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CALAMBA INTEGRATED SCHOOL

The Effect of Broken Family to the Academic Performance of


Selected Grade 10 Students in Calamba Integrated School
For School Year 2017-2018

A Research

Presented to the Faculty of the

Senior High School Calamba Integrated School

In Partial

Fulfilment of the Requirements

For the Grade-12 Senior High School

Technical Vocational Livelihood Home Economics

Cabidog, Ramilyn R.
Denio,Jenilie B.

January, 2018
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Chapter 1

The Problem and Its Background

Introduction

Family is the base unit of the society. It is one the most essential components
of the nation. At home is way a family lives. It maybe alternated to the world house,
but house most appropriately referring to the material structure, whereas home
refers to the intangible thing that binds together the family members. It is
immeasurable love and care that keeps together the mother, the father and their
children. Beckford (2010), children from broken families is nearly five times more
likely to suffer mental problem than those whose parents stay together.

Although children experience divorce and separation differently the one love
that should be addressed are the children feeling of abandonment, mistrust and
symptoms that defines the emotions of an attachment disorder, factor that also
seriously affects school learning disordering to researchers, divorce affects secure
attachments, which could have a negative impact on behaviour in childhood and
throughout the life of a child.

The emotional stress of a divorce can be enough to stop the children’s


academic progress but the lifestyle changes and instability of broken family can
contribute to poor education. However, this for academic progress can be cause by a
numbers of factors, such as instability in the home. Life in the single parents family
or broken home can be stressful for the both child and parent. Children of unmarried
parents or separated families often fail and are risk emotionally. Some children
irrespective of home background or structure may work hard and become successful
in life.

The Problem
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A broken family can negatively affect all domains of your child’s development.
The effects of a broken family on a child’s development depend on numerous factors,
including the age of the child at the time of parents’ separation, and on the personality
and family relationships. Although infants and young children may experience few
negative developmental effects, older children and teenagers may experience some
problems in their social, emotional and educational functioning.

Emotional
After a divorce, children from pre-school through late adolescence can
experience deficits in emotional development. Children of all ages may seem tearful or
depressed, which is a state that can last for several years after a child’s parents’ have
separated, explains psychologist Lori Rappaport.
Additionally, some older children may show very little emotional
reaction to their parents’ divorce. According to Lori Rappaport, this may not be
developmentally beneficial. Some children who show little emotional response are
actually bottling up their negative feelings. This emotional suppression makes it
difficult for parents, teachers and therapists to help the child process her feelings in
developmentally appropriate ways.

Educational
Slowed academic development is another common way that separation
of the parents affects children. The emotional stress of a divorce alone can be enough
to stunt your child’s academic progress, but the lifestyle changes and instability of a
broken family can contribute to poor educational outcomes.
This poor academic progress can stem from a number of factors, including instability
in the home environment, inadequate financial resources and inconsistent
routines.

Social
Divorce affects children’s social relationships in several ways. First,
some children act out their distress about their broken family by acting aggressive and
by engaging in bullying behavior, both of which can negatively affect peer
relationships. Other children may experience anxiety, which can make it difficult for
them to seek positive social interactions and engage in developmentally beneficial
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activities such as teen sports. Teens from broken families might develop a cynical
attitude toward relationships and harbor feelings of mistrust, both toward their parents
and potential romantic partners, explains psychologist Carl Pickhardt in the article,
‘Parental Divorce and Adolescents’ published in Psychology Today.

Settings of the Study

This study conducted at selected Grade 10 students in Calamba Integrated


School at Calamba City school year 2017-2018. Supervised by Mrs. Rosemarie V.
Magnaye and the key teacher Mr. Crisostomo B. Canon. Calamba Integrated School
is located at Brgy. Banadero Calamba, City Laguna. This school offers Senior High
School Program, they have two tracks on academic namely GAS strands which
means General Academic strands, and ABM strands which means Accountancy,
Business, and Management. Also they offers Tech-voc they two strands the ICT
which means Information and Communication Technology and the HE which means
Home Economics, that they have a Bread and Pastry production, Cookery, and the
Food and Beverages Services.

