Copyright © eContent Management Pty Ltd. Journal of Family Studies (2011) 17: 86–109.

Family structure, co-parental

relationship quality, post-separation
paternal involvement and children’s
emotional wellbeing
JENNIFER BAXTER PHD1
Senior Research Fellows, Australian Institute of Family Studies, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

RUTH WESTON MA
Principal Research Fellow, Australian Institute of Family Studies, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

LIXIA QU PHD
Senior Research Fellows, Australian Institute of Family Studies, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

ABSTRACT
It is well documented that children who experience parental divorce are more likely than those in intact
families to experience a range of emotional and behavioural adjustment problems, and to perform less well
academically. However, few studies of the impact of divorce have exclusively considered young children.
This paper takes advantage of a recent Australian child cohort study to examine links between young
children’s emotional wellbeing, the quality of the co-parental relationship, and post-separation paternal
involvement. We found that while children aged 6–7 years living with both parents generally had better
emotional wellbeing than similar aged children living with one parent, inter-parental hostility was an
important factor in explaining young children’s emotional wellbeing. But regardless of family type, children
whose parents had a hostile inter-parental relationship tended to have poorer emotional wellbeing than
children whose parents did not have a non-hostile relationship, as reported by children and their parents.

Key words: children; divorce; wellbeing; parental conflict; family structure; family transitions

A s in other western countries, Australia has

experienced striking changes in many aspects
of family life, including increases in the propor-
tions of couples who are cohabiting outside mar-
riage, in the fragility of relationships, and in the
number of children born outside marriage (Hayes,
Weston, Qu, & Gray, 2010). It is not surprising,
then, that among all Australian families with
dependent children, the proportion headed by a
sole parent has increased (e.g., from 15% in 1986
to 22% in 2006; Australian Bureau of Statistics
[ABS], 2001, 2007). Most of these families arise
from the separation of parents who had been mar-
ried to each other (Hayes et al., 2010).
Each year over the past few decades, around
50,000 children under age 18 years have

1
Correspondence to: Dr Jennifer Baxter, Australian Institute of Family Studies, Melbourne, Australia 3000;
tel: +61 3 9214 7888; e-mail: Jennifer.Baxter@aifs.gov.au

86 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011


experienced parental divorce, However, given that
separating parents include those who were mar-
ried to each other and do not seek divorce (at least
for several years and possibly not at all), as well as
those who had been living together outside mar-
riage the number of children experiencing paren-
tal separation is likely to be considerably greater
than this figure. Overall, one in five children aged
under age 18 years have a natural parent living
elsewhere (ABS, 2011).
Prior research has shown that children who
experience parental divorce are more likely than
those in intact families to experience a range of
emotional and behavioural adjustment problems,
and to perform less well academically. As adults,
they are also more likely to divorce and become
single parents themselves than those who grew up
in intact families (see reviews by Amato, 2000;
Cherlin, Chase-Lansdale, & McRae, 1998). While
differences in emotional and behavioural problems
between children in divorced and intact families
are typically modest, with much overlap apparent,
the absolute number of children adversely affected
by divorce is substantial (Amato, 2000).
Assessments of links between parental separa-
tion and children’s wellbeing need to take into
account the fact that relationship breakdown
does not occur randomly. That is, factors that
predispose parental separation may also be asso-
ciated with children’s elevated risk of experienc-
ing emotional or behavioural problems. Without
taking some of these background characteristics
into account, the impact of parental separation
on children will be overstated (Furstenberg &
Kiernan, 2001). For instance, parents’ problem-
atic personality traits or mental health problems
that contribute to separation may be inherited
by children, increasing their chance of displaying
various psycho-social problems (Amato, 2010; see
Pryor & Rodgers, 2001).
Regardless of whether separation takes
place, processes associated with deteriorating
relationships between parents are also likely to
impact negatively on the children. Thus stud-
ies of intact and separated families suggest
Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES
Children’s emotional wellbeing
that high levels of overt inter-parental con-
flict increase the risk of children experiencing
socio-emotional problems. These problems
that can be long-lasting (see Amato & Booth,
1997; Sarrazin & Cyr, 2007). It is therefore not
surprising that the elevated risk of adjustment
problems apparent for children whose parents
have separated are frequently linked to their
experiences of significant pre-separation con-
flict (Amato & Booth, 1997; Ambert, 1997).
At the same time, there is some evidence to
suggest that of children exposed to high levels
of inter-parental conflict, those whose parents
remain together tend to indicate poorer adjust-
ment than those whose parents separate (e.g.,
Jekielek, 1997), while divorce between parents
who displayed low conflict prior to separation
tends to be associated with poorer wellbeing for
these children (Morrison & Coiro, 1999). In
his review of this literature, Amato (2010) con-
cluded: ‘Taken together, these studies suggest
that the consequences of divorce depend on
whether children are removed from an aversive
or a supportive family environment’ (p. 657).
While parental separation may bring about
relief from exposure to very frequent and intense
conflict between parents, it also tends to create
a range of other disruptions. Immediate upheav-
als may include substantial increases in financial
difficulties and associated deprivations, changes
in housing and school, enhanced parental dis-
tress and/or diminished quality of parenting,
and substantially reduced time or even total loss
of contact with one parent. Such disruptions can
be very distressing for the children (see Amato,
2010; Carlson & Corcoran, 2001; Furstenberg
et al. 1987; Kelly & Emery, 2003). In forg-
ing new lives, parents may re-partner, perhaps
more than once They may find themselves lead-
ing very complex lives which include having to
take responsibility for additional step children
or additional children resulting from the new
relationship (Amato, 2010; Cherlin, 2008).
Parental separation may therefore be best seen as
a step in the process of relationship breakdown
87
 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu
and readjustment, with the outcomes for chil-
dren linked to their experiences of the entire
process. This process is likely to entail multiple
transitions such as sequential changes in family
structure, which may in turn adversely affect the
children (Amato, 2010).2
When questioned about their feelings about
their parents’ separation, many children express
sadness about spending diminished or no time
with one parent (usually the father; Lodge &
Alexander, 2010; Pryor & Rodgers, 2001). Yet
previous research into the links between frequency
or duration of post-separation parent–child con-
tact and children’s wellbeing has yielded mixed
results.3 On the basis of a meta-analysis of 12
studies, Whiteside and Becker (2000) concluded
that the amount of time with the father was part
of the complex model explaining children’s out-
comes, with the link between fathers’ time with
children and children’s outcomes being mediated
by the quality of the father-child involvement.
Based on another meta-analysis of 63 studies,
Amato and Gilbreth (1999) concluded that chil-
dren’s frequency of contact with their non-resi-
dent parent does not necessarily benefit children.
Rather, the quality of parenting displayed during
this time together affects child wellbeing. These
authors also found that the relationship between
paternal contact and child wellbeing was stronger
for recent than earlier studies. They considered
this to be a tentative finding which, if true, may
arise from greater commitment and parenting
skills among more recent cohorts of non-resident
fathers.
Kaspiew et al. (2009) examined the link
between child wellbeing (as reported by one
parent – the mother or the father) and different
care-time arrangements of Australian children
whose parents had been separated for an aver-
age of 15 months. Mothers’ assessments of child
wellbeing were not linked with care-time arrange-
ments, once their views of the quality of the
2
At the same time, parental separation is by no means an inevitable consequence of relationship breakdown.
3
It is unusual for studies to examine both the frequency of time spent with the children and typical duration of
such episodes. Smyth (2004) represents an exception.
88 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011
inter-parental relationship and parent and child
characteristics were taken into account. On the
other hand, fathers with shared care time pro-
vided more favourable assessments of their child’s
wellbeing than fathers with a minority of care
time, while those who never saw their child pro-
vided the least favourable assessments.
Findings such as those reported above need to
be qualified by the fact that research has consis-
tently shown that different informants are quite
often not in close agreement when assessing
children’s psycho-social wellbeing (Achenbach,
McConaughy, & Howell, 1987; De Los
Reyes & Kazdin, 2005; Loeber, Green, Lahey, &
Stouthamer-Loeber, 1991). This is particularly
the case when informants are reporting on inter-
nalising problems, such as anxiety and depression
(Achenbach et al., 1987; Choudhury, Pimentel, &
Kendall, 2003; Comer & Kendall, 2004; Duhig,
Renk, Epstein, & Phares, 2000; Karver, 2006).
In addition, individual informants’ assessments
can be affected by ‘situation specificity’. For exam-
ple, children may be unhappy or anxious at school
but not at home or vice versa, leading teachers
and parents to provide quite different views of the
child’s psycho-social wellbeing. Smart, Sanson,
Baxter, Edwards, & Hayes (2008) provide an anal-
yses of child outcomes using teachers’ responses.
Parents may better reflect how children are at
home. For example children at home are likely to
be more directly exposed to any parental difficul-
ties that exist or to the realities of a parental sepa-
ration (Emery, 1982; Karver, 2006). But parents’
reports of their children’s emotional wellbeing may
be more directly coloured by their own sense of
wellbeing (i.e., ‘shared method bias’). Being linked
to parents’ own coping mechanisms and emotional
states, parental perceptions of the impact of family
problems on their children may be positively or
negatively skewed. For example, there is evidence
that mothers with anxiety problems report more
anxiety problems in their children (Briggs-Gowan,
 Children’s emotional wellbeing

