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Findings are reported from an empirical investigation of the relationship between divorced spouses one year following the divorce. Interviews covering a wide range of topics were conducted with 54 pairs of divorced parents. It was found that the majority continued to interact with one another; those who interacted the most frequently were the supportive and cooperative coparents.
Recent reports suggest that divorce is a significant developmental stress for most children. Preventive intervention programs aimed at mitigating both short- and long-term divorce sequelae for children are now widespread. Considerably less attention has been paid to youngsters in need of clinical services years after parental separation. In this paper, adolescent daughters of divorced parents are described in the context of a proposed conjoint mother-daughter intervention.
A model of time-limited, school-based groups for children of divorce is presented. Common themes that emerged in groups conducted in three schools suggest that youngsters continue to wrestle with divorce-related conflicts years after the marital disruption. Developmental tasks created by specific post-divorce stresses are described, and multiple brief interventions tied to nodal points in child development are proposed.
Attitudes of 104 female college students from divorced and intact families were compared. Parental divorce was found to have long-term effects on young women's expectations about their futures in relation to men, work, and marriage. However, these effects were not found to be closely related to the nature of the relationships they had with their fathers following the divorce.
This second of a two-part review examines four possibilities for explaining the discrepancy across studies in findings of sex differences in children's responses to parental divorce: sample type, nature of outcome variables, age of the child, and sources of data. Recommendations are made for further research that could clarify the nature and origins of differences by child gender in reactions to parental divorce. Part 1, reviewing research methodology and post divorce family forms, was published by this Journal in July 1988.
A case is presented involving counselling for a divorced mother and psychotherapy for her child. Review of the literature suggests that the suitability of a Child Guidance Clinic intervention when parents are divorced can depend on the age of the child, the nature of the parents' relationship and the timing of the referral. During the divorce crisis, children can be helped by a brief, individual intervention. After this period, family therapy--if possible to include the non-custodial parent--may help clarify issues relevant to the parents and remove the burden of symptom-carrier from the child. Long-term, individual psychotherapy for the child is crucially dependent on a sufficiently 'containing' setting and on parents who genuinely desire change. Our own experience has been that the clinic workers must always remain aware of the legal issues--i.e. which parent has custody, care and control--as this will determine who has the right to accept a treatment offer for the child.
The author summarizes the psychotherapeutic issues most frequently encountered in his crisis treatment of 16 divorcing fathers for whom divorce was fundamentally a child-centered crisis. Fear and guilt over separation from children and wife, outrage and disappointment with the legal system, anxiety about the social and sexual readjustment to single life, and the need to develop strategies for continued child contact were most prevalent. The author's suggestions for the management of these issues include the therapist's familiarization with divorce as it affects and is influenced by intrapsychic, interpersonal, familial, and legal systems.
Fifty-six married depressed patients were studied together with their spouses an average of 2 years after their discharge from the hospital. Thirty of the patients had psychiatrically ill spouses and 26 had psychiatrically well spouses. On follow-up the group as a whole had a divorce rate nine times the expected rate for the population. Couples in which both members were ill had a significantly higher divorce rate than couples in which only one member was affected. The authors suggest that the psychiatric status of the spouse of a depressed patient may be a significant factor in marital maladjustment and divorce.
OBJECTIVE: The authors' goal was to address five questions: 1) What is the frequency of early REM sleep in subjects in the process of divorce who meet diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder? 2) What is the frequency of this sign in subjects in the process of divorce who are not depressed? 3) How often does this sign persist following remission of depressive symptoms? 4) What is the predictive value of early REM sleep among depressed subjects for later adjustment to the process of divorce? and 5) What is the role of a family history of depression or alcoholism in the presence and persistence of early REM sleep? METHOD: Two hundred fourteen volunteers undergoing marital separation were recruited; 70 of these subjects were selected for a 3-night sleep study. Forty of the 70 subjects met criteria for depression and 30 did not; 61 (87%) returned for repeat studies 1 year later. RESULTS: Fifteen (38%) of the 40 depressed subjects had short REM latency. Seven of these continued to have short REM latency 1 year later, but none of these met the criteria for depression at that time. A higher proportion of these subjects had made a good adjustment to their new life than did depressed subjects whose initial and follow-up REM latencies fell within the normal range. CONCLUSIONS: These data suggest that depressed individuals with normal REM latency may need more aggressive treatment intervention.
