Study: When parents split, preschoolers show behavior problems
Gannett News Service May 7, 2012 10:48AM
Updated: June 9, 2012 8:07AM
Kids whose parents split up when they were preschoolers have increased behavior problems, according to new research that suggests the timing of such breakups has long-term effects. The study by University of Chicago and Georgetown University researchers found that such disruption — particularly in a child’s first three years but probably until they’re as old as 5 — “more strongly influences children’s development than changes later in childhood,” and those influences “seem to have negative effects on children’s behavior.” “Family-structure changes during early childhood at the preschool period seem to matter more than later changes,” said the study’s co-author Rebecca Ryan of Georgetown. “Change experienced in middle childhood and pre-adolescence had no effect on kids’ outcomes.”
