In a new four-part documentary titled Divorced Kid, Minnesota Public Radio's Sasha Aslanian reports on lessons learned from the divorce boom of the 1970s. A child of divorce herself, Aslanian admits that she felt as though "the sky was falling" during her parents' breakup. Nevertheless, she once bristled at hints that she came from a "broken home," and undertook her massive research project five years ago in order to prove once and for all that "divorced kids" aren't "all messed up." What she says she found instead was, "how deep this stuff cuts. The past stays with us as a cautionary tale."

While noting that some pop psychologists in the 70s believed that "staying together" for the sake of the kids was more harmful than walking away from an unsatisfying marriage, Aslanian counters, "We know more now."

Following is a brief excerpt from her in-depth coverage. However, it's well worth taking the time to visit the MPR News Web site to read more:

Nick Wolfinger is a demographer from the University of Utah who pores over giant data sets from the National Survey of Families and Households, tracking children of divorce.

"The bad news is that you really are much more likely to get divorced as an adult if your parents divorced, and parental divorce really does affect almost every aspect of your behavior in your own relationships," said Wolfinger.

Wolfinger's academic book has the ominous title: Understanding the Divorce Cycle: The Children of Divorce in their Own Marriages. It's like reading a mathematical proof that you're doomed.

"This is why I'm so much fun at weddings," Wolfinger quipped.

When people ask what the bride and groom's chances are, Wolfinger said he cherrypicks the most optimistic data for the happy couple. He does have some advice for the rest of us.

"If you want to stay married, marry someone just like you. Except if you're from a divorced family, marry someone from an intact family," said Wolfinger.

That's because Wolfinger found when either the husband or wife was a child of divorce, those marriages were almost twice as likely to dissolve as marriages where neither spouse came from a divorced family.

Marriages between two spouses from divorced families were more than three times as likely to fail. Wolfinger finds children of divorce are more likely to cut and run.

"If you experience relationships as transitory while growing up, that's what you'll do as an adult," he said.

Wolfinger finds children of divorce are about 50 percent more likely to end their own marriages. He breaks down the risk factors that many children of divorce bring into their marriages—marrying young, not finishing their education, living together first.

The age the child experiences divorce also matters. Wolfinger gives an example of a 4-year-old whose parents divorce.

"Most people remarry, so a couple years later that kid is going to pick up a stepparent," said Wolfinger. "And as you probably know, second marriages have even higher rates of divorce than first marriages, so that kid may experience a second divorce."

By contrast, if a 17-year-old's parents divorce, chances are by the time there's a remarriage, the child is out of the house.

"The age the child initially experiences divorce simply determines exposure to additional family structure transitions," Wolfinger concluded.

But Divorced Kid offers more than simple statistics: it's the personal stories that make the greatest impact. Aslanian's full documentary can be downloaded from the MPR News site.

Image Courtesy Stuart Pilbrow

A common theme of this blog is that much of who we are and what we do can be traced back to the quality of our family relationships. Positive, supportive family relationships contribute to our well-being in countless ways—while negative, abusive ones can be deadly.

Most parents would love to give their children the best possible environment in which to develop physically and emotionally: they understand that it's not only the immediate well-being of children that is at stake, but their future well-being—and that of the wider community as well.

But however ardently parents may hope to ensure that positive environment, it isn't always easy for them to do so. In Western society it is increasingly necessary for families to have two wage earners, and school, extracurricular activities and other obligations also encroach. Could there be an effect on family interaction as a result? If so, how? This was essentially the question explored by Rena Repetti and her colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles, in a peer reviewed study published in the April 2009 issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science. 

"The family is popularly imagined as a stable haven, a place where individuals come together to recuperate from the ups and downs of the outside world," wrote the researchers. "But the family has ups and downs of its own; it is a dynamic system, not impermeable to outside influences but porous and continually in flux. For example, parents' job schedules and children's homework shape family time, activities, and routines. Other effects of work and school on the family are less overt." 

Certainly, as the researchers explain, we may continue to react to a particular stressor long after the event has occurred. As a result, we may continue to nurse our wounds after returning home. How does the fallout affect our family relationships?

"We have found that, following more stressful days at work, spouses and parents adjust their social behavior at home in two ways. One common pattern is an overall reduction in social engagement and expression of emotion," says the report. In a series of studies, Repetti and her colleagues found that mothers as well as fathers withdrew emotionally and disengaged socially from their children after stressful or exceptionally demanding work days, and spouses "were more distracted and less responsive" toward one another. Children also showed lingering reactions to school stress. Both elementary-school-age children and teens initiated more conflict with other family members after a day characterized by problems in academics or with peers.

"A second short-term response to job stress resembles the stereotypic image of an agitated employee kicking his dog after an argument with his boss," write the researchers. This plays out as "an increase in irritability and displays of anger with both spouse and children."  Ripetti and her colleagues note that this second pattern usually occurs in a particular subset of people: particularly those with a history of psychological distress.

How harmful is all this take-home stress in the long run? It depends. If the short-term effects are allowed to build up over time, there may be more lasting effects. Especially within families with high levels of conflict, or where one or more family members have a history of depression and anxiety.

We do know from other studies explored in this blog that family support and parental engagement are crucial to the well-being of children, so if our coping style in reaction to stress at work involves withdrawing from our families at home, it can't be good over the long haul. As difficult as it may be to push ourselves out of our comfort zone, resilience experts suggest that connecting rather than withdrawing is our best bet for handling stress. Rapetti's research is fascinating and important in several respects: but perhaps the most important thing parents can take home from this study is a new awareness of what they may be bringing home to their children at the end of their work day.