Theoretical Framework
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It explore why some family systems adapt and even grow and thrive when
faced with situational stressors or transitional events, while other family units
deteriorate and disintegrate under similar circumstances
Mountain (2016), if a family experiences multiple stressors, Attneave (2010),
pointed out that they are socially isolated an emotionally disconnected to one
another, they are depressed ,hopeless, and disempowered, then they will be
increased risk for illness accidents child substance abuse, delinquency and school
failure.

Conflict can be defined as the lack of piece in an environment. Conflict in a


family therefore refers to a situation where by the smooth interaction and relation
among members of family is disrupted because of one thing or another. It can be
between the two parents or parents and their children conflict in a family can be as a
result of lack of trust, drunkenness and lack of dialogue, lack of respect, joblessness
and idleness. It comes in form of fights, quarrels, spouse, battering child abuses and
child molestation. It can result to a bad atmosphere in the home, separation or
divorce.

According to walker(1999), studies carried out have shown that when one
from of violence was found in the family, other forms were more likely to also occur
and that violence in the family has a direct relationship to community violence and
other forms of aggression and gender based violence . Law of enforcement in many
countries will not intervene in what is often called a “domestic quarrel” even though
psychological research indicates that without such intervention, abusers are unlikely to
seek help to stop their battering behavior.
Research has found a strong relationship between violence in the home and
violence in the community. Golden (2000) reports that it has been found that prior
history of abuse can increase the likelihood of abusive behavior.

According to Steinberg (1996), parental conflict and aggression or a conflict


atmosphere in the home is related to offspring’s personal or violent crimes.

Murphy and O’Farrell (1994) highlighted the view that parents play a central role
in shaping the child’s development through their influence. Thus if parents keep
having conflicts in their homes, children are bound to be affected as they grow up.
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They also asserted that children learn through imitating and identification with the
parents and other significant adults. If the children grow up in a family where violence
is a common phenomenon, they may end up doing the same in their families, unless
intervention is carried out. The first important influence on children is the family but
children and families are interactive members of a large system of social institutions,
such as the school, the workplace and community.
Parental involvement and education improve both family and child functioning.
It has been found out that parental involvement in a child might have lasting effects on
its behavior. Steinberg (1996) assets that conflict is a critical aspect of family
functioning that often outweighs the influence of family structure on the child’s
development. He also reports that studies carried out have found that children’s health
and social development is most effectively promoted by love and at least some
moderate parental control.

According to Seifert and Hoffnung (1997), children who have lived for
years in situations of neglect or abuse suffer severe stress. They also state that
students often receive long term support from parents or other adults at home as well
as strong support from teachers and others at school.
Involving parents in learning activities with their children at home is one kind
of parental involvement that many educators believe is an important aspect of the
child’s learning. If the family is undergoing conflict, parents will not have time for their
children. Men, who more often use violence, do so in order to obtain and maintain
power and control over others.
The APA task force on violence and the family defined domestic violence as
a pattern of abusive behaviors including a wide range of physical, sexual and
psychological maltreatment used by one person in an intimate relationship against
another to gain power unfairly or maintain that person’s misuse of power, control and
authority.

Conceptual Framework

Independent variable Dependent Variable

Effect of broken Relationship


Family to the parents Academic
selected grade Achievements
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FIGURE 1.

Schematic Diagram

The conceptual framework of this research is can be seen below was affixed to the
independent variable that effects of broken family while this academic, performance
the dependent variable was effect of broken family on the selected grade 10
students at Calamba Integrated School.

Statement of the Problem

This study aims to determine the effects of broken family to the selected grade
10 students specially answer the following questions.

