The name is absent

Distal family factors

only the main earner of the household but also the main provider of care for the
children. The resulting trade-off between income and care in single parent households
may also induce stress which may decrease the quality of parental resources.

Psychologists, on the other hand, focus more on the nature of parental relations in the
family (McLanahan & Bumpass, 1988). In this sense, family structure is seen as an
influence on the home environment (parental well-being) and proximal processes. In
particular, the frequency and length of fathers’ or mothers’ absence from the child’s
home environment may affect children’s sense of security and ultimately disrupt
familial proximal processes (McLanahan, 1985). Similarly, these theories emphasise
that unstable relations, perhaps characterised by intra-household violence, conflict or
periods of parental absence, can affect proximal processes in the home impacting on
children’s behaviour at school and on the likelihood of gaining school qualifications
(Hill et al., 2001).

Empirical evidence has shown that children who experience the breakdown of their
parents’ relationship, i.e. living in a one parent household due to divorce or
separation, differ from those who do not in terms of their behaviour at school and
completed years of schooling (Brooks-Gunn et al., 1997; Ermisch & Francesconi,
2001; Hill et al., 2001). Other evidence points to the importance of living with both
natural parents for a broad set of child development outcomes that include cognitive
achievements and behavioural indicators (McLanahan, 1997). In contrast, some
studies suggest that the arrival of a step-parent can have both positive and negative
consequences for child development (Cooksey, 1997). Among the negative effects we
find low educational qualifications (Boggess, 1998) (West et al., 1995).

However, several important caveats need to be added to this evidence. Conflict and
instability in the relationship between parents have negative consequences for child
development regardless of the structure of the family (Joshi et al., 1999). Family
structure does not influence children cognitive ability when income is included as
control (Joshi et al., 1999; Peters & Mullis, 1997; Smith et al., 1997), though it may
influence their educational attainments (Haveman et al., 1997; Manski et al., 1992).
This suggests that the main underlying causes of the effect of family structure are the
income loss and conflict associated with broken or unstable relationships. The effect
of conflict can occur in one or two parent family structures and the causal pathway is
not necessarily from structure to conflict but may more likely be the other way
around.

5.2.2 The effects of prior parental education on family structure

Of all the distal factors, family structure has the weakest or most unclear relation to
parental education. Individuals’ risk of partnership breakdown depends on personal
circumstances as well as on legal and social factors and on the cultural environment.
Hoem (1997) suggests that education would decrease the risk of partnership
breakdown if people with high levels of education are better at selecting their partners
or spouses and making their relationship work. In contrast, individuals with more
education stand to gain more than their counterparts with less education in ending a

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