University of Sharjah

Department of Foreign Languages

Negative Effects of Divorce on Children

By:

Reem Emad-Eldin Hatab

U18104795

Research Paper Writing

Prof. A. F. Abu-Ssaydeh

Spring 2019/2020

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 Introduction

It is often thought that divorce only affects the spouses who are getting separated, but they

are not the only ones who get affected negatively in such a situation. Divorce is a social

problem that countries all over the world suffer from today, and the numbers have only

increased in recent years. But most people do not think about how such a break-up of the

family’s structure would affect their children. This paper will explore the negative effects of

divorce on children and what happens when they are adults. This paper contains 6 sections:

the first section discusses how children are directly affected by divorce. The second section

explains why divorce impacts children. The third section discusses whether or not children

get better as they grow up. The fourth section explains how different age groups get affected

and react differently. The fifth section briefly discusses the toughest time on children after

divorce. The sixth section revolves around the question of whether or not the effect on

children extends into adulthood and what are the long term effects.

First section: How Does Divorce Affect Children?

Divorce does not affect only one aspect of the children’s lives, it affects many important

ones. They get affected academically, behaviorally, mentally, and socially. Starting with

academic effects, a study that was made in 2019 claimed that kids from divorced families

often got lower grades and struggle more with school when their parents’ divorce came as a

surprise, unlike kids whose families divorce was obvious and expected to happen (Morin).

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Aside from getting affected academically, there are also changes in their behavior and social

skills. People around the kid start to notice that they develop negative behaviors that they did

not have, before like being more aggressive and becoming antisocial and impulsive (Wayne).

That is partially due to the kids receiving less affection and attention from their parents which

makes the kids in turn rebel and act out to gain that attention back (Fagan and Churchill 13).

Cummings and Davies reported that “between 9% and 25% of the differences between

children in externalizing problems are accounted for by marital conflict in the home" (4).

Children suffer from a decrease in social skills, they dread any social situations and they fear

refusal and denial from classmates and friends, in addition to generally having fewer friends

(Fagan and Churchill 12).

Mental health is another area where children get affected. Several pieces of research state that

kids face multiple psychological problems that stem from trouble adapting to new changes in

their lifestyles and living situations (Vassila). Morin discusses that divorce increases the

percentage of anxiety and depression cases in kids but those problems get solved in a short

time. Aside from that, most teenagers develop feelings of anger due to the changes that

happen after the divorce, and Morin claims that "they may blame one parent for the

dissolution of the marriage or they may resent one or both parents for the upheaval in the

family”.

Lastly, kids get exhausted mentally from worrying about the changes that will occur. Many

kids worry about how their relationship with their parents will change, or in some cases, they

think there will be no relationship at all. Kids get extremely confused and worry that if the

love between their parents disappeared, then their parents' love for the kids will disappear as

well (Wallerstein et al. 45). Some kids might take it as their responsibility to fill the role of

the missing parent, which is often the father. That pressure from such a young age causes a

toll on their mental health (Miller 21).

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 Second Section: Why Does Divorce Impact Children

As stated in the previous section, divorce affects children in many different aspects and many

people know that, but the real question is why does divorce have such an impact on children.

In some cases, a household has very high levels of conflict where parents are constantly

fighting and arguing, so when those parents decide to get divorced, the children are relieved

that this will stop and they will finally have some peace in their homes. Therefore those kids

do not get affected negatively. In other households, the levels of conflict between parents are

low and they do not fight regularly and even if they do, they do it away from their kids.

Therefore, when they decide to get separated, the kids get surprised and confused since they

didn’t deal with a toxic environment before the separation happened (ifstudies.org). Blakeslee

and Wallerstein claim that in their study, only one of ten children felt relieved after their

parents’ divorce, and they usually were older children who experienced or saw a lot of

fighting or violence in their household (11). I personally felt relieved when my parents got

separated when I was 16. We grew up with high levels of toxicity in our household and daily

shouting-matches. Although we were all relieved, the change in the family dynamics and

structure affected us negatively but only for a short period.