1. What are the effects of broken family to the selected grade 10 students?

2. What are the characteristics of the respondents in terms of


2.1 Age
2.2 Sex
2.3 Year level
2.4 Family background

3. What is the effect of broken family to the students that same from broken
family?

4. How does being in a broken family affect the students?

Hypothesis of the study


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Family is the basic components of the society. The researcher believes that the
number of one ingredients on youths happily life is their family. The parents are the
most important source of youth’s behaviour, which effect to their outlook in life. So if
the parents are separated, how does if affect the youth and what can they do about
it? When parents split up there can be many emotions that a youth and what can
they do about it.

This study tested the following null hypothesis:

Ho1.There is no significant correlation between gender and age.

Ho2. There is no significant correlation between year level and family backgrounds.

Ho3. There is no significant divergence from the normal curve of high school
students academic performance coming from the broken homes.

Scope and Delimitation

This study primarily focuses on the academic performances of the selected


grade10 high school students in Calamba Integrated School. Involves as subjects
and respondents of the selected 50 students during school year 2017-2018.

The subjects matter under investigation was the profile of the students in
terms of age, gender, and academic performance. They study correlated the age
and academic performance and also correlated the gender and academic
performance.

Significance of the Study

The result of the following would be beneficial to the following.

Broken Family- they will know what’s the effect of broken family on their child or
children also on the society.
Family- they will know what the importance of being a whole family are and also
they will know what a good effect of f together with family is.
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Future researchers- It will help to them especially when they’re topics are almost
near to this.

Parents- They will know that before making family they should physically, mentally,
and financially ready on that situation. And will be able to benefit in this study as to
guide their children in school.

School Administration- the researcher drop the administration may be able to look
into activities on seminars that could boost the self-esteem of the students.
Students- They will know that broken family was not underwire on their study.
Teachers- they will know that because teachers have a family and understand how
hard family is.

Definition of terms
The following special terms has been used to suit this study.

Abandonment- the action or fact of abandoning or being abandoned.


Adult Children- A son o daughter who has reached the age of majority.
Broken family- is a term of used to describe household, usually in reference of
parenting in which the family unit does not properly puncher according to accepted
societal norms. This household might suffer from domestic violence, a dissolve
marriage, drug- abuse, or anything else that interferes with the upbringing children.
Detrimental effect - A damaging or negative effect.
Divorce-is the termination of marriage
Family- Small part of the community a small foundation of society.
Mistrust-be suspicious of, have no confidence in, lack of trust.

Chapter 2
Review of Related Literature and Studies

This chapter present a review related literature and studies related to


broken family that effect on academic performance of the students.

Foreign Literature
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Separations of parents can generally affect a child’s life forever. He may not
believe in the power of marriage anymore. The poem entitled Divorce by Anna
Wickham is about helpful to think of the word divorce in terms of separating or
breaking away from something. The speaker in this poem is feeling restricted and
constrained in the house in the valley but is aware of potential freedom outside .a
voice from the dark is calling her, yet she is not frightened. She yearns to be let free
into a night she associates with liberty and desire. Notice how the poem turns on the
exclamation wait in line nine, when the speaker appears ready to break away from
smothering house and the fire which has been fanned with her sick breath.
This study is anchored on field of theory and family stress theory. both
explanatory and understanding of the study.
For Kurt Lewin (2011), behaviour was determined by totality of an individual
situation, in his field theory, a field is defined as the totality of coexisting factors
which are conceived of as mutually
Tognotti (2013), subsequently, field theory deals with the problem of how people
gain understanding of themselves and their environments
Beronio (2013), there is basically a change of oneself if the environment changes.
Thus, individuals participate in a series of life spaces such as the family work, school
and church, and these were constructed under the influence of various force vectors
Lewin (2015), relatively, if we speak about environment family contribute greatly
to the development of a person and if the family encounter crisis, problem occurs.
And every family member is apparently affected.
Karl Zinsmeister (2012), asserts that there is a mountain of scientific evidence
showing that when families disintegrate, children often end up with intellectual,
physical and emotional scars that persist for life i.e. the drug crisis, the education
crisis, and the problem of teen pregnancy and juvenile crime. But all these is trace
back predominantly to one source: broken families. A broken families in this context
is one that is not structurally intact for various reasons, death of parent, divorce
separation, dissertation an illegitimacy in which case, the family was never complete.
Conkline (2014), this analysis becomes necessary because life in single parent
can be stressful for both h child and parents. Such families are faced with the
challenges of diminished financial resources.
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Children’s defence fund (2016), assumptions of new roles and responsibilities,
establishments of new patterns in familial interaction and reorganization of routines
and schedules.
Nzewunwah(2014)when the single parents is overburdened by responsibilities
and by their own emotional reaction to their situation, they often become irritable,
impatient and insensitive o their children’s needs.
Agullana(2013),as seen children from broken homes household are
disadvantage. Some of them do not go to school who do may attend low quality
schools, with low academic performance.