Carter, & Schwab-Stone, 1996; Chi & Hinshaw,
2002; Richters, 1992). On the other hand, deal-
ing with and being distracted by their own prob-
lems, some parents may overlook the emotional
and behavioural difficulties experienced by their
children during and after parental separation. Or
regardless of the home situation, parents may wish
to present their children in the most positive light
possible (Karver, 2006; Riley, 2004; Silverman
& Rabian, 1995). On the other hand, teachers
are unlikely to know a child as well as the child’s
parents.
Gathering information from young children
about their own wellbeing is difficult within the
context of large-scale surveys. More commonly,
such research, is conducted in clinical settings.
Such assessments are based on the premise that
children are reliable informants of their own feel-
ings and behaviours. While children lack the
sophistication and experience that adults can bring
to judgements of particular emotions and, like
adults, may be influenced by social desirability in
the responses they give (Cole, Hoffman, Tram,
& Maxwell, 2000; Karver, 2006; Riley, 2004;
Silverman & Rabian, 1995), their feelings can nev-
ertheless be captured with age-appropriate instru-
ments (Measelle, Ablow, Cowan, & Cowan, 1998).
In the study reported on below, we explore the
links between the emotional wellbeing of children
aged 6–7 years, the quality of their parents’ co-
parental relationship and post-separation paternal
involvement.
DATA AND METHOD
The present analyses are based on data from the
Growing up in Australia: the Longitudinal Study
of Australian Children (LSAC), an ongoing lon-
gitudinal study of children’s growth and devel-
opment. The sampling frame for LSAC was the
Health Insurance Commission’s (HIC) Medicare
database, a comprehensive database of Australia’s
population. The LSAC study is based on two
birth cohorts of children and their families: the
younger cohort was born between March 2003
and February 2004, and the elder between March
1999 and February 2000. A random sample of
children was selected by the HIC and their fami-
lies were invited to participate in the study. The
final sample, comprising 54% of those selected,
was broadly representative of all Australian chil-
dren, with the LSAC sample distribution simi-
lar to the population distribution (based on the
Australian Census) on a number of characteristics
(Australian Institute of Family Studies, 2005).
In this article we focus on the elder of these
two cohorts (aged 4–5 years in the first survey
wave). The first survey wave was held in 2004
(N = 4,976 for the 4- to 5-year cohort) and the
second in 2006, when the elder cohort of children
was 6–7 years old (N = 4,464, 90% of those inter-
viewed at Wave 1). Wave 2 data have been used in
this analysis because the children were also inter-
viewed at this time. (For a detailed description of
the LSAC study design, see Gray & Smart, 2008,
and Soloff, Lawrence, & Johnstone, 2005.)
The following analyses are based on a sample
of 4,303 children. Of these children, 3,640 (85%)
were living with both biological parents, and 663
(15%) were living with their mother, while their
father lived elsewhere. In total, 560 were living with
their single mother (i.e., 13% of all children rep-
resented in the present study), and the remaining
103 (2%) were living with their mother and step-
father.4 Final numbers for some analyses vary from
these because of missing data for the measures of
emotional wellbeing or the explanatory variables.
Several variables were derived to characterise the
co-parental relationship. In the present analyses, a
measure of whether or not the parents believed that
the relationship entailed hostility at least some of
the time was derived. Where the father lived else-
where, this measure was based on a single question

4
A total of 169 children were excluded from analyses for the following reasons: key data about the child’s living
arrangements were missing; the child’s was not living with the mother (there were too few children living with
their single or re-partnered fathers to derive reliable estimates of the children’s wellbeing); the child had a parent
who had either died, was in jail, or living elsewhere because of an apparent ‘temporary’ separation.

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 89

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

asked of mothers only: ‘How often is there anger
or hostility between you?’. Mothers who indicated
that anger or hostility sometimes, often, or always/
almost always prevailed were deemed to have a
‘hostile’ inter-parental relationship, while those
who said that anger or hostility was never/almost
never or rarely were considered to have a ‘non-hos-
tile’ relationship. For intact couples, the co-paren-
tal relationship was classified as hostile or not on
the basis of parents’ answers to the following two
questions: (a) ‘How often is there anger or hostility
between you?’; (b) ‘How often do you have argu-
ments with your partner that end up with people
pushing, hitting, kicking or shoving?’ Response
options were: never, rarely, sometimes, often, or
always. Relationships were classified as ‘hostile’ if
a parent reported that either one of these experi-
ences occurred at least ‘sometimes’.5 This approach
was based on the assumption that parents would
be inclined to minimise, or feel reluctant to dis-
close, relationship difficulties.
All other measures in this set of analyses were
based on mothers’ reports (a) because very little
information was derived from parents who lived
elsewhere (all of whom were fathers in the present
analyses), and (b) because not all fathers in intact
families provided information.6
A unique feature of the LSAC study is the
availability of multiple perspectives on children’s
wellbeing: parents’ reports (usually the mother),
teachers’ reports and the reports of children
themselves. Three measures of children’s experi-
ence of emotional wellbeing were thus developed,
two of which were based on mothers’ and teach-
ers’ answers to the multi-item ‘emotional symp-
toms’ subscale of the Strengths and Difficulties
Questionnaire (SDQ: Goodman, 2001). This
subscale captures, for example, the extent to
which the child has worries or fears, is unhappy,
and/or is nervous or clingy. Assessments by moth-
ers were available for 4,189 children (97% of the
in-scope sample). Teacher assessments were pro-
vided for 3,487 children (81% of the sample).
The emotional symptoms scale ranges from 0
to 10, with a higher number corresponding to a
greater number of negative emotional symptoms.
In Wave 2, the children were asked a set of
questions about their enjoyment of school, their
relationships with teachers and other students,
and also about their feelings. The latter ques-
tions were used in this analysis and constitute the
third measure of emotional wellbeing used in our
analysis. Specifically, the children were asked to
indicate how often they felt (a) happy, (b) scared
or worried, (c) sad or (d) angry or mad. Possible
response categories were: lots of times (= 1), some-
times (= 2) and hardly ever (= 3). They were also
shown prompt cards with these categories written
on them, and with each category paired with a
simple drawing of a face showing a smile, appar-
ent indifference, or a frown. In analysing these
data, the coding for the last three items was
reversed. The scores for each item were summated
(range = 4–12) and then rescaled so that, as for
the SDQ Emotional Difficulties scale, total scores
ranged from 0–10, with a higher score depicting
greater evidence of distress. Cronbach’s alpha was
quite low for the scale derived from these items
(α = 0.42). Accordingly, multivariate analyses
were also conducted separately on each of the
underlying items to determine whether results
reflected certain items (results not shown). The
associations presented in this paper, for the overall
scale, usually reflect associations apparent for each
of the underlying items, although in the separate
analyses the effect sizes tended to be greatest for

5
If hostility is instead grouped such that ‘often’ and ‘always’ are compared to ‘sometimes’, ‘rarely’ or ‘never’, then
many significant differences according to this variable are no longer apparent. This may be due to the treatment
of ‘sometimes’ as the same as those with less possible exposure to conflict, or it may be due to the smaller
number classified as hostile, reducing the ability to detect significant differences. Using this definition, across all
single and couple families, 202 are classified as having some hostility compared to 1,021 using the more inclusive
definition.
6
A questionnaire designed for parents who lived elsewhere was available in Wave 2, but attracted a very low
response rate.

