“You have several articles in your folder that explore divorce and children. One of your articles is a longitudinal study that views experiences of children who came from families that divorced, but the other – and studies like this are rather rare – actually looks at individual experiences and how they understood the divorce that happened around them. You have another article with data on trends among single parent families.
The second article is an example of qualitative research (of which I am a huge fan) and allows us to develop a deeper understanding of the effect of divorce and the individualized meanings. It provides a ‘timeframe’ of a divorce that is a helpful way to study the effect on children. You can also see the common themes that emerged from the experiences of the study participants.
1. What are some of the ways the children from divorced families who participated in these two studies were affected by divorce?
2. Since these studies are both based on retrospective research, what can be learned from the studies? What could have happened differently and might have made going through a divorce a healthier experience, if not a happier one?
3. How can we understand the trends in parenting as reflected in household composition?”
