Personality Development and Single Parent Families

This paper will review the literature related to the effect of single parent families on personality development. The paper will present a discussion of the important variables which need to be controlled in studies investigating the effect of single parent families, followed by issues of creativity and single parenting, and a summary.

Every single parent family has sustained some loss to the system - one of the spouses is not present. In 89 percent of the single parent families in the U.S. (U.S. Department of Commerce, 1981a) it is the husband/father who has been lost. The incidence of single parent child rearing has increased markedly from 11.9 percent in 1970 to 20.1 percent in 1981, and most of these cases are headed by women. Single parent families resulting from divorce or separation have increased by 111 percent since 1970. However, the percentage of father headed households has not increased in the past decade (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1981b).

The magnitude of this change in child rearing environments has produced research into the effects of single parent families on children. However, much of this research consists of the following: inadequate data gathering procedures, biased sample selection, and inadequate controls. Only a small percentage of studies have used appropriate methods. Studies often fail to control for: race, socioeconomic status, type of single parent family (father absent vs mother absent), length of time livi

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ers usually point to the well trodden path of conventional thought. In some ways fatherless children supply their own cues and they may, especially with good input from the mother, be creative. Studies of children's social adjustment to school suggest that, although fatherless children adjust less well than others, fatherlessness alone does not cause poor adjustment. Rouman (1956) studied 48 father absent students in kindergarten through 12th grade, who had been referred to the school counselor, primarily for academic failure. Elementary school age children were referred more frequently than older children, and the youngest born and first born children were referred more than those in other ordinal positions. Consistent with this, Adams and Horovitz (1980) found more aggressive behavior problems among younger than older firstborn black and Cuban fatherless males and suggested maternal sensitivity was higher when the son was young. The greatest problem in social adjustment in Rouman's group was a lack of self-esteem or a diminished sense of personal worth. The children appeared deficient in motivation and internalization of social standards. However, in this study, race and socioeconomic status were not controlled. Study

Category: Psychology - P