Kathleen Kiernan

Parental divorce in childhood and demographic outcomes in young adulthood

We investigated the long-term effects of parental divorce in childhood on demographic outcomes in young adulthood, using a British longitudinal national survey of children. Our analyses control for predisruption characteristics of the child and the family, including emotional problems, cognitive’ achievement, and socioeconomic status. The results show that by age 23, those whose parents divorced were more likely to leave home because of friction, to cohabit, and to have a child outside marriage than were those whose parents did not divorce. Young adults whose parents divorced, however, were no more or less likely to marry or to have a child in a marriage. Moreover, even in the divorced group, the great majority did not leave home because of friction or have a child outside marriage.

Becoming a young parent : A longitudinal study of associated factors

Teenage fertility rates in the UK are amongst the highest in Europe and have not altered significantly in the last 15 years, but the proportion of births outside marriage has risen rapidly. In this study we used longitudinal data from the National Child Development Study (NCDS) to investigate the social, economic and educational backgrounds of young parents. The analysis showed there to be striking variations in the probabilities of becoming young parents but not with respect to whether the child was born within or outside marriage. Young mothers and fathers were more likely to come from economically disadvantaged families and to have lower educational attainment. Teenage mothers were more likely to have mothers who had a child in her teens and were more likely to have exhibited higher levels of emotional problems particularly in adolescence. Young women whose educational attainment scores deteriorated between childhood and adolescence had particularly high probabilities of becoming young mothers. For some teenage motherhood was unintended and the result of unprotected intercourse whilst other men and women who subsequently become young parents had expressed a preference for early parenthood whilst still at school.

Poverty, Maternal Depression, Family Status and Children's Cognitive and Behavioural Development in Early Childhood: A Longitudinal Study

Improving childrens lives is high on the UK policy agenda. In this study for a recent birth cohort of UK children we examine how three aspects of parental resources - income, mothers mental well-being and family status - in early childhood enhance or compromise their childrens cognitive and behavioural development. As well as examining how these three aspects of parental resources separately and jointly affect childrens well-being, we also enquire whether persistent poverty or persistent maternal depression are more deleterious for childrens current well-being than periodic episodes of poverty and depression. We find strong associations between poverty and young childrens intellectual and behavioural development, and persistent poverty was found to be particularly important in relation to childrens cognitive development. Maternal depression (net of other factors) was more weakly related to cognitive development but strongly related to whether children were exhibiting behaviour problems, and persistent depression amplified the situation. Family status, net of other factors (most noticeably poverty), was only weakly associated with childrens development.

Parental Divorce during Childhood: Age at First Intercourse, Partnership and Parenthood

It is well established that young people whose parents divorced or experienced marital breakdown during their childhood are likely to enter into first partnerships and into parenthood earlier than those whose parents remained married. In this paper using data from the British National Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles Survey we examine how far the timing of first coitus plays a role in the genesis of this demographic behaviour for children of divorced parents. Other factors including the timing of menarche attitudes to sexual activity degree of parental strictness and religiosity were also examined. In general these factors had little explanatory power. The analysis showed that earlier sexual activity for men and women from disrupted families is an important proximate determinant of their earlier entry into partnership and parenthood compared with those brought up with both natural parents. (EXCERPT)

Parental divorce and subsequent disadvantage: A cross-cohort comparison

Although many studies have examined the link between parental divorce and subsequent wellbeing, some theories of the effects of divorce suggest that the negative associations should have declined over time. However, few studies have examined the extent to which the associations have remained stable over time. Using data from two British cohorts, we analyzed both shorter- and longer-term outcomes of children who experienced parental divorce and the extent to which the associations have changed over time. Estimating similar models for both cohorts, we found little evidence of any change in the size of the relationship as divorce became more commonplace.

Poverty, family resources and children’s early educational attainment: the mediating role of parenting

This study uses longitudinal data from the UK Millennium Cohort Study to show the extent to which episodic and more persistent poverty in early childhood and the lack of other family resources disadvantage children at the start of their school careers in terms of whether they have achieved the target indicator of ‘good level of achievement’ on the Foundation Stage Profile. Positive parenting is shown to be an important contributor to school achievement that matters for children, regardless of poverty experience or family disadvantage. It is also shown to be an important mediator in redressing the effects of poverty and disadvantage.

Ethnic Density Effects on Physical Morbidity, Mortality, and Health Behaviors: A Systematic Review of the Literature

It has been suggested that people in racial/ethnic minority groups are healthier when they live in areas with a higher concentration of people from their own ethnic group, a so-called ethnic density effect. Ethnic density effects are still contested, and the pathways by which ethnic density operates are poorly understood. The aim of this study was to systematically review the literature examining the ethnic density effect on physical health, mortality, and health behaviors. Most studies report a null association between ethnic density and health. Protective ethnic density effects are more common than adverse associations, particularly for health behaviors and among Hispanic people. Limitations of the literature include inadequate adjustment for area deprivation and limited statistical power across ethnic density measures and study samples.

Parental divorce and partnership dissolution in adulthood: evidence from a British cohort study.

From a longitudinal survey of a British cohort born in 1958 this study finds that, by age 33, off-spring of parents who divorced are more likely to have dissolved their first partnerships. This finding persists after taking into account age at first partnership, type of first partnership (marital, pre-marital cohabiting union, and cohabiting union), and indicators of class background and childhood and adolescent school achievement and behaviour problems. Some of these factors are associated with partnership dissolution in their own right, but the association between parental divorce and second generation partnership dissolution is largely independent of them. Demographic factors, including type of and age at first partnership, were important links between parental divorce and partnership dissolution. Moreover, the estimated effects of parental divorce were substantially reduced when the demographic variables were taken into account, suggesting that cohabitation and early partnership may be important pathw...

Who remains childless

Who are the men and women who are childless in their mid-30s? Life history data for a British cohort born in 1946 show that age at marriage and marital breakdown were clearly associated with childlessness. Women who were only children were more likely to be childless than those with siblings. Further, early menarcheal age, being highly qualified and having a high status occupation were indirectly related to childlessness. For men, particularly amongst those who had experienced a broken marriage, it was the most ambitious, the highly educated and those in professional occupations who were relatively more likely to be childless.

Teenage Marriage and Marital Breakdown: A Longitudinal Study

The risk of marriage breakdown for teenage brides is substantially greater than for women who marry later. From the life histories of a British cohort born in 1946, we show that teenage brides frequently come from less advantageous family backgrounds, have received less education and are in occupations of a lower status than those who marry later. Such pre-marital factors did not distinguish between teenage marriages that survived and those that broke down by the time the women were in their early thirties. Antecedent factors associated with higher risk of marital breakdown were marital breakdown in the family of origin and, more importantly, neuroticism score at age 16. Women whose marriages broke down were less stable, even before they married, than those whose marriages remained intact. Conditions after marriage also distinguish broken marriages from surviving marriages. Women with short first birth intervals and greater numbers of children were more frequently found in the group with broken marriages....