Divorce has no effect on parenting

Being divorced does not hamper a parent's ability to offer care and support for their children, new research indicates.

According to a study conducted by the University of Alberta, men and women with youngsters who obtain an official marital separation from their spouses are just as capable of parenting as their married counterparts.

Sociology professor and lead researcher Lisa Strohschein studied over 5,000 children and found that divorce had no relation to changes in parenting.

The study, entitled Challenging the Presumption of Diminished Capacity to Parent: Does Divorce Really Change Parenting Practices?, found that the upbringing of children of divorced parents had more similarities than differences to the upbringing of kids in families where the parents were married.

Commenting on the findings, Ms Strohschein said they "overturn this idea that divorce is necessarily harmful to the children and that divorce is necessarily the same for all".

She added: "This study reveals that researchers still have much to learn about the divorce process and the factors that predict variations in parenting behaviour in the post-divorce period."

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