(May 12, 2014) Does it really matter whether a child is raised by a single mom, two moms, two dads or a mom and a dad? That’s a debate that is gaining attention as more and more states move to allow same-s*x marriage.
Dr. Douglas Allen is an economist at Simon Fraser University in Canada. He studies family makeup and its impact on children, the economy and culture. His most recent work has included a replication of a study that claims children in same-s*x households fare no differently than those raised in homes with a married mother and father. After making several corrections in methodology, Allen and his team discovered something extraordinary:
“Gender composition matters a lot in a household,” Allen told CitizenLink. “Moms probably do something that’s a lot different than dads. If you’re a child, there are times in your life when you really need a mom’s input, and there are other times you need a dad’s input; and those times are probably different for boys and for girls.”
For instance, in the area of academic achievement, Allen’s findings favor kids in households with a married mother and father.
“It turns out,” he said, “that with a child in a same-s*x household, the odds of them failing a grade are about 35 percent higher than if you were in an opposite-s*x married household. And it’s statistically significant.”
While no economists challenged Allen’s findings, the blogosphere lit up when his research was published.
“So people immediately, almost like the next day, were blogging that the study was ‘worthless,’” he said, “that ‘he made this mistake’ or ‘that mistake.’ Almost all of these things were just entirely made up and false, but in the blogosphere you can say whatever you want.”
Glenn Stanton, director for Family Formation Studies at Focus on the Family, said Allen’s replication findings are spot on.
“All things being equal, children with married parents consistently do better in every measure of wellbeing than their peers who have single, cohabiting, divorced or step-parents,” he said. “This is a stronger indicator than parental race, economic or educational status, or neighborhood. The literature on this is broad and strong.”
Allen said there is a lot more research to be done on the subject.
“It’s going to take a long time,” he said. “It took 35 to 40 years to figure out the effects of no-fault divorce; it will take 35-to-40 years to figure out the effects of same-s*x marriage.”
http://www.citizenlink.com/2014/05/12/fami...
Posted By: Jeni Fa
Tuesday, May 13th 2014 at 3:14PM
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