Effects of Divorce on Children - Essay Example

Effects of Divorce on Children The issue of family conflicts and divorces has been growing more serious in the contemporary society. The impact of numerous personal and social influences is the fuelling agents for the sad growth tendency. Naturally, divorce as a social phenomenon has existed since the invention of the institution of marriage, but, along with a relatively simple procedure, it has become a very frequent phenomenon nowadays. Whereas inviolately of marriage has been impaired and neglected in recent decades, people started to feel freer about breaking marital ties. In case they have problems of different types, it became typical to escape from problems rather than try to solve them by joint efforts and compromise. The nature of divorce has evolved through centuries, similar to the nature of marriage itself. Centuries ago, it was common to marry due to benefits the union could provide. The benefits could be financial or social status of a potential partner, family, religious or national preconditions. Moreover, marriage was a contract without love and often at the discretion of parents and relatives. Many European couples of the 17th century got the teaching that they would learn to love each other once they entered the marriage (Porter). Cultural and moral environment affected the institution of marriage much. Therefore, as cultural and social conditions have changed since those times considerably, the position of marriage has changed as well. Contemporarily Matrimony is not wholly regarded as a sacred union; hence, its dissolution is considered acceptable and is vested in a rather simple procedure. Due to this, people do not feel enough responsibility when contracting a marriage and see divorce as an easy way out that is always available. Divorce has led to a swell in the number of divorces in modern societies, with almost half of American marriages eventually falling apart (Coleman et al. 30). Due to the rampant incidences occurring, this research focuses on finding out the effects of divorce on the children as the future generation. There are plenty of preconditions and reasons that might lead a couple to such a radical decision, but the consequences of it can be rather negative for both sides in many aspects. Although people tend to view divorce as a solution to the problem, it often turns out to be another problem rather than a solution. Backgrounds of divorces are involved and incorporate profound reasons and certain conditions. Most commonly, some of the reasons identified are as follows; lack of responsibility in one or both spouses, priority of personal happiness and comfort, financial problems, trivial incompatibility of tempers, views or even tastes (in politics, religion, culture or hobby). Social conditions reinforce the reasons thereby catalyzing increase in divorces. The social conditions include urbanization, decrease in social control over social units, industrialization, and emancipation. Divorce as a phenomenon is not a momentary whim; it is usually resorted to as an outcome of long-lasting tensions and dissatisfactions in the couple. The social phenomenon results in decreased birth rates and derogation of the society’s ethical standards since couples stay apart. Taking into an account seriousness of the issue, we will have a closer focus on the effects produced by divorce. Effects of Divorce Probably, the immediate victims vulnerable to devastating consequences of divorce are families themselves, including men, women, and children. First, as any dramatic change in life especially the negative one; divorce might be the cause of stress. When a family falls apart, lives of both spouses (and of children) change completely, and the need to adapt oneself to a new way of life arises. The necessity to get used to a new reality triggers serious stress, and the stress might affect health, both physical and mental. Neuroses, insomnia, depression and other unfavorable displays of fear arise (DeBord). Divorced men are more vulnerable to substance abuse, hypertension, strokes and cardiovascular diseases that cause premature death (HuffPost). Divorced men have 250% higher mortality rates than married ones. Moreover, divorced people are more prone to alcoholism than those who never divorced (Jackson). Furthermore, this effect of divorce can be worsened by the fact that nowadays many couples fail to preserve good relationships and tend to shower each other with accusations and complaints. Thus, social statuses of both partners get impaired significantly. Divorce associated with an increase in low self-esteem, depression, people experience loss of partner and lifestyle (O’Connell Corcoran). These words confirm the previous statements about the devastating effect of divorce of the partners’ psyche. In general, the overall life satisfaction becomes much lower in divorced people. Another important aspect of divorce-related problems is, of course, financial difficulties. As partners split, joint family budget ceases, and the same assets must now support almost double the expenses (O’Connell Corcoran). Mainly, as women leave children under the men’s custody, the men experience many additional financial difficulties especially in solely raising the children. Despite all the graveness of the impact on adults, the most vulnerable party suffering the biggest problems because of divorce are children. Divorce hurts them the most, as they love both parents and find it hard to survive parting with either of the parents. Due to peculiarities of children’s psyche and socio-development, divorce produces the widest range of adverse impacts on the children. The subject has been an objective of numerous researchers, and this is not surprising as psycho developmental trauma originating from childhood leaves deep scars in entire life of an individual. Impacts of Divorce on Children Family is the “prism” through which a child learns the world, seeks his/her place in it, learnt to love, understand, forgive and enjoy life. Relationships of parents should perceivably be the role model. Looking at parents, children acquire models of behavior in certain situations with the expectation of helping them to build their relationships in the future. In this way, parting of a family inevitably affects Socio developmental growth of a child after divorce. Although child reactions to divorce might vary, there is a set of general responses to this event in children. First, fear that a child