Relationships Affect Young Women's Views On Marriage And Divorce?

Modern, contemporary society’s mindset on marriage has shifted considerably over the years. Some research has noted the increase in early sexual experiences, greater acceptance of cohabitation and the increase in narcissistic tendencies, are complicating and muddying the ideals of what marriage means to people today. Research done on this subject resulted in several studies that found that spouses who did not believe that marriage would last forever, were less likely to commit to the relationship financially and were more likely to have extramarital affairs.

     In years past, the American Dream for most young girls’ is to grow up and be married to Prince Charming and to “Live Happily Ever After!” Although this may be expected - it is rarely fulfilled. Marriage is the legal and binding union between a man and woman. Yet when couples marry, they vow to stay by their partner’s side ‘till death do us part.’ Currently that vow seems to have little or no value in today’s society. The current statistics for survival of marriage are quite grim. The divorce rate in the United States is somewhere between 50 percent and a startling 67 percent. (KSL News) One contributing factor the growing epidemic of divorce is the parting of different family

The key research question in this study is what are the long term effects of parental divorce on a child’s relationship between their parents and their siblings? They took into consideration variables such as age of divorce, gender, and living arrangements so they can see what influence they may have on the present study results and compare it with previous studies. They gave 3 different surveys to 102 students with married parents and 107 students with divorced parents to be able to observe the differences in relationships between the two types of families. Some of the key findings of this study are that females actually have better adult relationships with their siblings and that divorce caused the children to have better relationships with their mother, and worse relationships with their father. They noted that the age when their parents got divorced was not a variable that affected whether or not they had a good relationship with their siblings. For the relationship between their mothers, it was better unless there was a variable of pre-divorce or post-divorce conflict between them. For their fathers, it showed that daughters had worse relationships with their fathers compared to sons. Living arrangements showed effects for both of the parents depending on which parent they lived with. When it comes to remarriage, it had a positive affect on mother-child relationship when the father got remarried and no affect when the mother was remarried.

The statistics for divorce in the 1990's suggest that nearly sixty percent of marriages end in divorce. Given this startling figure, the assumption can be made that many children will experience some effects caused by the life-changing event called divorce. What is it exactly about divorce that causes negative consequences for these children? In what ways will these children be effected? Will these effects show outwardly? I will attempt to uncover some of the complexities surrounding these psychological questions in the following text. The unsettling fact is: young children of divorced parents face great psychological challenges due to the environmental conditions and changes associated with divorce (Wolchik and Karoly 45).

With over one million American children suffering yearly from their parents getting a divorce, it is evident why couples desire to cohabit before marrying. Divorce has shown to have a terrible effect on children (Fagan and Rector, 56). For some children this can result in lifelong psychological problems. Children who use drugs and alcohol are more likely to have come from a background that involves parental conflicts, such as divorce. Since divorce increases the chances of the children effected to abuse drugs or alcohol, many couples have been taking an extra step of cohabiting before marrying to hopefully decrease their chances of divorcing. However, divorce rates have steadily increased with the rapid increase of cohabitation rates. These divorce rates have been increasing steadily because it is now easier than ever to obtain a “no-fault” divorce. Also, these rates have been increasing because women no longer have to depend on the men in their lives to support them. As mentioned before, women are just as strong in the work force as men.

Our society has become nonchalant about the dynamics of divorce. Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, co-director of the Rutgers University National Marriage Project, “Divorce is now part of everyday American life” (Sheehan-Johnson & Paine, 2013). In Brian Orchard’s 2011 article, A Culture of Divorce first marriages have 45 percent chance of breaking up and second marriages are given 60 percent chance of being unsuccessful (Orchard, 2011). Barbara Dafoe Whitehead and Brian Orchard both agree marriage and divorce have changed due to the relationships within the family structure. Whitehead states, “Americans began to change their ideas about the individual’s obligations to family and society” (Sheehan-Johnson & Paine, 2013). Women became more independent during the

Around 50 percent of all marriages in the United States today end in divorce (Cherline, 1992; Popenoe, 1996, as cited in Potter, 2010). There are several contributing factors. Infidelity, addictions, abuse, lack of intimacy, conflicts, finances, and changes in views of success, priorities and interests could all be reasons marriages fail (Payne, Olver, & Roth, n.d.). Divorce not only impacts the married couple, but also their children. Children may experience many mixed emotions when internalizing the divorce. This group proposal will evaluate the behaviors that children may display when going through a period of family breakup. In addition, I will discuss how group counseling may benefit adolescent children in coping with divorce and strategies that may help limit unwanted behaviors.