Many divorced couples unintentionally expose kids to their hurt and anger. Some couples,

even after being divorced for a long time, call the other parent and get into “shouting

matches” with one another, therefore the kids experience the anger coming from the parents

(Wallerstein et al. 7). Kalter states that some divorced parents use their kids as objects to

anger or belittle the other parent, therefore they pressure the kids to participate in their

conflicts or choose sides which put the kids in a position where they feel unsafe and

threatened (13). Some parents intentionally talk badly about the other parent or place the kids

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in the middle of a fight so the kid can choose which side he's on, but instead, they take it

negatively and get confused on why his parents are treating themselves and him in that way

(Ryoko 63).

Kalter continues to explain that parents who feel lonely after the divorce, seek emotional

support and comfort from their children and often do that by sleeping with them in the same

room or even the same bed, and parents justify that by saying their kids are scared to sleep

alone at night or that the house is too small. In doing so, the child steps up to take the place of

the missing spouse and sacrifices their emotional wellbeing for that of the parent’s (14).

Some parents intentionally talk badly about the other parent or place the kids in the middle of

a fight so the kid can choose which side he's on, but instead, they take it negatively and get

confused on why his parents are treating themselves and him in that way (Ryoko 63).

The most common reason kids suffer is because they blame themselves for why their parents

are separating, as Wallerstein and Blakeslee mention: "many children feel guilty, and some

feel that they must mend the marriage. One seven-year-old believed for five years that she

caused her parents' divorce because she failed to deliver a message from one parent to the

other. A little boy thought it was his fault because his dog was noisy" (13).

Teenagers deal with several stressors once the parents decide to get a divorce. First, they

think of the possibility of the loss of close family connection that brings them a sense of

security, comfort, and balance. Most of them are often oblivious to their feelings of being

scared so they don't express it right, they might express it to themselves as a need to mature

faster than normal or that their parents left them and they are alone now. Second, they change

how they think and feel about their parents. Often teenagers think highly of their parents and

think they rarely ever do any mistakes and often idolize them, so when parents get divorced,

teenagers think of their parents now in a negative light and change their perspective of them

to a harsh one. They think their parents are self-centered and hateful. Third, teenagers resort

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back to the way of thinking like little kids and grade-school children. They hold and place the

divorce responsibility on them and they take the blame of their parents' separation and that

results in guilt (Kalter 311,312).

Third Section: Do the Children Get Better As Adults? How Do They Think of Divorce Years

Later?

Getting better as children grow up differs from one child to another. Some get over their

anger and negative feelings, and some fear social situations and become even more angry and

bitter than when they were younger. “The effects investigated in the analysis pertained to

outcomes measured up to 5 years after the marital disruption ”(Furstenberg and Teitler).

Miller shared some real instances from adults whose parents got divorced when they were

younger: a person shares that even as an adult, he hates family gatherings of any kind since it

reminds him of how incomplete his family is, and how much hate and damage he still feels

like a grown man (95). Another person shares that: " Although a young adult at the time of

the divorce, the feelings are no different, except one is not as vulnerable to the physical

effects such as abandonment or a reduced standard of living. Emotionally, it is still as

devastating and shocking” (119). Another person said: "I despised divorce then, I still despise

it, and I will always despise it" (107). Grown-ups dread social situations where both divorced

parents may attend like graduations and weddings. (D’Onofrio and Emery).

Section Four: How the Different Age Groups Get Affected and React

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Divorce does not affect all children of different ages and age groups the same. Each group is

different in how they react and conceive the divorce. Infants and toddlers have very limited

cognitive and understanding abilities so they don't feel or understand what is happening when

a divorce occurs, but they can feel the change that happens with divorce. They get affected

and even stressed when they feel how their routines are changing, the fights occurring

between the parents, and when one of the parents is stressed (Kalter 42).

Researchers have found that preschoolers (ages 3-5) are the children most vulnerable to

divorce, due to their lack of cognitive ability to fully understand the divorce process.

