| |||||||||
August 2, 2008Family type has less-than-expected impact on parental involvement |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
From EurekAlert! - Breaking News: Children in step-families and in other non-traditional families get just as much quality time with their parents as those in traditional families, with only a few exceptions, according to research to be presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association today. Using the amount of time parents spent with their young children as a measure, sociologist Hiromi Ono found that children spent comparable amounts of time with their biological mothers regardless of the family structure in which the children were living (i.e., dual-parent homes that included their biological father, a stepfather or their mother's live-in partner). When she analyzed the time allocation of a variety of male parental figures (including biological fathers, stepfathers and unmarried male partners), Ono found that married stepfathers were less involved with their stepchildren than biological fathers were with their own children. "Children have no control over their family situation, so it's encouraging to find that the amount of quality time that they have with their parents is largely unaffected by their family arrangement," said Ono, author of the study and an associate professor of sociology at Washington State University. If a mother disagreed with the practice of cohabitation before marriage, her children tended to spend less time---approximately 4.6 fewer hours per week---with their previously married stepfather. Girls spent more time with their mothers than boys did, but boys spent more time with their fathers. When biological mothers worked longer hours, children spent less time with their mothers, yet when fathers worked longer hours, children spent more time with them.
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
