Divorce is usually considered to be a bad thing under the assumption that it has a negative effect on children whose well-being and development depend on nurture from their parents. Feelings of insecurity and financial problems are only some examples of major problems both children and adults face after divorces. However, the positive effects of divorce are often overlooked because divorce is sometimes the only solution to a deteriorating marriage that can be a significant source of stress. Furthermore, it is possible that the negative effects of the divorce are actually the consequences of living in a dysfunctional family rather than the consequences of the divorce.
For parents, a divorce can lead to an increase in physical and psychological well-being. According to Rutter (2015, p. 335), marital distress is the most significant predictor of depression, even if other depression risk factors are accounted for. Furthermore, “for women who face continuous instability – rather than a single transition – their health was negatively affected” (Rutter, 2015, p. 335). Although physical and psychological distresses are often attributed to divorce, they are actually caused by living in a deteriorating marriage rather than leaving it.
In terms of economic well-being, divorce may not be related to economic hardships following a failed marriage as people usually think. Although divorced women do experience economic disadvantages, some of those disadvantages start and persist before the divorce and were unrelated to it (Rutter, 2015, p. 335). Therefore, economic distress cannot be attributed to divorce alone and cannot be used as an argument to support the negative effects of getting a divorce.
Divorce is often a good outcome for the safety of individuals and society in general. The rates of suicide, domestic violence, and homicide in American households were high, but they started declining after the United States legalized unilateral divorces during the 1970s (Rutter, 2015, p. 329). Therefore, if a marriage proves to be dysfunctional and individuals are not permitted to leave it, domestic violence and spousal homicide are possible outcomes that are much worse than psychological and economic hardships people will experience after a divorce.
The effects of divorce on children are usually described in a way that emphasizes the negative effects. For example, Kalmijn (2013, p. 888) found that the relationship between children and one parent usually suffers after divorces. Losing contact and the deterioration of the relationship quality with one of the parents was found to have a significant effect on the increasing prevalence of emotional and psychosomatic problems among children and adolescents (Reiter, Hjörleifsson, Breidablik, & Meland, 2013, p. 283). Furthermore, it is estimated that between 20% and 25% of children experience adjustment and mental health problems in divorced families, whereas the same difficulties are experienced by 10% of children in the general population (Rutter, 2015, p. 333).
Although children are often traumatized during the divorce because of their involvement in legal child custody battles, the behavior of the parents is to blame for any developmental issues a child might experience in the future because of the divorce. Researchers that explored how divorce affects children found that “the worst kind of family for a child to be raised in, in terms of mental health and behavior, was a distressed married family” (Rutter, 2015, p. 333). Furthermore, even if the children’s parents were divorced, maintaining good relationships with both parents after divorce has a significant affect of attenuating psychosomatic and emotional problems children or adolescence (Reiter et al., 2013, p. 283).
It is worse for children to live in dysfunctional families than to live with the consequences of divorce. As long as children maintain parental contact and as long as parents are not the cause of stress for their children after divorces, children will have fewer physical and emotional issues later in life (Reiter et al., 2013, p. 283). Therefore, instead of looking for ways to decrease divorce rates, it is important to look for ways to improve counseling services that would help divorced parents maintain the well-being of their children.
References
Kalmijn, M. (2013). Long-term effects of divorce on parent–child relationships: Within-family comparisons of fathers and mothers. European Sociological Review, 29(5), 888-898.
Reiter, S. F., Hjörleifsson, S., Breidablik, H. J., & Meland, E. (2013). Impact of divorce and loss of parental contact on health complaints among adolescents. Journal of Public Health, 35(2), 278-285.
Rutter, V. E. (2015). The case for divorce. In: B. J. Risman & V. Rutter (Eds.), Families as they really are (2nd ed.). New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.
