DIVORCE AND THE EFFECT IT HAS ON CHILDREN

Divorce and the effect it has on children

Divorce and the effect it has on children

Introduction

Each year, over 1 million American children suffer the divorce of their parents; moreover, half of the children born this year to parents who are married will see their parents divorce before they turn 18. Mounting evidence in social science journals demonstrates that the devastating physical, emotional, and financial effects that divorce is having on these children will last well into adulthood and effect future generations. Among these broad and damaging effects are as follows: Children whose parents have divorced are increasingly the victims of abuse. (Galston 2001)

Discussion

Divorce, might be the resolution for the ongoing quarrels between a married couple however, it unfortunately is the cause of broken families over generations and generations due to its negative effect on children. Ever since the 1960's, the number of children directly affected by divorce has increased from 485,000 to one million every year. Today, about one half of all marriages conducted will cease in divorce. (Galston,1) Although it is no question that divorce harms children, the short term effects vary greatly depending on age, sex, and how the situation is taken care of by the parents and other care-givers. Divorce also affects children's performance in education, their social life, their financial security and a lot of the decisions that they make for their future. (Amato 2003)

The age of the child is the independent factor when it comes to dealing with divorce. Different ages deal with divorce in different ways. Preschoolers aged 3-5 are likely to experience feelings of anger, sadness, and anxiety. Each sex displays emotions differently. (Amato, Keith) Boys at this age tend to be noisier and more disruptive in school than they normally would be. Their restlessness can often lead to disciplinary problems in school(Newman 2004). On the other hand, preschool aged girls are more concerned with good behavior and having everything they do orderly and under control. However, they might imitate their parents by acting as a parent by reprimanding others. They might even play “marriage” with the opposite sex and re-enact the argument between their parents. Both boys and girls at this age that come from a family where the parents are divorced cry more often, even unnecessarily, become overtly demanding, and regress to what they have outgrown before such wetting their bed, sucking their thumb, wanting a security blanket, and experiencing consistent nightmares.(Amato, Keith) A child this young usually behaves in such a way due to the lack of comfort they receive by having divorced parents. When parents divorce, children show changes in their emotions and their behaviors. When people think of divorce the last thing they think of is the children, but children usually suffer the most from a divorce. Their change behaviors start to become negative and their emotions are drastically different. The changes that the children are negative ones, that cause a great amount of ...