Children of divorce versus children of intact families: does parental status influence how one evaluates different marital situations?
Abstract
The purpose of the present study is to determine if young adults from divorced families interpret negative marriages differently than young adults from intact families. Participants were 131 college students from a small liberal arts college; they completed several questionnaires pertaining to family conflict, parental attachment, and a couple questionnaire that referred to a positive, negative or neutral marriage between two fictional characters. It was hypothesized that children from divorced or high-conflict families would rate the negative marriage scenario more negatively than children of intact families. The results indicate that children from divorced or high-conflict families did not rate the scenarios more negatively compared to children from intact families.