Child Health Status and Parental Relationship Dissolution

Background/Purpose: As the number of families raising a child with a disability rises by some estimates and policymakers and social workers continue to examine ways to support parents in their caregiving efforts, it is important to consider the association between a child’s health status and parental relationship outcomes. Raising a child with a disability often entails increased caregiving demands, which can in turn negatively impact parental relationship quality. Indeed, many studies find higher rates of divorce and relationship instability for parents raising children with disabilities. However, the current literature does not include nationally-representative estimates, and many studies focus on specific health conditions. Given the relative disadvantage of children with special healthcare needs overall, it is important to understand at a national-level how a child’s health status—regardless of specific diagnosis—may impact parental relationship stability, and, thus, a family’s access to a range of resources, including economic resources, social support, and shared caregiving responsibilities. This paper asks: (1) Does the experience of parenting a child with a disability increase the likelihood of parental relationship dissolution?; (2) Does the likelihood of dissolution change over time?; and (3) Does the risk of parental relationship dissolution differ by marital status?

Methods: Data are drawn from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 cohort (NLSY97), a nationally-representative longitudinal study following young adults to adulthood. My sample is comprised of NLSY97 participants who are parents and reported either cohabitating or being married to the child’s other parent at the time of the child’s birth (N=5,765), 15% of whom reported having a child with a disability (N=862). I use propensity score matching to first create a comparable sample of respondents with children with disabilities and those with typically-developing children. I employ logistic regressions to estimate relationship dissolution by parent’s report of child’s disability (Question 1). To account for the timing of the dissolution (Question 2), I use event history methods. Finally, I conduct analyses separately for parents who were married and cohabiting at the time of the child’s birth (Question 3).

Results: I find that caregiving for a child with special healthcare needs is associated with a relatively high increased likelihood of relationship dissolution (baseline hazard increase of 51%, p<.01). This is concentrated among parents who were married at the time of their child’s birth; I find no significant effect on dissolution of cohabiting unions. Further, the event history models suggest that the timing of marital dissolutions differ for parents of children with disabilities compared to parents without additional caregiving responsibilities, with the former moving towards dissolution more slowly than other parents.

Conclusions/Implications: These findings have important implications for social work practitioners and researchers. This suggests social workers have a crucial role to play in supporting families with children with special needs through programs such as respite care and relationship interventions. Further, it has important implications for the mechanism and delivery of services, policies, and support as well as for resources—both financial and social—available to children and parents who may already be facing disadvantages.