90 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

‘angry or mad’. These questions were answered by
4,220 children (98% of children).
It is important to note that, while the three
measures described above are actually measures
of emotional difficulties, we refer to the findings
throughout from the perspective of wellbeing.
We do this for two reasons: (a) we seek to avoid
a negative focus in relation to children;7 and (b)
focusing on ‘emotional wellbeing’ in the broad
sense is more consistent with prior work than an
idiosyncratic focus on ‘compromised’ emotional
wellbeing. For these reasons, our findings use the
language of children’s wellbeing being better or
poorer in certain circumstances. (The distribu-
tion of emotional difficulties scores is shown in
Appendix Table 1. Correlations between the three
measures of children’s emotional wellbeing are
reported in Appendix Table 2).8
The main variables of interest in the following
analyses are family type (whether child has a father
living elsewhere), the inter-parental hostility (hos-
tility vs no hostility), and father–child contact (no
face-to-face contact vs some contact). Five groups
of children are the focus of our analyses:
1. Children who were living with both parents,
where parents had a hostile relationship with
each other;
2. Children who were living with both parents,
where parents were not hostile with each other;
3. Children who were living with one parent,
where mothers reported a hostile relationship
with the father;
4. Children who were living with one parent,
where mothers did not report a hostile rela-
tionship with the father; and
5. Children who were living with one parent,
and never spent any time with their father
For children of separated parents, we also incorpo-
rate information on the frequency with which they
spent time with their father who lived elsewhere.
Analytic approach and background
variables
Bi-variate analyses were first conducted to explore
the extent to which each of the three assessments of
children’s emotional wellbeing differed. Ordinary
Least Squares (OLS) regression was then applied
to the data to assess the extent to which the three
sets of assessments differed according to the main
variables of interest when various background fac-
tors were controlled.9
The background variables used in this analy-
sis represent a selection of those that have already
been shown to explain differences in the LSAC
children’s socio-emotional outcomes at age 4–5
and 6–7 years (Smart et al., 2008). The contri-
bution of these variables to children’s emotional
wellbeing was assessed using a stepwise approach,
with child characteristics (age and sex) considered
first. This was followed by an assessment of the
additional contribution of the following infor-
mation provided by the mother:10 her assessment
of financial circumstances (whether ‘just getting
along’ or ‘poor’, versus better financial wellbeing),

7
Psychometrically, scores had positively skewed distributions suggesting that the experience of poor emotional
wellbeing was fairly unusual.
8
All these correlations were fairly low, but significantly greater than zero. The highest correlation was derived for
scores provided by parents and teachers (r = 0.24), while the correlation between scores provided by children
and parents was somewhat higher than that between the scores provided by the children and teachers (r = 0.13
vs 0.09). These fairly low correlations suggest that there is considerable merit in exploring the views of these
three different informants. This divergence in reports is consistent with prior work (see, for example, Achenbach
et al., 1987; De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005; Loeber et al., 1991).
9
We treated the SDQ as a continuous measure in multivariate analyses for two reasons. First, other researchers
treat the SDQ as a continuous measure in multivariate analyses (see, for example, Edwards & Bromfield 2009;
Maynard & Harding, 2010). Second, we re-estimated the models using logistic regression (separating the
outcomes into those with high levels of emotional difficulties, and the rest) and found that the pattern of results
was consistent with the results using OLS. Goodman and Goodman (2009) recently noted that it is appropriate
to use the SDQ to identify gradations of child wellbeing, as opposed to identifying children with clinical levels of
difficulties.
10
As noted above, many fathers, including almost all who lived elsewhere, did not provide personal information.

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 91

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

TABLE 1: DISTRIBUTION OF CHILD, FAMILY AND MATERNAL CHARACTERISTICS BY FAMILY TYPE, QUALITY OF INTER-PARENTAL
RELATIONSHIP AND CONTACT WITH NON-RESIDENT FATHER

Lives with both parents Has father living elsewhere Total

Non-hostile Hostile inter- Non-hostile Hostile inter- No contact

inter-parental parental inter-parental parental with father
relationship relationship relationship relationship

Child characteristics
Age (months), mean 82 82 82 82 82 82
Boy (%) 51 53 47 57 52 51
Family characteristics
Just getting along or 18 25 44 52 59 24
poor
Mothers’ characteristics
Incomplete 17 16 28 22 31 18
secondary education
Secondary or post- 50 52 52 61 58 51
secondary, less than
bachelor degree
Bachelor degree or 33 32 20 17 11 31
higher
High distress 1 4 4 7 5 2
Low parental warmth 13 18 12 11 15 13
High angry parenting 9 19 11 17 22 12
Low inductive 19 23 20 12 16 19
reasoning with child
Low parental 18 30 21 31 30 21
consistency
Lives with step-father n.a. n.a. 24 6 8 2
Number of
observations
Sample size 2,816 763 356 227 75 4,303
Note: Sample sizes do not add to total as data on inter-parental relationship quality was not available for 66 respondents.
In this table the hostility of the inter-parental relationship between mother and father living elsewhere is derived for all
children who have some contact with their father.

her age (up to 30 years versus older), her edu- post-secondary qualifications other than a degree;
cation level (incomplete secondary education achievement of a bachelor degree or higher quali-
and no post-school qualifications; completion fication) and an indicator of the mother’s self-
of secondary education and/or achievement of reported level of distress.11

11
The six-item Kessler-6 screening scale for psychological distress was used. The K6 questions ask the respondent
to ask how often in the last four weeks they felt (a) ‘Nervous’; (b) ‘Hopeless’; (c) ‘Restless or fidgety’; (d) ‘So
depressed that nothing could cheer you up’; (e) ‘That everything was an effort’; and (f) ‘Worthless’. There were
five response categories, from ‘None of the time’ (‘0’) to ‘All the time’ (‘4’). These values were summed and those
with a sum of 13 or higher (out of a possible maximim of 24) were considerted to be of serious risk of mental
health problems. These respondents are identifed as ‘distressed’ in these analyses.

92 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

TABLE 2: EMOTIONAL WELLBEING BY FAMILY TYPE AND STATUS OF INFORMANT, CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS, MULTIVARIATE
RESULTS (OLS)

Mother Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Coefficient and 95% confidence interval

Family type (Reference = lives
with both parents)
Father lives elsewhere 0.5*** 0.2* 0.5*** 0.3** 0.5*** 0.4***
[0.3, 0.7] [0.0, 0.4] [0.3, 0.7] [0.1, 0.5] [0.3, 0.7] [0.2, 0.6]
Factors controlled
+ Child variables Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
+ Parent characteristics and Yes Yes Yes
parenting style
*p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.
Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’ and
teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Full model results are available in Appendix.

Four measures of maternal parenting style were
also included, again based on self-report: ‘parental
warmth’, ‘angry parenting’, ‘inductive reasoning’,
and ‘consistent parenting’. The ‘Parental Warmth’
measure focused on such issues as how often the
respondents expressed affection, and how often
they had a warm and close time together with
their children. The ‘Angry Parenting’ scale gauged
such matters as how often they praised their chil-
dren, how often they expressed disapproval of
their children’s behaviour, and how often they
felt angry when they punished their children. The
‘Inductive Reasoning’ measure tapped, among
other behaviour, the frequency with which moth-
ers provided an explanation when they corrected
their children’s behaviour, and how often they
reasoned with their children when children mis-
behaved. Finally, the ‘Consistency Parenting’ scale
assessed such issues as how often mothers made
sure that the children obeyed directions, and how
often their children ignored any punishment they
received. For each question, mothers rated their
behaviour on a scale ranging from 1 ‘never/almost
never’ to 5 ‘all the time’. Ratings for some items
on the various parenting style measures were
subsequently reversed, so that high ratings on all
items within a scale consistently reflected the par-
enting style suggested by the scale’s name.12
The distribution of these scales was used to cre-
ate a dummy variable for each scale that discrimi-
nated between mothers who indicated that their
style of parenting was more negative (in relation
to ‘angry’ parenting) or less positive (in relation
to warmth, reasoning and consistency) than most
other mothers. Specifically, mothers with scores in
the bottom 20% of the distributions for warmth,
inductive reasoning and consistency were respec-
tively treated as engaging in low parental warmth,
inductive reasoning and consistency (taken sepa-
rately) relative to other mothers. Likewise, those
with scores in the top 20% for the Angry Parenting
scale were treated as adopting a parenting style
that entailed relatively high levels of anger.
We also examined the extent to which chil-
dren’s scores regarding emotional wellbeing were
related to their living with a step-father, net of the

12
For instance, mothers’ ratings of the frequency with which they praised their child were reversed scored, given
that this item formed part of the ‘angry parenting’ scale (see Baxter & Smart, 2010 for details on these measures).

