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Keywords

divorce, children, coparenting, conflict

Abstract

When parents divorce, their children are affected in significant ways. Many of the consequences of marital dissolution may adversely affect children’s success in their future romantic relationships, but fortunately this downward spiral can be mitigated through deliberate parental efforts (Cui & Fincham, 2010; Shulman, Zlotnik, Shachar-Shapira, Conolly, & Bohr, 2012) . One remedy to counteract this trend is conscientious coparenting— continuing to work together despite altered family dynamics, since such effort positively impacts the children’s future relationships, specifically daughters’ future intimacy (Haaz, Kneavel, & Browning, 2014; Shulman et al., 2012). Another significant factor in children’s future marital success is the amount of conflict between their parents. High-conflict parental relationships have been linked to children’s difficulty in forming their own healthy relationships (Cui & Fincham, 2010; Gager, Yabiku, & Linver, 2016; Sprague & Kinney, 1997). However, when the amount of conflict betw een parents decreases following divorce, children fare significantly better (Gager et al., 2016). If divorced parents have an increased awareness of how their behavior and relationship affect their children, they may take measures towards more cooperation and less conflict, thus increasing their children’s future chance for success in romantic relationships.

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