Behavior of Children Brought up by a Single Parent

Hisham Al Abbad
Ruth Rogers
Eng 300
November 25, 2012
Behavior of Children Brought up by a Single Parent
Single parenting has become an increasing trend both in the U.S and overseas. According to the U.S Bureau of statistics, 40% of births occur outside wedlock by the year 2007. This means that, approximately 1.7 million children were born to unmarried mothers. This translates to 250% higher number than that reported in 1980 (Ideboean 10). In Australia, in 2009, children under the age of 15 years found to be raised by single parents were approximately 19%. The gradual increase in single parenting has been a major concern and part of government policy focus. Concerns have been raised about the implication of single parenting on the children’s behavior as compared to the behavior of children raised by two parents, the wellbeing of the children as well as for the parents themselves. Different myths that mainly focus on the negative behaviors portrayed by children raised by lone families have been put forward hence leading to the view that children from single parent families are wild, aggressive; perform poorly in school among other negative traits (Ideboean 9). However, this research may prove these myths wrong or right according to various scholarly articles and research done globally.
Kurdek in his article narrates the story of Ashley who was brought up by a father figure and never knew how it felt to have a mother by her side or a female figure to advise her while growing up. Ashley’s mom left when she was only two months old meaning that her father was her mom and dad. However, being a working person, her father was always late to come home from work and at times; the dad could not attend Ashley’s school activities due to work meetings or even exhaustion. Due to this, Ashley’s dad employed a female nanny who was supposed to take care of Ashley. During adolescence, Ashley was left to take care of herself as her father decided she was mature to do so and hence she had no nanny to take care of her. With all the physical, mental and emotional change that comes with being a teenager, Ashley was left to figure out life by herself, as her father was always busy. The two never had time to talk about life, share what each one was going through or even have fun together. At school, Ashley disliked having female friends as she did not know how to relate with them and since all he had was a father figure, she struggled to fit in with other males but with the wrong crew. She began substance abuse, immorality and was failing in school. When her father was informed, he was shocked at his daughter’s behavior and that’s when he came to the realization that he was not there for her, that apart from him, Ashley also needed a female figure to help her through life. Ashley was then taken to rehab after which her father asked her aunt to be visiting her and talking to her about life, as he would also do to help Ashley figure out life and what it entails.
From reading of this case, I asked myself, “Is single parenting that bad for children?” “Are single parents ever too busy for their children?” “What if Ashley’s negative behavior had been noted earlier, would her father have changed?”
A single parent household can be one, which is headed by either a father or a mother, an extended relative who plays the role of the caregiver, older sibling, grandmother, aunt, grandfather or foster parent. Many factors tend to influence the rapid increase of single parents. These include widowhood, homosexuality, migration, divorce, separation and teenage pregnancy (Mavis 211). Women who live without a partner and those who have also never been married also lead to this increasing number of single parent families. Traditionally, a family is expected to be nuclear, that is, consist of a mother, father and the children. There is a very good reason for this combination since the two-parent figure has different advice to offer to the children as well as play different roles in their children’s lives. Lack of one parent figure means that the molding of the child, no matter what the present parent may do during the child’s upbringing will always be incomplete. As a result, the child may try to fill the void of the missing parent by doing weird things, which mostly turn out to be negative things, for instance, drug abuse, bullying, disliking one type of sex, teenage pregnancy among others (Kurdek 2).
The majority of research carried out has indicated that, children from single parents families tend to be overly poor in school and have a high rate of dropping out of school. The children are also most likely to experience mental, health and behavior problems as well as become teenage parents in the future. Although some children raised by lone parents may grow up and be successful in the future, the majority will have challenges during the changeover to adulthood (Mavis 213).
Kurdek managed to conduct an interview with Ashley’s father and below is the conversation.
Kurdek: “How is it being a single parent?”
Ashley’s Dad: “It is challenging, hard, frustrating but at time fun”
Kurdek: “Why all those negative descriptions of challenging, hard and frustrating”
Ashley’s Dad: “First and foremost, I think one parent is never enough for the child. Two parents are supposed to be present to mentor the child in the right direction. I am a male and my daughter is a female, so there are some other issues I am unable to tell since I have no knowledge in them. This mostly provokes her to seek advice from outside and whether wrong or right she gets to act on the advice given”.
Kurdek: “Does that mean that Ashley depends on advice from other people other than you as the parent?”
Ashley’s Dad: “Sometimes yes sometimes no. Most of the times I am never at home; I am either at the office, business meetings or business trips. She gets to spend most of her time alone since I withdrew the nanny from her life when she reached adolescents”.
Kurdek: “What do you do to bridge the gap of the female figure that Ashley needs?”
Ashley’s Dad: I get to invite her aunties over and her female cousins so that she can share and talk to them”.
Kurdek: “Do you think that is enough?”
Ashley’s Dad: “No, but it is the only option I have”.
Kurdek: “Are you proud of Ashley’s behavior?”
Ashley’s Dad: “Can’t say am proud of her behavior but now I realize that if I had taken keen interest in her and played my role as a parent effectively she could have turns out to be a better person”.
Kurdek: “Do you think single parenting is okay for children?”
Ashley: “No. Reason being, we always want to fill that void of the other parent and if the present parent is not there to help the child emotionally, the child ends up seeking fulfillment form other people hence indulging in bad behaviors”.
Literature Review
A “sizeable body of research” depicts that children brought up by single parents tend to be generally rowdy, poor and have a higher percentage of dropping out of school. Nonetheless, they are likely to be teenage parents as well as experience mental, behavioral, social and financial and health problems as compared to those children raised by two parents. According to Kurdek, (page 2), approximately 70% of children brought up by parents who have never been married are poor compared to the 48% of children raised by single mothers who have been divorced. This notwithstanding, children raised by two married parents tend to do best in almost all sectors of their lives including educationally, socially, financially as well as raising their own families. Approximately half of the greater risk for negative educational results from children raised by lone parents attributes to the fact that a majority of single parent families live within a low-income level.
However, other factors are associated with the disruptions in the family structure. This include weak bonds between the child and his or her parent (more so the father), child emotional turmoil when the parents separate and weak connections to resources beyond that of the immediate family. The parent’s level of education, race, residential location or family size has little effect in the child’s outcome whether the single parent family is form divorce or non-marital background. However, according to Paton (page 1227-1231) children from widowed parents tend to be more successful and do better in school as compared to children from other types of lone families with the same traits. Comparing single parent families with two parent families often covers vital subtleties. Successive research has contributed to a better understanding of the wide range of family structures through separate examination of data for homosexual parents, widowed, divorced, separated parents, never married parents and married stepparents.
Divorced Families
Before adulthood, approximately 4 out of 10 children will undergo their parents’ divorce and roughly, nearly 1.2 million children experience their parent’s divorce yearly. Ideboean (page 7) says, “In the sector of educational achievement, children raised by divorce parents are more disadvantageous than those raised by two parents. These cate...