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 93

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

Reported by mother Reported by teacher Reported by child

Mean emotional difficulties score 4.0

3.0
Intact
Father elsewhere

2.0

1.0

FIGURE 1: MEAN EMOTIONAL WELLBEING SCORES BY FAMILY TYPE AND STATUS OF INFORMANT, CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS
Note: Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’
and teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Figure shows 95% Confidence Interval.

other background factors described above. This assessment. In addition, mothers with an appar-
variable was included because of the likely com- ently hostile inter-parental relationship were more
plexity of children’s experiences leading up to, likely than mothers in non-hostile relationships
and including, life in a stepfamily,13 and the fairly to report difficult financial circumstances (intact
consistent research findings that children raised in families: 25% vs 18%; separated families entailing
step-families tend to fare less well in terms of sev- at least monthly contact: 52% vs 44%).
eral aspects of wellbeing than those who are raised Further, compared with mothers in intact fami-
in intact families. (For a review of this literature, lies with a non-hostile inter-parental relationship,
including alternative explanations for such find- mothers in a hostile inter-parental relationship
ings, see Sweeney, 2010; Wu, Hou, & Schimmele, were more likely to report high distress, low paren-
2008.) Much of the relevant literature, however, tal warmth, high angry parenting, low parental
focuses on wellbeing by the time the children had consistency and low inductive reasoning. Three of
reached adolescence or young adulthood. these trends were also apparent among separated
mothers in a hostile inter-parental relationship,
RESULTS compared with mothers in a non-hostile relation-
ship: separated mothers in a hostile relationship
Background characteristics of the
were more likely than other separated mothers
five groups of children
to indicate that they displayed a parenting style
Table 1 shows the extent to which the background entailing anger and low consistency as well as a
factors (including parenting style) varied for five high level of distress. Nevertheless, it should be
key groups of children. Separated mothers were noted that reports of negative parental styles and
more likely than those who lived with their child’s distress were uncommon across all groups assessed.
father to see themselves as either ‘just getting along’,
‘poor’ or ‘very poor’ (reported by 44–59% of these Family type
respondents), with mothers whose child never saw Figure 1 shows the mean scores for chil-
the father being the most likely to provide this dren’s emotional wellbeing according to the

13
In many cases, children in step-families would have been spent time adjusting to life in a single parent families
before the mother re-partnered. Such experiences, along with possibly improved financial circumstances, and
the quality of their relationships with all three parent-figures (mother, father and stepfather) may well affect their
emotional wellbeing.

94 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

FIGURE 2: MEAN EMOTIONAL WELLBEING SCORES BY CONFLICT BETWEEN RESIDENT AND NON-RESIDENT PARENT
AND STATUS OF INFORMANT, CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS WITH PARENT LIVING ELSEWHERE

Note: Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’
and teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Figure shows 95% Confidence Interval.

relationship status of the informant and family
type. (Background characteristics have not been
taken into account here.) According to all infor-
mants, children with a father living elsewhere had
poorer emotional wellbeing, compared with chil-
dren who lived with both biological parents.
Table 2 shows that when the selection of back-
ground factors are controlled, the emotional well-
being of children of separated parents continued
to be lower (i.e. children’s Emotional Difficulties
scores are higher) than those whose parents had
not separated. This was apparent in the reports of
all the informants. At this broad level, then, the
results suggest that young children of separated
parents fared worse in terms of emotional wellbe-
ing than those who lived with both parents.
Hostility in inter-parental relationship
Figure 2 shows the average scores (derived from
the three informant sources) of children repre-
sented in these five key analytic groups before the
effects of the selected background factors were
controlled. Table 3 shows the extent to which
these results held when the selected child-related
factors were controlled [see column of results
with heading ‘(1)’], and then when all selected
background factors were controlled [see column
of results with heading ‘(2)’].
Both before and after these controls were
introduced, the assessments provided by moth-
ers and children suggest that, among children in
intact families, those whose parents had a hostile
inter-parental relationship tended to have poorer
emotional wellbeing than those whose parents did
not have a hostile relationship. No such variation
emerged when scores concerning emotional well-
being were based on teachers’ assessments.
Before the controls were introduced
(Figure 2), the results based on teachers’ reports
suggest that the children with separated par-
ents were more likely to display poorer emo-
tional wellbeing than other children, regardless
of whether or not the parents’ held a hostile
relationship with each other. However, the dif-
ference between the teachers’ assessments of
children in intact families and of children who
never saw their father was not statistically sig-
nificant.14 This pattern of results also emerged
when the selected child-related characteristics
were controlled, but the difference for intact ver-
sus separated parents was no longer significant
when all background factors were controlled.

14
This non-significant result could be explained by the fact that teachers’ assessments of children who never saw
their father varied greatly (as reflected in the long vertical bar).

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 95

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

TABLE 3: EMOTIONAL WELLBEING BY CONFLICT BETWEEN RESIDENT AND NON-RESIDENT PARENT AND STATUS OF
INFORMANT, CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS, MULTIVARIATE RESULTS (OLS)

Family type and hostility Mother Teacher Child

of relationship between
parents

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Coefficient (relative to reference category) and 95% confidence interval

Reference = lives with
both parents, non-hostile
relationship
Lives with both parents, 0.5*** 0.3*** 0.0 −0.1 0.3** 0.2*
hostile relationship [0.4, 0.7] [0.2, 0.5] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4] [0.0, 0.4]
Has father living elsewhere-
Non-hostile relationship 0.4** 0.2 0.5** 0.3 0.3 0.2
[0.1, 0.7] [−0.1, 0.5] [0.1, 0.8] [−0.0, 0.6] [−0.0, 0.6] [−0.1, 0.5]
Hostile relationship 0.7*** 0.3* 0.4** 0.3 0.9*** 0.8***
[0.4, 0.9] [0.0, 0.6] [0.1, 0.7] [−0.0, 0.6] [0.6, 1.2] [0.4, 1.1]
No contact 1.0** 0.6* 0.4 0.3 0.7** 0.4
[0.4, 1.6] [0.1, 1.2] [−0.2, 1.1] [−0.3, 1.0] [0.2, 1.2] [−0.1, 0.9]
Factors controlled
+ Child variables Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
+ Parental characteristics Yes Yes Yes
and parenting style
*p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.
Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’ and
teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Full model results are available in Appendix.

In other words, the differences in the teachers’
assessments of children in intact and separated
families could be explained in terms of system-
atic differences between these groups in the fam-
ily background factors examined.
Again, before the various controls were intro-
duced, the assessments of all three informants sug-
gested that, for most comparisons, the children
who lived with both parents who had a non-hos-
tile relationship had better emotional wellbeing
than the three groups of children whose fathers
were living elsewhere. The only two exceptions
to this finding related to teachers’ assessments for
children who never saw their father and to the
reports of children whose parents had separated
but held a non-hostile relationship.
Much the same pattern of results emerged
when all the selected controls were introduced,
although trends based on all three informant
groups suggested that children of separated par-
ents who did not have a hostile relationship did
not exhibit significantly poorer emotional wellbe-
ing than their counterparts in intact families (i.e.,
whose parents did not have a hostile relationship).
In addition, according to children’s reports, the
emotional wellbeing of children who never saw
their father was not significantly different to that
of children who lived in an intact family entailing
a non-hostile inter-parental relationship. A statis-
tically significant difference between these groups
was apparent according to mothers’ reports, with
those having no face-to-face contact with their

