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Sharing
the children’s time 50:50 after a divorce
might seem like a fair arrangement for parents,
but Leeds researchers have found that young
people themselves do not always endorse this
view. The findings from the ESRC enduring
families project come as Fathers4Justice step
up their campaign for mandatory shared residence
and as the Australian Government consider
implementing automatic 50:50 residence on
divorce.
Bren Neale, Jennifer Flowerdew and Carol Smart
of the centre for research on family, kinship
and childhood re-interviewed 60 children and
young people who had been part of two earlier
studies on post-divorce family life. Half
of these young people had been ‘shared’
between their parents and their experiences
of this arrangement varied widely.
Dr Flowerdew said: “For the children,
the key to good shared residence was flexibility,
supportive and co-operative parenting, and
a sense of belonging in both homes. Under
these conditions, young people were very positive
about their families.”
In these cases, the benefits of moving between
two homes outweighed the inconvenience, the
researchers found, and children had a say
in how things would evolve over time. But
where the needs of the parents took priority
over the needs of the children, things were
less positive.
Professor Smart said: “Some children
felt their parents wanted 50 per cent of their
time only because they could not tolerate
the idea that the other parent had more. Rather
than feeling loved, they could come to feel
that they were possessions to be fought over.”
Where shared residence is rigidly imposed
upon young people, dissatisfaction can also
begin to grow. An acceptable arrangement for
primary school children can become irksome
for teenagers seeking greater independence
from their parents, the research showed.
Dr Neale said: “Where shared residence
is legally imposed on families, the potential
for long-term problems may be magnified. This
makes the growing lobby for automatic shared
residence after divorce all the more worrying.
“Shared residence is not necessarily
a magic solution. It isn’t yet the norm
in England and Wales but before we drift too
far in that direction we need to learn from
the young people who know what it is like
to live under a dual residence regime.”
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