feels, especially when being a witness of parents’ quarrels. Displays of hostilities and violence cause severe trauma. Second, children tend to blame themselves as they often act as a center of confrontation. The parents often struggle to win the superiority of their children’s love. Whereas confrontation and quarrels are trivial for parents on the verge of the divorce, children might consider these quarrels to be their fault. The third response is self-depreciation and problems with self-esteem caused by the child’s belief that parents do not love him/her. When one parent leaves the family, it is typical for a child to think that he/she got abandoned and doomed to loneliness. Moreover, as a parent who stays with the child after divorce, typically the mother suffers difficulties herself, there can be lack of attention for the child, which may hurt his/her self-respect. One more Socio developmental response is depression, as children see a divorce as a loss. In contrast to other sad events like death, feelings related to divorce are likely to come to the surface for many years. For example, if the father cannot spend the weekend with his child due to some rush job, feeling of loss flares up again. The reaction is typical for both adults and children in case of divorce. Excessive sensibility and negativism are also likely to emerge in response to parents’ divorce. Seeing divorce as a disruption of the usual way of life and chaos, children may feel anger. For them, divorce is soreness and parents’ refusal to love them. Hence, there may be displays of excessive susceptibility and denial of reality (Bojuwoye &Akpan 76). Next, due to family conflicts, children feel themselves as less precious. In addition, they lose the feeling of parental love in comparison to others. Sense of guilt, related to divorce; shame for parents’ quarrels; examples of their hostility reinforce the child’s perception of him/herself as an outsider. Furthermore, devotion to the family limits possibility to share emotions with other people and thus strengthens the child’s isolation. Effect on Children’s Development in Accordance with Age It is quite natural that the effect produced by children in connection with parents’ confrontation and divorce is not the same at every age. Effects and their scales differ in various stages of childhood development. Depending on the age, divorce as a conflict between parents leads to certain changes in children’s behavior (Divorce Help Clinic). Whereas one could think that divorce is more likely to affect children in conscious ages, researchers prove that even infants experience grave consequences of it (Divorce Health Clinic). If a child is an infant depending on breastfeeding, a close connection to his mother will leave its imprints on his condition. If the mother has no milk due to this stress affects stress caused by divorce, the baby. Owing to the interruption of breastfeeding, it does not get enough nutrients for development. Besides, facing financial difficulties caused by divorce, new mothers often have to work and thus leave infants under their grandparents’ wing. Resultantly, this often leads children to loss of appetite, stomach problems and anxiety (DeBord). High level of vulnerability at this age is preconditioned by close connection and symbiosis between the mother and the child: the child is still virtually a part of mother’s organism. However, as children grow older, it gets more complicated to cope with divorce of parents. Keeping this in mind, one could conclude that pre-school-age children suffer even more from the split in the family (Hansen). Children find it complicated to comprehend why their fathers leave the family and why their mothers cry. As this stage of Socio- development presupposes egocentric thinking, children perceive themselves as a reason of divorce (American Board of Family Medicine). Children between 3 to 6 years tend to suffer from intense sense of guilt. Between 10 and 11, the dominating feelings are offense, anger towards parents – children of this age feel abandoned and ashamed of their family problems. However, by the age of 15-18 years, they are expected to develop more mature perception of the conflict. Though teenagers also feel loss and offense, they are capable of evaluating the situation adequately and understanding reasons and consequences of divorce as well as their relations with each of parents. Children’s adaptability to divorce depends on the extent to which they are ready for possible conflicts; hostilities between parents before divorce; amount of time and attention they used to get from each of their parents when the latter were married. Gender-related issues It has been proven that both genders react to divorce in different ways, and seriousness of arising problems varies depending on sex of the child. In general, studies show that different gender express dissatisfaction because of absence of their fathers (as children typically live with mothers after divorce) (Bojuwoye &Akpan 77). At the same time, perception of divorce differs first because of differences in perception of fathers’ role in their families. First, male children turn out to be more vulnerable to divorce effects and have more difficulties in adaptation to the new lifestyle. Becoming more aggressive and fretful, they prefer working it off with their peers. They may start smoking and using obscene words among other adverse social effects. If a mother scolds a boy for bad behavior or underperformance at school, he is likely to be rude to her, to become virtually uncontrollable or even to run away. Except that, many boys display reluctance to keep in touch with fathers or give cheek when meet them. In general, boys’ response and divorce’s effect on their behavior characterizes by increase in aggression. Second, male children experience greater difficulties because of their perception of fathers in the context of the family (American Board of Family Medicine).Fathers are perceivably the same sex parent usable as a model of behavior and example of what a man should be like. Parents are expected to teach boys their gender roles and all valuable lessons about life, viewed from a male standpoint. So, when male parents leave, mothers find it hard to develop male interests in boys and form right image about men’s role of in the family in their minds. Girls, in their turn, have their own specific reactions to divorce. Becoming more susceptible and weepy, they often complain of head or stomach aches to