fears of abandonment, their assignments of blame for divorce, their fears of negative peer reactions, and their negative evaluations of their parents and themselves. These t...

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“…Although preventive programs for children of divorce, particularly latency-aged children, have also become more frequent, few have had rigorous controlled research evaluations. Early small scale interventions of this type (Cantor, 1977;Guerney & Jordon, 1977) reported mixed outcomes based on clinical impressionistic data. A more ambitious eight-session program (Kalter, Pickar, & Lesowitz, 1984), emphasizing catharsis of feelings and role playing, reported positive clinical findings but no gains on objective measures of perceived competence or teacher-rated school behavior.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Preventive intervention with latency‐aged children of divorce: A replication study

Pedro-Carroll

Cowen

Hightower

et al. 1986

American J of Comm Psychol

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This replication study assessed the efficacy of a school-based preventive intervention for latency-aged children of divorce. The Children of Divorce Intervention Program (CODIP) emphasizes support, identifying and expressing divorce-related feelings, training situationally relevant communication, problem solving, and anger control skills, and enhancing self-esteem. Fifty-four children of divorce participated in the 11-session program conducted in small groups. Their adjustment was contrasted at pre and post with that of demographically matched peers (N = 78) from intact families on teacher, parent, self-report, and group leader measures. Children of divorce were less well adjusted than their peers before the intervention. They improved significantly after the intervention, approaching youngsters from intact families in adjustment status. The replication data support CODIP's efficacy as a preventive alternative for children of divorce. Needed future development and research steps are considered.

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School-based Groups for Children of Divorce

Cited by 28 publications

References 7 publications

The Children of Divorce Intervention Program: An investigation of the efficacy of a school-based prevention program.

The Children of Divorce Intervention Program: An investigation of the efficacy of a school-based prevention program.

Correlates of children's long-term adjustment to their parents' divorce.

Preventive intervention with latency‐aged children of divorce: A replication study

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