Caught between parents: adolescents’ experience in divorced homes

Author: Buchanan, C.M.; Maccoby, E.E.; Dornbusch, S.M.

Description: This study examined adolescents’ feelings of being caught between parents to see whether this construct helps to explain (1) variability in their postdivorce adjustment and (2) associations between family/child characteristics and adolescent adjustment. Adolescents 10 to 18 years old (N = 522) were interviewed by telephone 4 1/2 years after their parents’ separation. Feeling caught between parents was related to high parental conflict and hostility and low parental cooperation. Being close to both parents was associated with low feelings of being caught. The relation between time spent with each parent and feeling caught depended on the coparenting relationship. Adolescents in dual residence were especially likely to feel caught when parents were in high conflict, and especially unlikely to feel caught when parents cooperated. Feeling caught was related to poor adjustment outcomes. Parental conflict was only related to adjustment outcomes indirectly, through adolescents’ feelings of being caught.

Subject headings: Adaptation, Psychological; Adolescent; Adolescent Psychology; Antisocial Personality Disorder/psychology; Anxiety/psychology; Depression/psychology; Divorce/psychology; Female; Humans; Male; Parent-Child Relations; Parenting/psychology; Personality Development; Social Environment

Publication year: 1991

Journal or book title: Child Development

Volume: 62

Issue: 5

Pages: 1008-1029

Find the full text : https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1991.tb01586.x

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Type: Journal Article

Serial number: 281