Child Well-being in Single-Mother Families:Do Single Mothers Really Need Help?
...elopment and academic achievement were measured through GPAs, The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, and college expectations. Family structure, sociodemographics, family structure, and parenting were among the independent variables controlled for. (Manning & Lamb, 2003) The results indicate that adolescents living with only their single mothers have similar odds of being suspended or expelled of those living in cohabiting households. Delinquency is substantially lower with adolescents living with just the mother as compared to those living in cohabitation. As far as problems in school, the results indicate similarities between the two family structures. Those adolescents living in cohabiting households reportedly have lower grades that those in single-mother families, however there were no relevant differences in cognitive development or college expectations. (Manning & Lamb, 2003) The nature and/or duration of the relationships between cohabiting partners and children were not analyzed in this study, which could have a direct effect on positive or negative child well-being. If a child has a negative relationship with the cohabiting partner in the household, he or she could reflect delinquency problems, problems in school, psychological problems, or low self-expectations for his or her future. The article entitled “Child Well-Being in Single-Mother Families” from the January 2002 edition of the Journal of the American Academy of Child Adolescent Psychiatry was chosen as the second to be included. The primary focus of this study was examine relationships between a single-mother family structure and the outcomes of the children involved, both alone and controlling for other sociodemographic and individual variables. Data from the Canadian National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth, NLSCY, Cycle one, were used which is of cross-sectional design assessing randomly selected single-mother and two-parent families of 22,831 participants. STATA was also used to ensure proper estimates, reducing limitations. One of the dependent variables of child well-being used in this case was behavioral descriptors, including conduct problems, emotional problems, and hyperactivity assessed by antisocial tendencies, anxiety, and inattentive and impulsive actions, respectively. Social impairment, or the inability to get along with others, and math score, measured by standardized Canadian Achievement Tests, were also among the dependent variables accounted for. Income had a significant positive relation to math score and an inverse relationship to social difficulty. Hostile parenting and maternal depression, in this case, were strongly related to social inability and psychological problems in children living in the family structures being compared. Overall, the results suggest that children living in single-mother families develop complications for the same reasons as children from two-parent structures, including lower income, hostile parenting, and maternal depression. The measures in this experiment depended solely upon the mother as the provider of information. This could result in biased measures, providing skewed results. None of the variables were assessed by alternative methods, basing information on only one type. Observations, standardized tests, or questionnaires could have provided a wider base of collecting relevant material. The final articled used in this research is “Does Family Structure Matter? A Comparison of Adoptive, Two-Parent Biological, Single-Mother, Stepfather, and Stepmother Households” from the August 2001 edition of the Journal of Marriage and Family. This particular study looked at the quality of family relationships and well-being throughout these five family structures. Data from the second wave of the National Survey of Families and Households, of NSFH, were used assessing 799 families, randomly selected and nationally representative. Over-sampling for minorities and the five family types needed was done to ensure significant quantity. (Lansford, Ceballo, Abbey, & Stewart, 2001) To measure child well-being, parents completed an abbreviated version of the Child Behavior Checklist and reported child problem behaviors such as suspension and/or expulsion, problems with authorities, meetings with school faculty about behavioral issues, grades, and frequency of visits by friends to the household. The children were also asked to report about frequency of visits by friends and grades as well as about self-esteem, life satisfaction, and behavior problems, such as whether they smoke, drink, or fight. Demographic variables were controlled for to make certain of relevant results. (Lansford, Ceballo, Abbey, & Stewart, 2001). The results signify overall that family structure, on average, is irrelevant in predicting child well-being. Accounting for both the mothers and the children, results also indicated that children from different family structures did not differ in their reports of well-being, problem behavior, grades, or relationships with others. (Lansford, Ceballo, Abbey, & Stewart, 2001) A key limitation here is t...