96 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

father having poorer emotional wellbeing than
those who had contact.
Before the controls were introduced, the only
significant difference between the mean scores of
the three groups of children whose father lived
elsewhere emerged in the children’s reports: of the
children who had some contact with their father,
those whose parents had a hostile relationship
with each other appeared to experience poorer
emotional wellbeing than those whose parents
had a non-hostile relationship (p < 0.001). This
difference remained significant when the con-
trols were introduced (p = 0.004). As evident
in Figure 3, child emotional wellbeing appears
somewhat poorer for those children who never
see their father, according to mothers’ reports,
however, the mean emotional difficulties score for
this group did not differ significantly from that of
other children with a father living elsewhere. In
fact, regardless of the informant (mother, teacher
or child), the mean scores for children who never
saw their father did not differ significantly from
the mean scores for the other two groups of chil-
dren whose father lived elsewhere. This was appar-
ent before and after the controls were introduced.
The analyses also allow other comparisons
regarding the extent to which children in dif-
ferent circumstances examined were judged to
have different levels of emotional wellbeing. Of
the children whose parents had a hostile rela-
tionship, those whose parents had separated had
poorer wellbeing than those whose parents were
living together, according to teachers’ reports,
(p = 0.004 before controls and p = 0.02 after con-
trols) and children’s reports (p < 0.001 before con-
trols, p = 0.001 after controls), but not according
to mothers’ reports.
Hostility and frequency of contact
Here we expand on the above analyses to incor-
porate, for children of separated parents, the fre-
quency with which they spent time with their
father who lived elsewhere. Those who saw their
father at least weekly and those who saw him at
least monthly (including at least fortnightly) were
sub-divided according to whether or not the rela-
tionship between the parents was hostile. Those
who saw their father less frequently were included
in the analyses but not classified according to the
inter-parental hostility measure. This approach
yields six groups of children with fathers living
elsewhere. Figure 3 provides the bi-variate results
regarding the six groups of children whose father
lived elsewhere. Table 4, which summarises the
multivariate results, examines these six groups,
but also includes the two groups of children
whose parents had not separated: those whose
parents’ relationship was hostile or non-hostile.

FIGURE 3: MEAN EMOTIONAL WELLBEING SCORES BY PARENTAL CONFLICT AND FREQUENCY OF CONTACT,
AND STATUS OF INFORMANT, CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS WITH FATHER LIVING ELSEWHERE

Note: Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’
and teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Figure shows 95% Confidence Interval.

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 97

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

When based on parents’ and teachers’ assess-
ments of children’s emotional wellbeing, none
of the differences (depicted in Figure 3) in aver-
age scores of the six groups of children (with
separated parents) was statistically significant.
However, one significant difference emerged
in the children’s assessments: of those who saw
their father at least weekly, children whose par-
ents had a hostile relationship reported poorer
emotional wellbeing than those whose parents
did not have a hostile relationship. This differ-
ence remained significant in the multivariate
analyses, even when the controls were introduced
(Table 4, p < 0.002). Children’s reports of their
experience of different parenting arrangements
deserve careful attention – especially given that
most Australian research of patterns of parenting
after separation is based on parents’ reports, not
children’s reports.
According to the bi-variate analyses of moth-
ers’ and teachers’ assessments, no significant dif-
ferences emerged in the emotional wellbeing
scores of the six groups of children with separated
parents. However, in the multivariate analyses
(summarised in Table 4), which included chil-
dren in intact families, significant differences
emerged for some groups. For example, based
on mothers’ reports: (a) among children in intact

TABLE 4: EMOTIONAL WELLBEING BY PARENTAL CONFLICT AND FREQUENCY OF CONTACT, AND STATUS OF INFORMANT,
CHILDREN AGED 6–7 YEARS, MULTIVARIATE RESULTS (OLS)

Frequency of contact with PLE Mother Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Coefficient (relative to reference category) and 95% Confidence Interval

(Lives with both parents, not
hostile)
Up to once a week, not hostile 0.6** 0.3 0.5** 0.4 0.1 0.0
[0.2, 1.0] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.1, 1.0] [−0.0, 0.8] [−0.3, 0.5] [−0.4, 0.4]
Up to once a week, hostile 0.6** 0.2 0.4* 0.3 1.1*** 0.9***
[0.2, 1.0] [−0.2, 0.6] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.6, 1.5] [0.5, 1.3]
Up to once a month, not hostile 0.2 0.1 0.4 0.3 0.5* 0.4
[−0.1, 0.6] [−0.2, 0.5] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.2, 0.8] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.0, 0.8]
Up to once a month, hostile 0.7** 0.5* 0.4 0.3 0.7** 0.6*
[0.2, 1.2] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.2, 0.7] [0.3, 1.2] [0.1, 1.0]
Less often 0.7** 0.3 0.5* 0.3 0.8*** 0.5*
[0.3, 1.1] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.8] [0.4, 1.2] [0.1, 1.0]
Never 0.9** 0.5 0.5 0.3 0.7** 0.5*
[0.3, 1.4] [−0.0, 1.0] [−0.1, 1.0] [−0.3, 0.9] [0.2, 1.1] [0.0, 0.9]
Lives with both parents, hostile 0.5*** 0.3*** 0.0 −0.1 0.3** 0.2*
[0.4, 0.7] [0.2, 0.5] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4] [0.0, 0.4]
Factors controlled
+ Child variables Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
+ Parental characteristics & Yes Yes Yes
parenting style
*p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.
Scales for all informants range from 0 to 10, with higher scores reflecting poorer emotional wellbeing. Mothers’ and
teachers’ reports are based on the SDQ-emotional symptoms subscale, while the children’s self-reports are based on
ratings of how often they felt ‘scared or worried’, ‘sad’, ‘angry or mad’ and how often they felt ‘happy’ (reverse scored).
Full model results are available in Appendix.