This study used a national sample to examine whether there are patterns of postdivoce families. Specifically, attention was focused on whether children of families who had more characteristics of a “good divorce” could be identified empirically. Their exploratory analysis included data from 13,017 households in the United States. Their data also consisted of interviews and surveys with parents, along with interviews with children. The authors found partial support for the good divorce hypothesis. Children with families with a good divorce had fewer behavioral problem, however young children and adolescents with a good divorce did not differ in self-esteem, school grades, liking school, substance use, life satisfaction, substance use, early sexual activity, number of sexual partners, cohabiting or marrying as a teenager, and closeness to mothers.

In the last two decades divorce has increased substantially leaving couples single and families broken. Divorce is the reality for many families as there is an increase in divorce rates, cohabitation rates, and the number of children raised in step and single marital families. Divorce cannot be overlooked as it negatively affects and impacts youngsters for the rest of their lives. Although it is the decision between two parents’s children are hurt the most in the process. The concept of divorce is extremely difficult for children to understand as there are many unanswered questions and uncertainties. “Will my mom or dad remarry and who will I live with?” are concerns children express while going through divorce. Many

Such perspectives are theories, or a set of logically interrelated statements that attempts to describe, explain, and predict social events. I would like to take a deeper look at the United State’s current rising divorce rate and its affect on our adolescents, from an interactionist perspective. Interactionists viewpoints are based on the assumption that society is the sum of the meaning of the interactions of the individuals and groups. This perspective focuses on behavior or on each person’s interpretation or definition of a given situation. The relation of divorce to this macro-level interactionist theory is that divorce is primarily dependent on humans living in cohesive groups or not, and communicating and its affects on the members involved. Research shows that the wrenching act of divorce and the loss of that original unit and the hope tied to it is often irreplaceable for a child and has a permanent affect of cataclysmic proportions (Preston 12). And children of divorced households, appear to show higher expectations of divorce and to have higher divorce rates later in life, and less desire to have children (“How Might Divorce Affect My Child’s Behavior?” 2000). Thus completing the downward spin of the deterioration in family units and the increase of the divorce rate.

Each and every day a child somewhere in the world is experiencing major changes within their family. One of those major changes is divorce or separation of parents. Divorce is “the action or an instance of legally dissolving a marriage”(Webster, 2011 p1). Today’s reality shows that couples only have one in two odds of remaining together. “ The U.S. Census bureau – involved in research about counseling children of divorce- estimating that approximately 50% of all American children born in 1982 lived in a single-parent homes sometime during their first 18 years. Mostly are due to divorce”(Children of Divorce, 2008 p.1). The rapid increase in divorce rates is a factor that has contributed to the large decline of the typical family. “Over 1

Divorce can effect many things that happened in a person’s life. Many of the research done today focuses on the effect of divorce on work and finances; things that effect a person’s wellbeing for their future. However, not many research done on divorce discusses what happens to the family system in a family as a result of divorce, including the effect it has on the many relationships that make up the family. After researching the affects of divorce on relationships, it has become clear that relationships in the family decline in each relationship that makes up the family. What has not been prominent until now is that these relationships continue to decline as the children of divorced families become adults. The five articles reviewed in this

Marriage concept undoubtedly comes from your own parents. Who else’s marriage are your children watching day in and day out growing up? It is no surprise that a child, whose parents stay married, will generally have better relationships themselves. Marriage has a huge effect on daughters. A problem facing many young women today is premarital sex and parenthood. CIVITAS agrees:

Parental divorce often decreases the level of trust that a child of divorce finds in a relationship. Children whose parent’s have divorced exhibit a fear of being rejected by those they become close to, and often distrust that their friends, family members, or significant others will remain loyal and close. This lack of trust often hampers any deepening in the relationship, and is believed to be the result of having a dysfunctional example of a marital relationship set before them. Many children of divorce have reportedly been less trusting of their own or a partner’s fidelity, and have had difficulty in fully committing to or “choosing” one person.

Divorce is a plague that is destroying numerous families across the United States of America. Sadly, when husbands and wives divorce, the children are often caught directly in the middle. Throughout the years divorce has been becoming more and more common. In the 1920's it was a rare find to know a person whom had been divorced, today it is a rarity not to know of one who has been, or will be divorced. Divorce has numerous effects on the structures of families, and many devastating effects on the children that must experience it, although sometimes necessary, divorce radically changes the lives of adolescents and adults alike.