Preschoolers depend on their day to day routines and generally think of the world around

them in a self-centered way, not in a self-obsessed way, which means when a good thing or a

bad thing happened around them, they think they caused it. Any disruption in their daily

routines causes them distress. Since they are a bit older than infants and toddlers, their

understanding skills are more advanced than them so they understand what is happening

when their parents fight (Kalter 100). Kalter continues to explain that “when under stress,

some parents turn to their children as a source of comfort. This creates a shift in the parent-

child relationship. For preschoolers, it usually means greater physical and emotional

closeness with the parent. She may become overly protective of her preschooler, engage him

in play to the near exclusion of opportunities for interacting with other children, hold and

cuddle him frequently as if he were a much younger child” (114). Preschoolers react to their

distress in a few different ways and the most common ones are fear, anger, and sadness. They

start teasing other kids by kicking and spitting on them, snatching away their belongings, and

in some cases they resort to bullying and name-calling, and in even rarer cases that anger

would be directed towards the parent by disobeying them, yelling back, and biting a parent

(Kalter 130,131). Kids at this age start to fear situations they used to be fine in, for example,

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starting to cry when he/she is being dropped off at a nursery or being scared again from some

fears they have overcome like loud noises, the dark, or animals (Kalter 131).

Grade school children (5-12-year-old) get confused and worry that the divorce is their fault.

They worry that when their parents stop loving each other, they will also stop loving the kids

eventually, or they might think the separation is not permanent (Morin). Kalter discusses that

“grade school children do not resonate with their parents' rage or become angry about the

battles they observe. They typically feel overwhelmed by sadness over losing their familiar

sense of family cohesiveness. The costs in terms of loss of developmental accomplishment;

failure to progress on cognitive, emotional, and/or social fronts; and painful sadness,

fearfulness, and guilt can be considerable” (164). Kids at this stage deal with their sadness

and distress by avoiding it. They live their lives normally but if they get reminded of the

divorce they instantly become irritated and sad (Kalter 174). Grade school children react to

the stress of divorce by resorting back to childish behaviors like disobeying their parents,

experiencing bad dreams, and clinging to a parent (Royal College of Psychiatrists). At this age,

gender takes a role in shaping how boys and girls react differently as well. Boys display

distress as anger and aggression, while girls display it as sadness or depression. Girls would

cry at everything and prefer being alone rather engaging with others (Kalter 195).

Unlike young children, teenagers react in a vastly different way which often endangers them.

Many teenagers can distinguish their feelings but cannot figure out why they feel angry or

sad or mad towards their parents, and they act in a way that makes their parents feel

unsettled, worried, and bothered (Kalter 311). He continues to say that teenagers express their

anger by starting to “ use illicit drugs, abuse alcohol, physically hurt others or themselves, get

into trouble with the law, and/or run away from home" (Kalter 310). Most teenagers become

angry and may start hating or resenting one parent and blaming them for the separation and

change in the family and home and in their academic performance and self-esteem (Morin).

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Just like younger children, teenagers express distress as anger aimed towards their parents

and siblings, or their classmates, and maybe even at inanimate objects. It might also show in

the form of depression. Teenagers might suffer from mood swings, low self-esteem, and self-

worth, not being able to focus in school, eating less or eating more, difficulty sleeping or

staying awake. And sometimes suicidal thoughts and self-harm are linked with depression

(Kalter 347,348).

Section Five: Toughest Time After Divorce

Kalter states that after the first year or two years after the divorce, affected children go back

to normal and to how they were and are able to forget the problems and struggles that

occurred. But research shows that 30 to 50 percent of kids still feel the struggle and effects of

the parents' divorce even as they get older (2). According to Morin, kids might show their

struggle for the first two years by expressing their anger, sadness, and stress, and she claims

that kids who do not adjust to divorce within that time will not only suffer as kids but even as

adults.

Section Six: Effects and Changes That Extends Into Adulthood

As it was discussed in a previous section, many adults still feel resentment towards divorce

and how it changed the dynamics of their families, but that's not the only effect. Divorce

affects adults’ relationships and their views about them. When children of divorce become

adults, they struggle with the idea of marriage, and if they get married, they face problems

with having confidence and self-respect, they don’t trust their partners easily, and they have a

lack of problem-solving skills (Miller 20). A study concluded that people whose parents

divorced as children mostly do not involve themselves in serious relationships due to their

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home situation as kids, and those adults grow up thinking that marriage does not equal

happiness and in case they got married, divorce can happen at any time (Williams-Owens

21). “It also results in more trouble with dating, more cohabitation, greater likelihood of

divorce, higher expectations of divorce later in life, and a decreased desire to have children”

(Fagan and Churchill 21). Some of those adults express their intentions of never wanting to

get married or even have kids so that eventually they wouldn't subject their kids to what

they've gone through as children. They generally don't think falling in love and getting

married is worth it since, in their opinion, most marriages end with divorce (Ryoko 164).