This paper explores how divorce may affect psychotherapists' personal and professional lives. It offers theoretical speculations about the effects of divorce and makes recommendations for helping divorcing psychotherapists in their work.
This article discusses the potential impact of parental divorce on the lives of young adult offspring. Parental divorce may upset both social and psychological aspects of the transition to adulthood process. The family roles young adults are expected to assume could be altered by the break-up, as could opportunities for particular young adult pursuits, such as advanced education. Heightened adjustment problems also are likely to result, as divorce produces additional life changes during the highly transitional period of early adulthood. Qualitative data from an exploratory study of 39 college students, ages 18-23, illustrate many of the relevant issues. Suggestions for future research are provided.
"This study uses a [U.S.] national sample of married persons under age 55, interviewed in 1980 and again in 1983, to estimate why divorce and marital instability vary by age and duration of marriage. Results indicate that the accumulation of assets substantially reduces the propensity to divorce. We also find that several important correlates of divorce and instability (age at marriage, health, social integration, and income) interact with age and duration. In general, these factors seem to operate almost exclusively among young people and young marriages."
The impact of war on marriage, divorce, and birth rates in the United States from 1933 to 1986 is explored. The author concludes that "the involvement of the nation in military activities was accompanied by a decrease in marriage and birth rates but not by any change in divorce rates. Mobilization of the armed forces and demobilization had no discernible impact on divorce, marriage or birth rates."
"A study of 27 [developed] nations indicated that divorce rates rose in 25 of the nations from 1950 to 1985 while marriage rates declined in 22 of the nations. Nations with higher divorce rates in 1950 had steeper increases in the divorce rate subsequently, supporting a critical-mass hypothesis."
Easing the plight of the divorcing and the divorced requires the efforts of a broad range of professional disciplines. It is not my purpose here to cover in detail the various ways in which different professionals can contribute to this goal. Rather, I will focus on certain specific changes which, if implemented, could prevent and/or lessen some of the psychological traumas attendant to divorce. Some of these changes are already being instituted but are mentioned here because they warrant more widespread appreciation and utilization. Others, to the best of my knowledge, have not yet been made and may never be. My hope is that this presentation will play some small role in bringing about these changes.
The purpose of this study was to assess predictors of male-initiated psychological and physical partner abuse during the separation process prior to divorce among a sample of 80 divorced fathers who reported no physical violence during their marriages. The predictor variables examined were male gender-role identity, female-initiated divorces, dependence on one's former wife, depression, anxiety, and coparental conflict. Through ordinary least square (OLS) regression techniques, it was found that male gender-role identity was positively related to male-initiated psychological abuse during separation. Logistic regression analyses revealed that male-initiated psychological abuse, anxiety level, coparental conflict, and dependence on one's former spouse increased the odds of a man engaging in physical abuse. However, depression decreased the odds of separation physical abuse. The models predicting both male-initiated psychological abuse (F = 2.20, p < .05, R2 = .15) and physical violence during the separation process were significant (Model chi2 = 35.00, df= 7, p < .001).
48 female and 48 male college students judged the extent to which the formerly married are restricted in their social relationships. Each subject evaluated one of four groups: widowed women, divorced women, widowed men, or divorced men. There was limited support for the hypotheses that the divorced would be perceived as more restricted than the widowed and that women would be perceived as more restricted than men.
131 subjects from a small north central Kansas high school participated and completed the Beck Depression Scale, Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory short form with the Lie scale included, the Death Anxiety Scale, and the first 11 questions of the Beck Scale of Suicide Ideation. Background information collected from each subject included age, grade, marital status of parents, and sex. Grade point averages (on a 4-point scale) were taken from the students' files. On death anxiety girls had a significantly higher mean than boys while freshmen's and sophomores' scores were significantly higher than those of juniors and seniors but there was no difference between means of students of divorced and nondivorced parents. On self-esteem and GPA children of divorced parents scored significantly lower than children of nondivorced parents, but there was no difference between the sexes on self-esteem. On GPA girls scored significantly higher than boys. On depression the children of divorced parents scored higher than children of nondivorced parents but there was no sex difference.