According to Fagan, Fitzgerald and Rector (1998) ("The Effects of


Divorce On America), fifty percent of those children who are born this year with both
parents, before reaching their 18th birthday, they will experience the divorce of their
parents.

Hopefully these statistics may ultimately cause you and your spouse to
sincerely consider all the cost of divorce before you make the final choice.

Based on these statistics, it becomes clear that children need secure, loving
homes with both parents. There is, of course an omission to every rule, and in this case
it is households where violence is taking place. Children should under no situation
remain in a violent ambiance that is unsafe for them.

If both of you have just "grown apart", or fell out of love and if there is no
violence enchanting place in your marriage, for your children's sake, I advise you to
seek out help for your marriage before you give up completely.

It has been expected in the United States today that almost half of all couples
that walk down the aisle will rashly have divorce, but how about the clause "until death
do us part?"

Over time, there have been many theories obtainable as to why divorce occurs
and why these tolls have enlarged so radically over the last 30 years. Some think that
the country may take part in a role; others suppose that the span of the courtship plays
an significant piece; cohabitation preceding to wedding "increases" the chance that
separation will result; or not cohabitating prior to marriage may add as the evolution era
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is too stressful; still others think that the separation progression is too simple; if laws
were stricter and divorces were further hard to get, these divorce statistics would get
better over era. At this era, although elevated, the separation tempo has decreased to
some extent lessening the minds of the American public. There is still small hope that
these information will ever diminish completely.

In this fast paced civilization that we exist in nowadays, it must to be simple


for us, the American public, to be aware of this phenomenon. The standard "American
Family" has both parents in the place of work, financial stress, job discontent, children
in school activities and sports, "high demand" lifestyles and generally small time to
center on the family's group cohesiveness.

Although Waite and Lillard (1991) viewed that children, especially young
children, present and improve marital steadiness, environmental stressors and
everyday labor are often more than a parental relationship can endure. These
"standard" stressors alone can make much chaos, turmoil and in time lead to marital
damage, argument and divorce.

Local Studies

One of the biggest problem to a mother is being depressed, worried, and


self-concern. Second problem having a lowered standard of living. The concerns of
being a mothers is directly affected their children. They can't able to provide the care
and other necessities of their children as they felt they should. The study found that
with women, earning capacity proves to be a direct determinant of happiness and
well-being.
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Women who did not reach college and who are in the lowest income group
are approximately twice as likely to become depressed as the problem of child-raising
as those who are educated and hold high-paying, professional jobs, blue-collar
women earning low income are three times more apt to complain of lowered
standards of living than those in the higher bracket. High wage-earners, on the other
hand, have a different problem. Almost a third of them claim that their involvement
with members of the opposite sex is the most trying part of solo parenting.

Who are in process of divorce is a one of the hardest situation to be in.


sometimes happening between couple, that concerns most people. Somehow divorce
is hurtful on both partner to those who undergo, the children end up with the greatest
amount of problems. This is a challenge to a child that can develop and not always
seen by the naked eye, and do not always come to the surface right away.