Miller shares some opinions of how their parents’ divorce as kids affected their opinions as

adults: “Marriage seems impossible. I desire it, but I fear it. On the other hand, my desire to

avoid hurting my future children is exceptionally strong. I do not want them to know the pain

I have known” (Miller 127). Another said: “I struggle with trusting my husband. I am always

waiting for the other shoe to drop, which I am sure must be related to the feeling of

abandonment by my family of origin. On the other hand, I feel that I guard my marriage

more, in order to save my children from having to endure the pain that I did ” (Miller 139).

Conclusion

This paper has attempted to explore and inform about the negative effects of divorce on

children. Divorce has become a huge social problem in recent years and contrary to popular

belief, children might get affected more than the parents. The intention of this paper is to

increase awareness of the effects of divorce on children. Children can be affected not only

emotionally, but behaviorally and mentally as well. Those effects often disappear over the

course of a few months but in some cases, it lasts for more than 5 years, and the idea of

marriage and divorce changes and affects those children when they grow up and start having

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relationships of their own. Couples these days get divorced for unnecessary reasons and if

they have kids, those kids are the ones who suffer the most, therefore unless the marriage is

toxic or abusive, parents should be able to work their differences out for the sake of their

children.

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 Works Cited

Books

Cummings, E. Mark, and Davies, Patrick T. Marital Conflict and Children. The Guilford Press. 2011.

Kalter, Neil. Growing Up With Divorce. Free Books. 2006.

Miller, Leila. Primal Loss: The Now-Adult Children of Divorce Speak. LCB Publishing. 2017.

Wallerstein, Judith, et al. The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A 25 Year Landmark Study. Hyperion.
. New York, United States. 2002.

Wallerstein, Judith, et al. Surviving the Breakup: How Children and Parents Cope With Divorce.
m. Basic Books. 1996.

Wallerstein, Judith, and Blakeslee, Sandra. Second Chances: Men, Women, and Children a Decade
. After Divorce. Bantam. 1989.

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D'Onofrio, Brian, and Emery, Robert. Parental Divorce or separation and children’s mental health.
2019. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6313686/ Accessed 21 Mar 2020.

Fagan, Patrick F., and Churchill, Aaron. The Effects of Divorce on Children. 2012.
https://downloads.frc.org/EF/EF12A22.pdf Accessed 2 Apr 2020.

Furstenberg, Frank, and Teitler, Julien. Reconsidering the Effects of Marital Disruption: What
Happens to Children of Divorce in Early Adulthood?. 1994
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249707903_Reconsidering_the_Effects_of_Marital_Disrupt
ionWhat_Happens_to_Children_of_Divorce_in_Early_Adulthood. Accessed 5 Apr 2020.

Morin, Amy. The Psychological Effects of Divorce on Children. 2019.

https://www.verywellfamily.com/psychological-effects-of-divorce-on-kids-4140170 . Accessed 10
Mar 2020.

Royal College of Psychiatrists. Divorce or Separation of Parents- The Impact on Children and
Adolescents. 2017. https://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mental-health/parents-and-young-people/information-
for-parents-and-carers/divorce-or-separation-of-parents---the-impact-on-children-and-adolescents-for-
parents-and-carers Accessed 5 Apr 2020.

Vassila, Peter. The Psychological Effects of Divorce on Children. 2017.

http://www.cpfamilylaw.co.uk/site/blog/children_parenting_issues_blog/the-psychological-effects-of-
divorce-on-children Accessed 5 Apr 2020.

Wayne, Parker. Key Statistics About Kids From Divorced Families. 2020.
https://www.verywellfamily.com/children-of-divorce-in-america-statistics-1270390 Accessed 10 Mar
2020.

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Williams-Owens, Wanda M. The Behavioral Effects Divorce Can Have on Children. 2017.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3353&context=gc_etds Accessed 29
Mar 2020.

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