98 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011


families, those whose parents had a hostile rela-
tionship tended to have poorer emotional well-
being than those whose parents did not have a
hostile relationship, and (b) the latter group of
children seemed to fare better emotionally than
one group of children whose separated parents
held a hostile relationship: those who saw their
father at least monthly. As with the other analyses,
teachers’ reports yielded fewer differences in emo-
tional wellbeing than children’s or parents’ reports
– none of which was significant after the inclusion
of control variables.
Other parental and family
characteristics
Before concluding, we briefly summarise the
results for the control variables (presented in
detail in Appendix Tables 3–5) because some of
these help explain the less favourable results that
emerged for children of separated parents. Many
of the other factors in these tables were stronger
predictors of children’s emotional wellbeing than
inter-parental hostility and frequency of father–
child contact.
We found that, according to parents’ and
teachers’ assessments, the children of mothers
whose saw themselves in difficult financial cir-
cumstances (i.e., ‘just getting along’, ‘poor’ or
‘very poor’) experienced poorer emotional well-
being. Interestingly, this trend was not evident
in children’s reports. Of course, it is unclear to
what extent young children understand fam-
ily finances. Separated mothers (single or re-
partnered) were more likely to indicate such
financial difficulties – a trend that would have
contributed to, but did not fully explain, poorer
emotional wellbeing of children in such sepa-
rated families.
Compared with other mothers, those who
indicated relatively high emotional distress also
assessed their child’s emotional wellbeing more
15
While it also seems reasonable to suggest that the negative emotional impact of parental separation on children
may heighten mothers’ distress, it has already been shown that a significant relationship between maternal
distress and the child’s emotional wellbeing only emerged when the latter measure was based on mothers’
assessments.
Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES
Children’s emotional wellbeing
negatively. However, children of somewhat dis-
tressed mothers did not appear to have signifi-
cantly poorer emotional wellbeing according to
teachers’ assessments or according to the chil-
dren themselves. This is consistent with find-
ings reported by Richters (1992) and suggests
that mothers who experience relatively high dis-
tress either over-report the emotional difficulties
experienced by their children or are better able
than other people, including their young child,
to detect such problems in their child. This raises
the question of whether mothers are likely to
have a better handle on their children’s emotional
wellbeing than the children themselves, and the
corollary of this question, whether children aged
6–7 years are able to interpret their emotions
accurately and are willing to disclose them. It is
important to note in this regard that the children’s
self-report measure was quite crude. Had a more
sophisticated self-report measure been used with
children, a greater consistency between children’s
and mothers’ reports may have emerged. Not sur-
prisingly, separated mothers were likely to indi-
cate higher levels of distress than non-separated
mothers (see Table 1). Such systematic differences
may have contributed to the more negative assess-
ments of the child’s emotional wellbeing provided
by separated than non-separated mothers.15
Children’s wellbeing was also significantly
associated with two aspects of mothers’ parent-
ing style. Firstly, mothers who reported that
they engaged in relatively high ‘angry parenting’
tended to provide less favourable assessments
of their child’s emotional wellbeing, compared
with other mothers. However, this effect was not
apparent when the children’s emotional wellbe-
ing was based on reports of either the children
themselves or their teacher. Secondly, the children
of mothers who indicated relatively high incon-
sistency in their parenting tended to fare worse
in terms of emotional wellbeing, when the latter
99
 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu
measure was based on assessments of mothers and
children, but not when it was based on teachers’
assessments.
In addition, children of mothers with a degree
or higher qualification appeared to have better
emotional wellbeing when measured by children’s
and teacher’s reports but not mothers’ reports.
Further, boys had poorer emotional wellbeing
than girls, although this difference was very slight
and may not translate to meaningful differences
in everyday life. This effect was not apparent
when the emotional wellbeing measure was based
on parents’ or teachers’ assessments.
There was no evidence that children’s emo-
tional wellbeing differed for those living with a
step-father, compared with those living with a
single mother or with both biological parents.
Nevertheless, as already noted, previous research
has suggested that, compared with children in
intact families, those in step-families are at a
higher risk of poor psycho-social adjustment and
poor academic performance, among other prob-
lems (see Sweeney, 2010; Wu et al., 2008). This
issue is worthy of ongoing investigation as the
child grows older and as, potentially, more chil-
dren enter step-parent families.
LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE OPPORTUNITIES
As with any analyses into the relative importance
of different factors in explaining children’s emo-
tional wellbeing, there are a number of limitations
in this work. One important limitation is that this
study could not explore the extent to which par-
enting arrangements or hostility caused emotional
difficulties in children. Our analysis is based on
cross-sectional data and correlation does not mean
causation. Differences in parenting arrangements,
for example, might affect child wellbeing but the
converse is also possible: children’s emotional dif-
ficulties might influence parental relationships.
Further, while our analysis included a number
of family characteristics, we have not taken account
of all aspects of family functioning, and so the
16
Given that mothers were usually the primary caregivers, we omitted cases where fathers had assumed this role.
100 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011
associations with emotional wellbeing that we have
observed may be due to the unobserved differences
in families that explain the parenting and family
structure measures as well as the child outcomes.
While some studies have been able to take account
of ‘unobserved heterogeneity’ in exploring links
between family structure and children wellbeing,
the results from these studies are quite mixed and
some find an association persists after the unob-
served heterogeneity is taken into account (see
Björklund, Ginther, & Sundström, 2007).
Mothers’ parenting style was explored to shed
light on the typical quality of the time they spend
with their child. For reasons noted above, fathers’
parenting style was not examined, nor were more
direct measures made of the quality of time that
parents spend with their child. Analyses of associ-
ations between fathering and children’s outcomes
using the LSAC data by Baxter and Smart (2010)
showed that fathers’ parenting styles and the qual-
ity of the co-parental relationship helped explain
variation in children’s social emotional outcomes,
after taking account of the variation explained by
various child and family characteristics. This sug-
gests that it will be worthwhile exploring such fac-
tors further in future analyses.
For separated parents, the measure of inter-
parental hostility we used is quite crude and
based entirely on mothers’ assessments. Fathers
may hold quite different views. Furthermore, it
was not possible to identify the extent to which
parents attempted to shield the child from expo-
sure to inter-parental hostility.
A key limitation of this set of analyses is that
we were unable to report fathers’ evaluations of
their child’s wellbeing, since only one parent (the
primary care-giver) provided such assessments in
Waves 1 and 2.16 Whether or not this matters is
unclear. Previous research has shown that mothers’
and fathers’ reports on children’s wellbeing tend to
be somewhat discordant (e.g., Moreno, Silverman,
Saavedra, & Phares, 2008), and we could expect
that this discordance may be even higher when

the parents do not live together, since they tend
to observe their child in different settings. In later
waves of the study (in Wave 417 and subsequently)
it will be possible to compare mothers’ and fathers’
reports on child wellbeing in intact families, and
also to compare the reports of parents who live
elsewhere. Ex-couple dyadic perspectives are likely
to provide a richer understanding of children’s
emotional wellbeing, especially when children’s
self-reports are also taken into account.
The preceding analyses can be developed fur-
ther in a number of ways. The logical next step is
to extend the work to take advantage of the lon-
gitudinal study design by incorporating informa-
tion about these 6–7 year old children in Waves 1
and 3 – that is when the children were 4–5 years
old and 8–9 years old – and taking into account
changes that occurred in the inter-parental rela-
tionship and family type. Making use of the lon-
gitudinal data would enable us to determine the
extent to which children exhibited emotional
problems before their parents separated, or even
before the parents’ relationship became some-
what hostile. Further, longitudinal analysis would
enable us to begin to examine to the nature and
strength of longer term effects of parental sepa-
ration. Previous research (Cherlin et al., 1998)
has shown that separation often has many ripple
effects, with some effects not becoming apparent
until adulthood (e.g., increased risk of early part-
nering and relationship breakdown).
Finally, these analyses can – and should – be
repeated for different dimensions of children’s
developmental progress, including cognitive
development, physical health and other aspects of
socio-emotional development.
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
It is well known that children who experience
parental divorce are more likely than those in
intact families to experience a range of emotional
and behavioural adjustment problems. Yet few
studies have focussed on young children, despite
17
In Wave 4, conducted in 2010, the children were 10–11 years old.
Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES
Children’s emotional wellbeing
an increasing awareness of the importance of
developmental considerations in research on chil-
dren (see, for example, Magnuson and Berger
2009; Cashmore and Parkinson 2011; McIntosh,
Smyth, Kelahar, Wells, & Long, 2010). We used
LSAC data to explore the links between young
children’s emotional wellbeing, the quality of
the co-parental relationship, and post-separation
paternal involvement. We found that while chil-
dren aged 6–7 years living with both parents gen-
erally had better emotional wellbeing than similar
aged children living with one parent, inter-paren-
tal hostility was significantly associated with (and
an important factor explaining) young children’s
emotional wellbeing. Specifically, regardless of
family type, children whose parents had a hostile
inter-parental relationship tended to have poorer
emotional wellbeing than children whose parents
did not have a hostile relationship, as reported by
children and their parents.
Amato (2000) found considerable overlap
in the wellbeing of children in intact and sepa-
rated families. This is consistent with the findings
of this paper, suggesting that most children are
quite resilient, and appear to cope well when con-
fronted with major changes to their lives (Amato,
2001; Amato & Rezac, 1994; Furstenberg &
Kiernan, 2001; Hetherington, 1999; Kelly &
Emery, 2003). And, of course, some children in
intact families exhibit quite marked psycho-emo-
tional difficulties.
One interesting finding concerned children
from separated families who saw their father
on at least a weekly basis. Differences in emo-
tional wellbeing, reported by these children,
were significantly linked to the level of inter-
parental hostility. This suggests (perhaps not
surprisingly) that more frequent time spent with
fathers whose former partners report hostile rela-
tionships exposes the child to this hostility more
often. At the same time, however, children who
never saw their father also had poorer emotional
wellbeing than those in intact families in which
101
 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu
the parents did not have a hostile relationship
with each other. This is consistent with recent
Australian analyses of children’s wellbeing in
separated families (Kaspiew et al., 2009; Qu &
Weston, 2010). It suggests that we need to know
more about the ‘absent father’ group. In some
situations, such as cases when the father engages
in systemic violence or other dysfunctional
behaviours, children’s interests may be bet-
ter served by no father–child contact until and
unless the father is willing to change his behav-
iour. But father absence may nonetheless leave
mothers more vulnerable. And regardless of the
reasons, father absence may be perceived by the
child as abandonment.
There was clear evidence that, on average,
children with separated parents have poorer
emotional wellbeing than those in intact fami-
lies. Some of this difference is likely to reflect
systematic differences in other characteristics
of separated and intact families – for example,
separated families were more likely to experience
difficult financial circumstances and a higher
proportion of mothers reported the adoption
of negative parenting styles. But associations
between variables such as these and children’s
wellbeing apply also in intact families, such that
these variables have a significant association with
children’s wellbeing even when the different
measures of co-parenting and post-separation
paternal involvement are included in the analy-
ses. For instance, mothers’ self-reported incon-
sistent approaches to parenting were a significant
predictor of negative emotional wellbeing in
children, where the latter was reported by the
child or assessed by the mothers.
An important contribution of this paper is
the use of data from three different informants.
Of the three assessments of children’s emotional
wellbeing, those provided by teachers seemed to
have the weakest associations with the charac-
teristics explored here. This suggests that chil-
dren’s emotional wellbeing may be less apparent
in the classroom. In addition, perhaps teachers
are not sufficiently familiar with each individual
102 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011
child to detect signs of internalised emotional
problems.
It needs to also be acknowledged that measur-
ing psychological domains is a complex pursuit.
Indeed, variables predicting mothers’ and chil-
dren’s assessments were not always consistent:
for example financial difficulties, and moth-
ers’ heightened level of distress (both of which
were reported by mothers) were associated with
children displaying poorer emotional wellbeing
according to mothers, but not according to chil-
dren. Having a mother with a degree or higher
qualification was associated with better emotional
wellbeing according to children’s assessments, but
not according to mothers’ assessments. On the
other hand, wellbeing appeared to be more com-
promised from both the perspective of mothers
and children where the mother engaged in a more
inconsistent parenting style, and as noted above,
where the parents had a hostile relationship with
each other.
It is possible that different views of infor-
mants are all picking up some valid differences
in aspects of emotional wellbeing of children in
different settings. The different findings based on
the assessments of mothers, teachers and children
have implications for identifying children with
emotional difficulties. Importantly, to the extent
that the children’s self-report measure concern-
ing emotional experiences has an acceptable level
of validity, it would seem that some children are
likely to miss out on the emotional help they
need, where such needs are based exclusively on
the assessments of mothers or teachers. The mea-
sure based on children’s assessments was crude
and the validity of this measure needs further test-
ing. Clearly however, children’s own assessments
have the potential to provide important insights
into their internal worlds that may otherwise go
unnoticed.
Finally, we note the emerging evidence
(Cashmore & Parkinson, 2011) that a sizeable
proportion of recently separated families involve
young children (i.e., children under 5). Some of
these separations will serve to relieve the conflict

