Adolescent-parent conflict in married and divorced families

The effects of parental divorce on adolescent development are receiving increasing attention by researchers. Few studies have looked at the impact of parental divorce on parent-child relationships during adolescence. Conflicts, bickering, and disagreements increase during early adolescence even in the best of cases. Adolescent-parent conflict in divorced, mother-custody families and married, two-parent families were examined in the present study. A total of 28 divorced families and 66 intact families participated in the study. Divorced mothers were divorced before their child's adolescence and had not remarried. They were seen as stabilized divorced families. Family members were interviewed individually about actual parent-child conflicts, and then, families were observed. Consistent with the findings of previous studies, adolescent-parent conflicts in the study families generally occurred over the everyday details of family life. Divorced families and intact families did not differ in the types of conflicts they experienced. There were also no differences in the frequency of conflicts over household responsibilities, decision-making, or the time parents spent at home, despite the facts that children in divorced homes had more responsibility for the household than children in intact homes, more independence in decision-making, and that divorced mothers spent less time at home than parents in intact families. The perceptions of conflict differed between families, however. Adolescent-parent conflict was perceived as greater in intact families, perhaps because the greater liberties in divorced families buffered them. It is also possible that the process of divorce transforms parent-child relationships in such a way that conflict in adolescence does not have the same function in these families as it has in nondivorced families. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)