attract more attention (American Board of Family Medicine). On the other hand, a peculiar feature of divorce is the effect on females that daughters of divorcees might develop distorted image of men and have a negative opinion of them. Moreover, deprived of the complete model of social roles, girls and boys are prone to form distorted types of behavior. Boys raised by mothers only, often adopt feminine model of behavior or have distorted the image of what a man should do in society and family life (Huff Post). As an outcome, it is more complex for them to perform their paternal duties in the adult life. Girls raised in single-parent families have fewer chances to understand their future husbands and sons. In fact, divorce as a social phenomenon produces continuous effect that it carried by children in their adult lives and transmitted to the society as a whole. Children brought up in single-parent families avoid marriage and are much more prone to divorces. Ultimately, this leads to a never-ending cycle of divorce. An absolute majority of children wants to have both parents, and many of them live with the hope of their reconciliation. However, this variant is rather unlikely as it happens not often do. Impact on Social Skills and Health Effects divorces produce for children are not limited by poor psychological condition: various aspects of social life and health are also affected significantly. One of the problems connected to health is high risk of picking up such habit as smoking. Teenagers might be vulnerable to the stereotype that smoking calms nerves and thus resort to this practice in case of family crisis. Particularly, women raised in divorced families resort to this practice 39% more often (Hansen). Another concern rises connects to increased susceptibility to illnesses: children of divorcees are more vulnerable to health issues. Scientists tend to link it to increased level of stress and trauma experienced by them. Moreover, this risk is caused by the possible neglect of the side of parent during the period following the divorce – as parents themselves suffer from consequences of conflict, they might simply forget to ensure children’s “safety”, i.e. keep children under supervision or create safe environment (Hansen). To add more, children of divorce are more vulnerable to strokes and are characterized by shorter life expectancy. The studies that tracked children of divorce throughout their further lives discovered that children of single-parent families tend to die five years earlier that those whose parents never divorced (Hansen). Men raised by divorcees die of unnatural causes like violence ad accidents more often. Consequences of divorce impair the social domain of children’s life, too. Suffering from stress, anxiety and extremely low self-esteem, children experience hardships in communication with their classmates and peers. At the same time, academic under achievements pose considerable problem for children, especially those of early school age, often need their parents’ help and control in their educational activity: parents are to help them with homework and explain rules that are too complicated for handling them alone. But when parents are affected by divorce, busy with its process and suffer from its consequences, little time is devoted to children. A particular problem, according to studies, is inadequate math skills in children of divorce: as learning mathematics has cumulative nature, children are unlikely to catch up with the class, once they missed or did not understand a topic. Beyond that, there is a higher risk of dropping out of school and committing crimes (Hansen). Positive Consequences Despite divorce associating predominantly with negative effects on families, society, and children, it poses positive aspects. The first argument is that sometimes divorce is really a necessary measure that has to be taken to improve the life of a child: unfortunately, cases of child abuse and improper treatment on the part of one parent are getting more and more popular. If a father applies violence and aggression or is an alcohol addict, life with such a parent might become psychologically not only harmful, but also directly dangerous for both mother and child. In this case, divorce is a measure of defense that has to be taken in order to ensure the child’s safety. Another positive effect of divorce on children that is observable in some cases is an increase in bravery and strength when relating to peers. For example, if a male child gets brought up by a single mother who works hard to earn their living and devotes herself to him. The child in turn becomes brave and strong in facing the challenges encountered. At the same time, in some cases, negative experience and mistakes of parents may serve an example of how it should not be to children in their adult lives (Jackson). In the end, it ethically shapes the child for the future. Works Cited: American Board of Family Medicine. “Children of Divorce”, Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 2001, from: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/405852_6 Bojuwoye, Olaniyi&Akpan, Orok. “Children’s Reactions to Divorce of Parents”, The Open Family Studies Journal, 2009, 2, from: http://benthamopen.com/tofamsj/articles/V002/75TOFAMSJ.pdf Coleman, Marilyn, Lawrence H. Ganong, and Kelly Warzinik. Family Life in 20th-Century America. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 2007. Print. DeBord, Karen. The Effects of Divorce on Children, from: http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/fcs/pdfs/fcs471.pdf Hansen, Lauren. “9 negative effects divorce reportedly has on children”, The Week, 2013, from: http://theweek.com/article/index/242059/9-negative-effects-divorce-reportedly-has-on-children Huff Post. Divorce Can Have Serious Impact On Mens Health, New Research Finds, 2013, from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/30/mens-health-divorce_n_4018432.html Jackson, Wayne. “The Devastating Effects of Divorce”, Christian Courier, from: https://www.christiancourier.com/articles/81-devastating-effects-of-divorce-the OConnell Corcoran, Kathleen. Psychological and Emotional Aspects of Divorce, 1997, from: http://www.mediate.com/articles/psych.cfm Porter, Brandi. Divorce as a Social Problem, 2009, from: http://ww2.valdosta.edu/~blporter/Research%20paper.html The Divorce Help Clinic LLC. Child Development and the Effects of Divorce, from: http://www.thedivorcehelpclinic.com/articles/developmental.html Read More