Foreign Studies

According to the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry (2014),


teenagers that is raised by a single-parent or in a blended family are three times more
likely to seek a psychological help within a given year.

These are some of the other outrageous statistics about the effect of divorce on
children:

According to Dawson ("Family Structure and Children's Health and Well-


being" Journal of Marriage and the Family (2011), twenty to thirty-five percent of
children who are living with both biological parents are physically healthy than those
from broken homes. Children who have divorced parents have greater possibility to
experience injury, asthma, headaches and speech defects than those children whose
parents are intact.

According to Wallerstein ("The Long-Term Effects of Divorce on Children"


Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 2012),
after six years of parental marriage separation, a study of children revealed that even
though many years have passed, these children still feel "lonely, unhappy, anxious
and insecure".
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According to McLanahan and Sandefur ("Growing Up With a Single
Parent: What Hurts, What Helps" Harvard University Press 1994), Children who
have divorced parents are approximately two times more expected to drop out of high
school than those children whose parents are intact.

According to Angel and Worobey ("Single Motherhood and Children's


Health"), fifty percent of children with divorced parents are more probable to develop
health problems than those with intact parents.

Effects on Adult Relationships

Many studies show that family conflict was typically a strong precursor to
divorce and lead children from divorced families to rate their relationships as having
greater family conflict. Those from intact families reported more cohesion,
expressiveness, sociability, and idealization and less conflict than those from divorced
families. However, coming from a divorced family did not affect young adults' self-
esteem, fear of intimacy, or relationship satisfaction, but it did affect fears and
expectations for divorce (Kirk, 2002).

In-depth studies strongly indicate that the attitudes surrounding marriage and
success in marriage is transmitted between generations in divorced families. Men and
women from divorced families tend to score significantly lower on several measures of
psychological well-being and more likely to be divorced themselves (Franklin, Janoff-
Bulman, & Roberts; 1990). This trend has the potential to have social impact on our
culture because the evidence suggests that adult children of divorce have relationship
problems that lead to divorce in their marriages as well, which could lead to a
perpetual cycle of this phenomenon.

Perhaps the greatest problem associated with divorce is that it does appear
to be a cyclical phenomenon. An estimated 40% to 50% of children born in the U.S. in
the 1980's experienced parental divorce (Fine, Moreland, & Schwebel, 1983).
Women who experience parental divorce have a 60% higher divorce rate than their
counterparts; while men whose parents divorced have a 35% higher rate of divorce
than men whose parents remained married (Glen & Shelton, 1983). It seems clear
that people from divorced families are more likely to be divorced themselves and
therefore convey the impression that marital dissolution is more acceptable. Amato
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(1987) states that adult children of divorce feel more pessimistic about their chances
of life-long marriage and evaluate divorce less negatively than do other young adults.

Students experiencing post-divorce conflict were more likely to have


engaged in premarital sexual intercourse, their satisfaction with their current
relationship was lower, and they showed a decline in the parent-child relationship.
These adult children of divorce also expressed more difficulty in finding people with
whom they could establish relationships (Morris & West, 2001).

Judith Wallerstein (2004) has been one of the leading researchers on the
phenomenon of divorce and its impact on adult relationships. Her 25 year longevity
study seems to strongly indicate that the attitudes surrounding marriage and success
in marriage is transmitted between generations in divorced families. Interestingly,
individuals from the Wallerstein study did not indicate feelings of fear of having
successful relationships, but felt less optimistic about their chances of having a
successful marriage. This study was one of the most in-depth studies ever conducted
on adult children of divorce, and illustrates how adult children of divorce have been
impacted by the choices of their parents.

The effect of parental divorce on young adults' romantic relationship


dissolution: What makes a difference?

