Single Parenting Versus Double Parenting
Single parenting versus double parenting. Which is a better suited environment to raise a successful child in? With America’s increasing divorce rate, this has become a reoccurring heated debate. “Everything depends on upbringing”. – Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace. Why is the question focused on the number of parents in the household rather than effective parenting techniques? Across America, the percent of families where children have two parents, instead of one has dramatically decreased over the past decade. According to a 2012 December issue of The Washington Times fifteen million U.S. children, or 1 in 3 live without a father and almost five million without a mother. In most cases, not all, single parent households are in lower socioeconomic status. Sadly, less than 50% of custodial parents receive full child support; as a result, these families are more likely to live below the poverty line. Children may engage in delinquent behavior-stealing selling drugs, to compensate for their single parents’ financial short coming’s. In 2010, the National Survey of Families and Households analyzed data of children’s outcomes from families of single parents, biological parent, and step parent- grades, drug use, age, and age of sexual activity. The results revealed children raised in a single parent or divorced parent home progressed worse in comparison to children raised with both parents. “The more the merrier!” Social Scientist Bradford Wilcox, suggested children raised in families with both parents are more likely to become college graduates. There is also less of a chance they will be teenage parents, physically or sexually abused, use drugs, and alcohol. There is also a slim chance they will be raised in poverty. Due to mothers playing the role of a nurturer and fathers being more so the disciplinary figure children receive important interactions from both sexes which is vital for their development. With both parents in the household the child has a