Postdivorce Coparenting Patterns and Relations With Adolescent Adjustment

Abstract

This study examined the association between postdivorce coparenting patterns and adolescent internalizing and externalizing behavior. Children after parental divorce increasingly grow up in shared residence arrangements, making postdivorce coparenting much more pertinent. The Coparenting Behavior Questionnaire was used to investigate the perceptions of 251 Dutch adolescents regarding postdivorce coparenting behaviors. Latent class analysis was used to identify coparenting patterns, and associations with adolescent outcomes were examined. Four distinct postdivorce coparenting patterns were identified: cooperative, negatively engaged, negatively disengaged, and average. Adolescents of parents with a cooperative pattern reported the least amount of internalizing and externalizing problems, whereas adolescents with negatively engaged parents reported the most internalizing problems. In line with family systems theory, interactions in the coparental subsystem are associated with adolescent adjustment and can therefore be viewed as both a risk and protective factor.

The Divorce Process and Child Adaptation Trajectory Typology (DPCATT) Model: The Shaping Role of Predivorce and Postdivorce Interparental Conflict

“…In general, supportive coparenting helps preserve the nonresidential parent’s involvement in childrearing after parental breakup and also has been widely demonstrated to be beneficial for child adjustment over parental divorce process (Adamsons & Pasley, 2006 ; Bergström et al, 2021 ; Lamela et al, 2016 ; Rejaän et al, 2021a , 2021b ), despite that such effects have been somewhat challenged (see Amato et al, 2011 ; Beckmeyer et al, 2014 ; and relevant discussion in the concluding section). Further, interventions reducing interparental conflict among separated parents in custody disputes can improve coparents’ relationship functioning and confidence in coparenting and thus promote their ability to work cooperatively (Owen & Rhoades, 2012 ).…”

Adolescents’ Post-Divorce Sense of Belonging

“…In addition, findings from family psychology indicate that ideally, parents not only 'share parenthood', but also try to actively support each other's parenting, while maintaining healthy but flexible boundaries (Adamsons & Pasley, 2006). Key factors for coparenting are mutual respect and cooperation, frequent communication, and minimizing the occurrence of parental conflicts and adolescents' involvement therein (e.g., Rejaän et al, 2020). A cooperative post-divorce coparental relationship allows adolescents to experience belongingness to both parental households, regardless of whether they grow up in shared residence arrangements or not.…”

Mother-Child and Father-Child Relationships in Emerging Adults from Divorced and Non-Divorced Families

“…A final limitation has to do with not examining protective factors, such as authoritative parenting, both parents' psychological wellbeing, parents' effective co-parenting relationship in the post-divorce period, or children's individual characteristics, such as their effective coping skills or psychosocial maturity. Analyzing these variables might help explain a reduced effect of both parental divorce and conflict (Amato 2014;DeBoard-Lucas et al 2010;Kelly and Emery 2003;Lee 2018;Rejaäan et al 2021;Yeung 2021). Moreover, the study of these factors could be of use to gather important information in order to make preventive and clinical intervention efforts to reduce the negative effects of both parental divorce and conflict.…”