It was proposed that parental divorce does not have a uniform effect on young
adults' romantic relationships and that differential outcomes depend on how young
adults perceive their parents' divorce. Using a sample of 571 young adults, structural
equation modeling suggested that, compared with those from intact families, young
adults whose parents divorced held a more favorable attitude toward divorce. A
positive attitude toward divorce was associated with lower commitment to their
romantic relationship, which in turn affected its dissolution. More importantly, young
adults' perception of parental divorce varied depending on inter-parental conflict and
parents' marital quality before the divorce. The variation in the perception of inter-
parental divorce was linked to relationship dissolution via attitude toward divorce and
relationship commitment.

Parental marital conflict and divorce, parent-child relationships, social


support, and relationship anxiety in young adulthood.
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Based on research documenting harmful long-term consequences of
parental conflict and divorce for offspring, relations between recollections of parental
conflict, parental divorce, and social outcomes in young adulthood were examined. A
total sample of 566 young adults from divorced and intact families completed
measures of parental conflict, quality of parent-adult child relationships, anxiety in
relationships with others, and perceptions of social support from others. As
hypothesized, divorce and conflict had significant independent effects on outcomes in
young adulthood. Effects of conflict were uniformly negative for quality of parent-child
relationships, perceived social support from others, and anxiety in personal
relationships.

Parental divorce was associated with lower quality father-child


relationships, yet divorce was associated with significant positive outcomes for quality
of mother-child relationships, social support, independence facilitated by both parents,
and reduced anxiety in relationships. Importantly, these effects occurred regardless of
participant sex, parental remarriage, and parental socioeconomic status.

Parental relationships, autonomy, and identity processes of high school


students

There continues to be controversy about whether adolescents' identity


formation is related to their emotional separation from their parents. According to
Eriksonian and neo-Eriksonian theory (J. E. Marcia, 1980, 1984), adolescents who
are successful in resolving their identity issues are better able to emotionally
individuate from their parents. That is, adolescents have fewer conflicts with parents
as they become more independent of them. Results of the present study indicate that
adolescent perceptions of mother's caring behavior, but not father's caring behavior,
predicted higher foreclosure identity status scores among adolescents. In addition, 2
dimensions of emotional autonomy (i.e., perceiving parents as people and parental
de-idealization) best predicted the adolescent identity statuses of moratorium and
foreclosure. Results also indicate that future research may need to establish a better
theoretical conceptualization of the constructs of interest in this study and better
measures of emotional autonomy among adolescents.

Impact of a broken family on children


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"Broken" Homes: The Effect of Divorce on Children

Going through a divorce is a very difficult situation to be in. Usually it is what is


happening between the parents, that concerns most people. However hurtful divorce
is on the couple that is going through it, the children end up with the greatest amount
of problems. These problems that the children develop are not always obvious, and do
notj always come to the surface right away.

"Most often the children responded to the announcement [of the


divorce] with apprehensiveness or anger . . . Several children panicked . . . finally, a
great many of the younger children, about one-third of the entire group, didn't really
believe what they had been told. For these youngsters, the single announcement by
the parents made it easier for them to pretend that the divorce would soon go away
and to postpone their own response to the frightening changes in their lives"
(Wallerstein 40-41).

Children often try to stop the divorce of their parents, but there are many who
seem to accept it at first. These who seem to accept it may even tell their parents that
they are happy about the divorce. This is not necessarily the case, as one would see if
he or she spoke with the child for a while. There are many things that divorce does to
a family, and there are many things that is does to the child. These effects are rarely
positive, or helpful depending upon the family's prior situation. Divorce has many
negative effects on the psychological, and social aspects of a child's life.

There are many psychological aspects of a child's life that change when his
or her parents go through a divorce. As previously mentioned by the writer, a child
may not show initially how he or she feels about the divorce, but the true feelings of
that child eventually surface. Joan B. Kelly, in an article for the Journal of the
American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry says," children incorporate
repertoires of angry, impulsive, and violent behavior into their own behavior as a result
of observing their parents' responses to frustration and rage". This is something that
many children that witness the divorce of their parents go through.

