New Estimates on the Effect of Parental Separation on Child Health

Abstract

While marriage remains the most common foundation of family life in the U.S., the prominence of the traditional process of family formation, namely marriage before having children, is diminishing. Today, more than one-third of all births in the U.S. occur outside of marriage (Martin et al. 2006). Although most unmarried parents are romantically involved when their child is born (Carlson et al. 2004), many separate before their child reaches age three (Osborne and McLanahan 2006). While the consequences of marital dissolution on children have been studied extensively,1 the effect of separation of never-married parents on child wellbeing has rarely been examined.