Introduction
Transition to parenthood is one of the most demanding and increasingly complex life experiences that sets a couple’s future relationship trajectory for determining the quality and stability of their relationship (Kluwer, 2010). The infant’s arrival requires the couple to adjust not only to daily baby care chores but also to the new roles of parents, often leaving the interpersonal relationship between husband and wife to a low priority. The prevailing majority of scholarship describe different levels of decline in the quality of marital relationship postpartum (Wallace & Gotlib, 1990; Helms-Erikson, 2001; Twenge, Campbell, & Foster, 2003; Mitnick, Heyman, & Smith Slep, 2009; Kluwer, 2010; Umberson, Pudrovska, & Reczek, 2010). At the same time, some scholarship explains how couples have more joy, happiness and a sense of fulfillment in life because of the baby (Petch & Halford, 2008; Nelson et al., 2013), while other findings report identical levels of marital happiness before and after birth of the baby (Amato et al., 2003). A genuine controversy lies in whether a decrease or increase of couple happiness takes place at transition to parenthood. During this transitioning process, new sets of tasks challenge the couples to act in new roles and adjust their daily routines, behavior, and relationship. When the couples experience less relationship distress in completing the transition tasks, they have a higher potential to create a positive context for raising an emotionally and physically healthy child and less chances for divorce. Because divorce has negative lasting effects on descendants for the next three generations, including lower education attainment, lower income, higher relationship distress, and higher chances...
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Conflicts within relationships are inevitable and some conflict can help strengthen a relationship; however, in marriages and families, many people fail to work through their conflict, which results in unhealthy patterns of behavior. Over time, if left unresolved, these patterns of behavior can lead to a breaking of the relationship. Furthermore, most people do not set out seeking conflict within relationships, but rather they lack the emotional maturity to move through conflict. In fact, it is not the differences between the two parties that create the conflict, but rather the emotional reaction to their differences. Therefore, an intervention is required to begin the healing process of working through conflict. Often a pastor or counselor
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The dramatic rise in the rate of divorce in the United States between 1960 and 1980 is well known, and even more so are the high divorce rates over the past twenty years. In 1970, twelve percent of American families with children under age eighteen were headed by single parents, and by 1984, one-fourth of American families and nearly sixty percent of black families were headed by single parents (Demo & Acock, 1988, p. 619). These high divorce rates have resulted in numerous changes in American family life. While predictions vary, the consensus is that most youth will spend some time prior to age eighteen in a single-parent household based on recent social and demographic trends. Individuals with divorced parents are at increased risk of experiencing psychological problems in adulthood (Amato & Sobolewski, 2001, p. 900). Growing up divorced has become an alternative developmental path for a substantial number of children in this country (Kalter, 1987, p. 587). These trends in family composition have major repercussions for the life course of children and their well-being. Studies have shown that adults with divorced parents, when compared with adults with continuously married parents, report to greater unhappiness, less satisfaction with life, a weaker sense of control, more symptoms of anxiety and depression, and a greater use of mental health services. Overall, most children of divorced parents have experienced dramatic declines in their economic circumstances, abandonment by one or both of their parents, the diminished capacity of both parents to attend meaningfully and constructively to their children’s needs, and diminished contact with many familiar or potential sources of psychological support.
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Girgis, George, & Anderson (2011) define marriage as the union of a man and a woman who make a permanent and exclusive commitment to each other of the type that is naturally (inherently) fulfilled by bearing and rearing children together. These marriages are intended to last eternity and are partially accomplished by raising children together, yet four of every ten marriages lead to divorce and of these divorces, 35% involve children (Ambert, 2009). Children tend to blame themselves for the divorce and are usually caught in the crossfire. These divorces lead to both stress and depression for children and without a strong sense of family, children will have a huge disadvantage over children with a stable healthy family (Arreola, Hartounian, Kurges, Maultasch, & Retana, 2013). Without the ability to cope with the stress of a divorce, children can be effected in multiple ways including a change in mentality, unacceptable behavioural traits and both short and long term emotional factors that will ultimately lead to a critical issue in child development.
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My motivation to research, discover, and stimulate social change is rooted in my childhood experiences. As a young child I grew up in a household filled with domestic violence, which ultimately ended with the suicide of my father. I subsequently came to know a variation of the typical American nuclear family: a single parent household. As I began to study family dynamics further, I was able to see my life experiences in a broader context. In hindsight, I now realize the impact and weight my own mother had on my personal development. It was through her strength, determination, and optimism that I was able to find the spark within myself to set goals and dreams for my future. She encouraged me never to accept anything at face value, including the way our society attempts to define my womanhood. As a result of this, I now question American culture’s classification of a ‘successful’ family and the factors that determine a ‘stable’ family.
Without the presence of children always around, childless people have several advantages to their experiences in life. The average childless person has obtained a better education, has more money, and are actively employed, while also committed to that employment (Connidis, 2010, pp. 182-83). They also have a
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Marriage life greatly contributes to exceptional family structures in today’s society. The article entitled “Married vs. Single Moms: Who Gets the Better Deal?” by Stephanie Wood, Jackie Spinelli, and Patty Onderko examines what