The child naturally looks to his or her parent or parents for the example of
how to handle certain situations and emotions. During a divorce there is much anger
and aggression that is expressed by one or both parents of that child. This is not
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healthy for the child to witness for several reasons. One of the main reasons is that
the child sees this example of aggression that his or her parents are setting, and he or
she begins to react in the same manner. Anger and aggression tend to become the
child's tools for solving his or her problems. The child becomes like the parents and
could cause harm to others because of not knowing or understanding how to control
these feelings. He or she may often violently lash out at those around him or her that
cause these feelings to occur.

"The severity of fighting has been documented in many studies to have


a central role. High-intensity fighting is associated with more insecure attachments
and anxiety in infants and toddlers. In older children and adolescents, severity of
conflict had the largest and most consistent impact on children's adjustment, with
intense conflict leading to more externalizing (disobedience, aggression,
delingquency0 and internalizing (depression, anxiety, poor self-esteem) symptoms in
both boys and girls, compared with children experiencing low-intensity conflict".

This leads to the next psychological effect that divorce has on children.
Depression is a major effect that divorce has on children. This is not necessarily
something that occurs during the divorce, but has major effects on the later life of the
child. "A high level of marital conflict experienced during childhood has been linked to
more depression and other psychological disorders in young adults, compared with
those reporting lower levels of family conflict during childhood" (Kelly 3). Lora Heims
Tessman, author of Children of Parting Parents says, "most of the adolescents were
overly depressed . . . many had conscious suicidal thoughts . . . a minority showed
increased acting out with self-destructive components, but without anxious
depression" (327). These are common psychological effects of divorce on children.

There are also many social effects that divorce has on children. The child
often feels unconnected to his or her peers. He or she feels "unable to make or
maintain friendships and complained about being 'unconnected' to [his or her] peers"
(Tessman 327). Also contributing to feeling unconnected to their peers is that "in
numerous studies over the past three decades, divorced children have been reported
to be more aggressive and impulsive and to engage in more antisocial behaviors,
compared with matched samples of never-divorced children" (Kelly 6). The divorce
that these children experience causes them to act and react in ways that are not
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considered socially acceptable, and distancing themselves from their peers.
"Diagnostically, the adolescents varied greatly, but did share a number of clinical
features. The great majority had either lost a previous enjoyment or learning or were,
increasingly, cutting and failing classes" (Tessman 327). The children of these
divorced families have become so mixed up that they do not know who they are any
longer. Things that they once loved or enjoyed, things that they were once interested
in no longer matter to them.

Going along with socially unacceptable behaviors Kelly says that, "Divorced
children are more likely to use alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana than are never-
divorced children . . . [they] are twice as likely to give birth to a child as a teenager
compared with never-divorced children" . The children that have suffered through the
divorce of their parents tend to rebel against society and the law. This is shown
through the higher drug, alcohol, and pregnancy rates of children who come from
"broken" homes. "In many cases in this group, one of the parent's presenting
complaints about the referred adolescent who was 'lying,' 'playing the truth,'
'untrustworthiness,' 'deviousness' etc." (Tessman 327). The reliability of the child's
word comes into question due to the child's rebellious ways. He or she might sneak
thing behind his or her parents' backs in order to commit the acts that they are
choosing to commit.

"Young adults whose parents divorced during childhood, compared with


never-divorced children, have more pregnancies outside of marriage, and earlier
marriages (a risk factor for later divorce), poorer marital relationships, increased
propensity to divorce, and poorer socioeconomic attainment". The divorce itself has
impacted the way that young adults view their relationships. They remember how their
parents handled situations or they remember the pain of that situation and it carries
over into their relationships that they will have throughout their lives.

To conclude, divorce has many negative effects on the children that live
through them. "Broken" homes are a tough situation to deal with, that children across
the United States of America attempt to handle in very similar ways. Their reactions to
the divorce itself are similar in many ways; it affects both the psychological and social
aspects of their lives.
CALAMBA INTEGRATED SCHOOL

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