US study: ‘Divorce scars children for life’

Children of divorced parents are more likely to suffer long-term financial, social and health consequences, a major US study has shown.

Economists Maggie R Jones of the US Census Bureau, Associate Professor Andrew C. Johnston, and Dr Nolan G. Pope tracked the effects of divorce on individuals using data for 5 million children born in the US between 1988 and 1993.

According to the National Office for Statistics, between 2012 and 2022, there were more than 1.14 million divorces in England and Wales, an average of around 2,200 every week.

Negative effects

The researchers found that parents who divorce “typically increase their work hours, while simultaneously assuming responsibility for additional dependents”.

These changes, they said, “suggest a significant reduction in the time and resources parents can devote to each child post-divorce”.

Their report also noted that divorce increases a child’s “risk of teen birth by roughly 60 per cent”, elevates “risks of incarceration and mortality by approximately 40 and 45 per cent, respectively”, and reduces adult earnings by 9 to 13 per cent.

It observed that changes “in household income, neighborhood quality, and parent proximity account for 25 to 60 percent of these divorce effects”, and called for further research to “examine additional channels through which divorce affects children”.

Direct consequences

In the UK, a new study by the Marriage Foundation suggests that family breakdown is the highest it has ever been.

Study author Harry Benson described the rate of family breakdown as an “epidemic”, and warned that it is set to get worse. He urged policy-makers to act, highlighting a host of negative social outcomes.

The report, ‘We need to talk about marriage’, found that nearly half of teenagers are not living with both of their natural parents by the age of 14 (45 per cent), and that family breakdown has tripled since the 1970s.

It noted: “The direct consequences of family breakdown include poverty, higher risk of mental health problems and poor exam results, and an annual bill to the taxpayer that exceeds the defence budget.”