Does divorce hurt kids?

The divorces are still the problem for Americans . By the data of the National Vital Statistics Report (2004 ) in 2003 there were 2 ,187 ,000 marriages and about 1 ,108 ,000 divorces . In other words , every second marriage is ended with the divorce in the United States . This fact makes the researchers to investigate issues of the divorces actively . They use different approaches and design of the surveys but they often focused on the same issues of the divorce . One of the most important questions is Does divorce hurt kids

In any

research the proper planning and sampling design is important for the validity of received data . On the example of the recommended sources (see references ) we can see two different approaches to the sampling Hetherington used the large size of the sample (more than 2 ,500 children . Wallerstein used small sample (about 60 kids ) but her study was longitudinal (25 years of following-up katamnesis

Unfortunately there are no data about statistical tools used in the both studies , but we can suppose that Hetherington used ANOVA and Wallerstein non-parametric statistics . The evaluation of Wallerstein study is difficult because she used only one referent group - she had no control group . She tried to give some evidence to her study and introduced a comparison group . But the comparison group was not selected randomly and divorce rate in this group was less than average rate in the United States . Judith Wallerstein worked in the wealthy California . She did not take in the account ethnical , social-economical and other issues of the problem . Thus her study has low validity

Dr . Hetherington from the University of Virginia done her study as the transversal one . She followed about 1 ,400 families for three decades The size of sample and referent groups and sampling design , the duration of the survey were made by the gold standards of the modern science Hetherington 's data have better representativeness than in Wallerstein 's work but we should understand the transversal study can not be used for tracing follow up long-term effects . This entire story with the different approaches is very similar to the fable of John Saxe 's poem (see Annex

But every side of the dispute has own allies . John Atlas wrote pretty revision on the book The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce : A Twenty-Five Year Landmark Study written by Judith S . Wallerstein , Julie Lewis , and Sandra Blakeslee . But even he found flaws in the book of Wallestein et all . Its findings rest on anecdotes and on an unscientific sampling -- the subjects are predominantly white , middle class , and well educated And the authors don 't deal with the impact of genetics and temperament on how children respond to divorce . But Mr . Atlas keeps silence about the design of study , he is disturbed much more with the fact that the authors avoid discussing the potential causes of the problems we see in children of divorced parents are not due to long-standing psychological problems of the parents , the stresses of poverty and...