between the parents. But many will not – and
indeed some will entail an intensification of con-
flict. Traditionally, parents often stayed together
for the sake of the children. But the devastating
impact of conflict on children was not well rec-
ognised. In Australia, a raft of new family rela-
tionship services was introduced in 2006 and
some existing services were expanded. A key aim
of many of these services has been to assist both
‘intact’ and separated families to manage conflict
within families, including that between the par-
ents. From the point of view of some children,
separation may often be seen as an undesirable
outcome of inter-parental conflict. At the same
time, our analysis of LSAC data suggests that
efforts by family relationship services such as
Family Relationship Centres to assist parents to
reduce or overcome their hostility towards each
other are likely to benefit young children irrespec-
tive of whether those parents remain together or
separate.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are grateful to the reviewers for their construc-
tive comments. An earlier version of this paper
was presented at the XXVI International Union
for the Scientific Study of Population (IUSSP)
International Population Conference, Marrakech
Morocco. This paper uses unit record data from
Growing Up in Australia, the Longitudinal Study
of Australian Children. The study is conducted in
partnership between the Department of Families,
Housing, Community Services and Indigenous
Affairs (FaHCSIA), the Australian Institute of
Family Studies (AIFS) and the Australian Bureau
of Statistics (ABS). The findings and views
reported in this paper are those of the authors and
should not be attributed to FaHCSIA, AIFS or
the ABS.
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Received 21 June 2011 Accepted 02 August 2011

APPENDIX
TABLE 1: FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION OF SAMPLE BY INTER-PARENTAL HOSTILITY AND FREQUENCY OF CONTACT OF CHILD
WITH PLE

Distribution – sample count Not hostile Hostile Total

Lives with both parents 2,816 763 3,640

Lives with mother; father lives elsewhere: Spends 286 247 663
time with father:
Weekly or more frequently 134 112 258
At least fortnightly or monthly 87 80 184
Less frequently 54 48 121
Not at all 11 7 100
Total 3,102 1,010 4,303
Columns do not add to total as some respondents did not provide sufficient information to determine whether hostile or not.

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 105

 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

TABLE 2: CHILD’S SCORES ON THE COMPROMISED EMOTIONAL WELLBEING MEASURES BY INFORMANT STATUS: SUMMARY
STATISTICS, INTERNAL CONSISTENCY, AND INTER-CORRELATIONS

Mean (SD) Median Cronbach’s alpha Correlations between measures

Mother Teacher Child

Mother – SDQ emotional 1.6 (1.7) 1 0.62 1.00

subscale (5 items)
Teacher – SDQ emotional 1.3 (1.8) 1 0.74 0.24 1.00
subscale (5 items)
Child – self-report emotional 3.1 (1.9) 2.5 0.42 0.13 0.09 1.00
scale (3 items)

TABLE 3: MULTIVARIATE RESULTS FOR FAMILY TYPE, OLS COEFFICIENTS AND 95% CONFIDENCE INTERVALS
Mother Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

(Reference = Lives with both parents)

Father lives elsewhere 0.5*** 0.2* 0.5*** 0.3** 0.5*** 0.4***
[0.3, 0.7] [0.0, 0.4] [0.3, 0.7] [0.1, 0.5] [0.3, 0.7] [0.2, 0.6]
Child lives with −0.2 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1
step-father [−0.7, 0.2] [−0.4, 0.3] [−0.7, 0.4] [−0.7, 0.4] [−0.5, 0.4] [−0.5, 0.4]
Child’s characteristics
Age (months divided by 0.2 0.1 0.0 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1
10, centred at sample [−0.0, 0.3] [−0.1, 0.3] [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.3, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1]
mean)
Boy −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 0.1* 0.2**
[−0.2, 0.1] [−0.2, 0.0] [−0.2, 0.0] [−0.3, 0.0] [0.0, 0.3] [0.0, 0.3]
Mother’s report re financial status
Just getting along, poor 0.3*** 0.3*** 0.0
or very poor [0.2, 0.5] [0.1, 0.5] [−0.1, 0.2]
Mother’s characteristics:
Age ≤ 30 years 0.2* 0.0 0.2
[0.0, 0.4] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.0, 0.4]
Completed or post- 0.0 −0.1 −0.2*
secondary, less than [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.0]
degreea
Bachelor degree or −0.1 −0.2* −0.5***
higher [−0.3, 0.1] [−0.4, −0.0] [−0.7, −0.3]
Parenting style: low 0.2 0.0 0.1
warmth [−0., 0.3] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.1, 0.4]
Parenting style: high 0.7*** 0.1 0.1
angry [0.5, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.4] [−0.1, 0.3]
Parenting style: low −0.2 −0.1 −0.1
inductive reasoning [−0.3, 0.0] [−0.3, 0.0] [−0.3, 0.0]

(Continued)

106 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

TABLE 3: CONTINUED
Mother Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Parenting style: low 0.3*** 0.0 0.3***

consistency [0.2, 0.5] [−0.2, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4]
High distress 1.2*** 0.4 0.4
[0.7, 1.7] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.0, 0.8]
Constant 1.6*** 1.4*** 1.3*** 1.3*** 3.0*** 3.0***
[1.5, 1.7] [1.2, 1.6] [1.2, 1.4] [1.1, 1.4] [3.0, 3.1] [2.8, 3.1]
N 4,186 4,159 3,484 3,410 4,216 4,094
R-square 0.01 0.08 0.01 0.02 0.01 0.03
*p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.
Child’s age is a continuous variable, centred at the mean of the sample. Maternal education is relative to incomplete
secondary education. ‘Completed or post-secondary, less than degree’ refers to the mother either having completed
secondary education or having achieved a post-school education other than a degree. Other parental and family
characteristics are dummy variables, relative to not having that characteristic. Column ‘(1)’ refers to results when child’s
characteristics were entered; Column ‘(2)’ refers to results when all listed characteristics were entered.

