Growing Up With a Single Parent: What Hurts, What Helps

By Sarah McLanahan

Book Overview

Non-white and white, rich and poor, born to an unwed mother or weathering divorce, over half of all children in the current generation will live in a single-parent family - and these children simply will not fare as well as their peers who live with both parents. Based on four national surveys and drawing on a decade of research, Growing Up With a Single Parent sharply demonstrates the connection between family structure and a child's prospects for success.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674364074
• ISBN13: 9780674364073
• Release Date: October 1994
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 0.8" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

Covers much real research

Forget all myths you were told, and concentrate on reality. Here you have a collection of various kinds of experiments and correlations regarding children that grow up with a single mother. A striking finding claims that children that grow up with single mothers are indeed less successful, but not because they grow up without a father. Just: 1) Genetic heritage. The same genes that cause the parents to divorce have on average some effect on children's personality etc. 2) Socioeconomic status. Single mothers are usually poorer. 3) Lake of stability. Single mothers move from neiborhood to another more often than married couples. This is damaging the children social relationships etc. There are other interesting finding there. I am not the last word in "approving" the conclusion. But they look convincing. And one should certainly give them a thought. There is a lot of value in thinking our assumptions from the beginning, and trying to give up our prejudices.