Single-Parent Family Structure and Children

Before discussing the effects of the single-parent family structure on the children, it is important to have a general profile of an AFDC family. Therefore, the class will have a clear picture of the impact of the family on its children's educational achievements.

AFDC, which stands for Aid to Families with Dependent Children, is a subsidy that is almost entirely devoted to single mothers. In 1983 (the latest official statistics available), single mothers constituted 75 percent of all AFDC mothers. In this group of single mothers, 45 percent are divorced or separated, while 30 percent had babies out of wedlock (Popenoe, 1996, p. 26). According to David Popenoe, who provided the statistic in this article, more recent data from the government would probably reveal a higher percentage of mothers with out of wedlock children (Popenoe, 1996, p. 26).

To qualify for this subsidy, she must not be working nor be married to a man who is working ("Babies making," 1993, p. A27-A28). For a single mother with two children, the subsidy is about $580 a month. Statistics have shown that more than 40 percent of the never-married mothers with young children who started receiving AFDC before they turned 25 have remained on the welfare list for nine or more years (Duncan, Hill, & Hoffman, 1988, p. 468).

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ts, criminals and juvenile delinquents. There are no resources for child development, such as playgrounds, child care, medical facilities and parks (Duncan & Brooks-Gunn, 1997, p. 71). Furthermore, to survive in these tough neighborhoods, the children are taught at a young age to be aggressive and intimidate other peopleùa behavior that is not helpful for performing well in school (Bower, 1994, p. 24). On the other hand, structural theorists claimed that the children from these families are not significantly different from other children. The difference occurs only when these children reach adulthood and encounter structural obstacles faced by their parents, such as job discrimination (Duncan, Hill, & Hoffman, 1988, p. 470). Psychoanalysts have also added to the discussion by studying the effect of the loss of a father on the children's development. For boys, they have to deal with the absence of an important role model (McLanahan & Sandefur, 1994, p. 56). Therefore, many boys have been allowed to run amok, dropping out of school and engaging in criminal activities. In his article, William Bennett sums the situation up succinctly: "We have come to the point in America where we are asking prisons to do for many young
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2088
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

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