TABLE 4: MULTIVARIATE RESULTS FOR FAMILY TYPE AND INTER-PARENTAL HOSTILITY, OLS COEFFICIENTS AND 95%
CONFIDENCE INTERVALS

Parent Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

(Reference category = Lives with both parents, non-hostile inter-parental relationship)

Lives with both parents, 0.5*** 0.3*** 0.0 −0.1 0.3** 0.2*
hostile inter-parental relp [0.4, 0.7] [0.2, 0.5] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4] [0.0, 0.4]
Father elsewhere, non- 0.4** 0.2 0.5** 0.3 0.3 0.2
hostile inter-parental relp [0.1, 0.7] [−0.1, 0.5] [0.1, 0.8] [−0.0, 0.6] [−0.0, 0.6] [−0.1, 0.5]
Father elsewhere, hostile 0.7*** 0.3* 0.4** 0.3 0.9*** 0.8***
inter-parental relp [0.4, 0.9] [0.0, 0.6] [0.1, 0.7] [−0.0, 0.6] [0.6, 1.2] [0.4, 1.1]
Father elsewhere, no 1.0** 0.6* 0.4 0.3 0.7** 0.4
contact [0.4, 1.6] [0.1, 1.2] [−0.2, 1.1] [−0.3, 1.0] [0.2, 1.2] [−0.1, 0.9]
Lives with a step-father −0.2 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.0 0.0
[−0.7, 0.3] [−0.5, 0.4] [−0.4, 0.8] [−0.4, 0.8] [−0.5, 0.5] [−0.6, 0.5]
Child’s characteristics
Age (months divided by 10, 0.2 0.1 0.0 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1
centred at sample mean) [−0.0, 0.3] [−0.1, 0.3] [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.3, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1]
Boy 0.0 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 0.1* 0.1*
[−0.2, 0.1] [−0.2, 0.0] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.0] [0.0, 0.3] [0.0, 0.3]
Mother’s report re financial status
Just getting along, poor or 0.3*** 0.3*** 0.0
very poor [0.2, 0.5] [0.1, 0.5] [−0.1, 0.2]
Mother’s characteristics:
Age ≤ 30 years 0.2* 0.0 0.2
[0.0, 0.4] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.0, 0.4]

(Continued)
Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 107
 Jennifer Baxter, Ruth Weston and Lixia Qu

TABLE 4: CONTINUED
Parent Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Completed or post- 0.0 −0.0 −0.2

secondary, less than degree [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.0]
Bachelor degree or higher −0.1 −0.2* −0.5***
[−0.2, 0.0] [−0.3, −0.0] [−0.7, −0.3]
Parenting style: low warmth 0.1 0.0 0.2
[−0.0, 0.3] [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.1, 0.4]
Parenting style: high angry 0.6*** 0.1 0.1
[0.4, 0.8] [−0.1, 0.4] [−0.1, 0.3]
Parenting style: low −0.2* −0.2 −0.1
inductive reasoning [−0.3, −0.0] [−0.3, 0.0] [−0.3, 0.1]
Parenting style: low 0.3*** 0.0 0.3***
consistency [0.1, 0.4] [−0.2, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4]
High distress 1.2*** 0.4 0.3
[0.6, 1.7] [−0.1, 1.0] [−0.2, 0.7]
Constant 1.5*** 1.3*** 1.3*** 1.3*** 3.0*** 3.1***
[1.4, 1.6] [1.2, 1.5] [1.2, 1.4] [1.1, 1.4] [2.9, 3.1] [2.9, 3.3]
N 4,115 4,088 3,406 3,358 4,102 4,027
R-square 0.03 0.08 0.01 0.02 0.02 0.03
*p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.
Child’s age is a continuous variable, centred at the mean of the sample. Maternal education is relative to incomplete
secondary education. ‘Completed or post-secondary, less than degree’ refers to the mother either having completed
secondary education or having achieved a post-school education other than a degree. Other parental and family
characteristics are dummy variables, relative to not having that characteristic. Column ‘(1)’ refers to results when child’s
characteristics were entered; Column ‘(2)’ refers to results when all listed characteristics were entered.

TABLE 5: MULTIVARIATE RESULTS FOR FAMILY TYPE, INTER-PARENTAL HOSTILITY AND FREQUENCY WITH WHICH CHILD SEES
NON-RESIDENT FATHER, OLS COEFFICIENTS AND 95% CONFIDENCE INTERVALS

Parent Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

(Reference = Lives with both parents, non-hostile inter-parental relationship)

Lives with both parents, 0.5*** 0.3*** 0.0 −0.1 .3** .2*
hostile [0.4, 0.7] [0.2, 0.5] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4] [0.0, 0.4]
Father lives elsewhere: frequency of time and inter-parental relationship
Up to once a week, 0.6** 0.3 0.5** 0.4 .1 .0
non-hostile [0.2, 1.0] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.1, 1.0] [−0.0, 0.8] [−0.3, 0.5] [−0.4, 0.4]
Up to once a week, hostile 0.6** 0.2 0.4* 0.3 1.1*** .9***
[0.2, 1.0] [−0.2, 0.6] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.6, 1.5] [0.5, 1.3]
Up to once a month, 0.2 0.1 0.4 0.3 .5* .4
non-hostile [−0.1, 0.6] [−0.2, 0.5] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.2, 0.8] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.0, 0.8]
Up to once a month, 0.7** 0.5* 0.4 0.3 .7** .6*
hostile [0.2, 1.2] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.2, 0.7] [0.3, 1.2] [0.1, 1.0]

(Continued)

108 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011

 Children’s emotional wellbeing

TABLE 5: CONTINUED
Parent Teacher Child

(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)

Less often 0.7** 0.3 0.5* 0.3 .8*** .5*

[0.3, 1.1] [−0.1, 0.7] [0.0, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.8] [0.4, 1.2] [0.1, 1.0]
Never 0.9** 0.5 0.5 0.3 .7** .5*
[0.3, 1.4] [−0.0, 1.0] [−0.1, 1.0] [−0.3, 0.9] [0.2, 1.1] [0.0, 0.9]
Lives with step-father −0.3 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 .0 .0
[−0.7, 0.1] [−0.5, 0.3] [−0.7, 0.4] [−0.7, 0.4] [−0.5, 0.5] [−0.5, 0.5]
Child’s characteristics
Age (months divided by 10, 0.1 0.1 0.0 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1
centred at sample mean) [−0.0, 0.3] [−0.1, 0.3] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.4, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.1]
Boy −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 −0.1 .1* .1*
[−0.2, 0.1] [−0.2, 0.0] [−0.2, 0.1] [−0.3, 0.0] [0.0, 0.2] [0.0, 0.3]
Mother’s report re financial status:
Just getting along, poor or 0.3*** 0.3*** .1
very poor [0.2, 0.5] [0.1, 0.5] [−0.1, 0.2]
Mother’s characteristics
Age ≤ 30 years 0.2* 0.0 .2
[0.0, 0.4] [−0.3, 0.2] [−0.0, 0.4]
Complete or post- 0.0 0.1 .2*
secondary, less than degree [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.1, 0.2] [0.0, 0.3]
Bachelor degree or higher −0.1 −0.2* −0.3***
[−0.2, 0.0] [−0.3,−0.0] [−0.5,−0.2]
Parenting style: low warmth 0.1 0.0 .1
[−0.0, 0.3] [−0.2, 0.2] [−0.1, 0.4]
Parenting style: high angry 0.6*** 0.2 .1
[0.4, 0.9] [−0.1, 0.4] [−0.1, 0.3]
Parenting style: low −0.1* −0.2 −0.1
inductive reasoning [−0.3,−0.0] [−0.3, 0.0] [−0.3, 0.1]
Parenting style: low 0.3*** 0.0 .3***
consistency [0.1, 0.4] [−0.2, 0.1] [0.1, 0.4]
High distress 1.2*** 0.4 .3
[0.7, 1.7] [−0.1, 0.9] [−0.2, 0.7]
Constant 1.5*** 1.3*** 1.3*** 1.3*** 3.0*** 2.9***
[1.4, 1.6] [1.2, 1.4] [1.2, 1.4] [1.2, 1.4] [2.9, 3.1] [2.8, 3.1]
N 4152 4126 3433 3385 4137 4062
R-square 0.03 0.08 0.01 0.02 0.02 0.04

Child’s age is a continuous variable, centred at the mean of the sample. Maternal education is relative to incomplete
secondary education. ‘Completed or post-secondary, less than degree’ refers to the mother either having completed
secondary education or having achieved a post-school education other than a degree. Other parental and family
characteristics are dummy variables, relative to not having that characteristic. Column ‘(1)’ refers to results when child’s
characteristics were entered; Column ‘(2)’ refers to results when all listed characteristics were entered.

Volume 17, Issue 2, August 2011 JOURNAL OF FAMILY STUDIES 109

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