Parental Divorce and Attitudes and Feelings toward Marriage and Divorce in Emerging Adulthood: New Insights from a Multiway-Frequency Analysis

Abstract

Experiencing parental divorce can exert long-term consequences on children’s attitudes toward marriage and divorce. Participants’ opinions on marriage and divorce were qualitatively coded and two themes selected based on Willoughby’s theoretical framework. Multiway frequency analyses (MFA) were used to investigate associations between empirically based factors (derived from previous empirical studies) and participants’ endorsement of the two themes. Four hundred and forty six participants between 18 and 25 years-old, including 217 participants from divorced households, were interviewed. Young adults’ optimism toward marital relationships was related to more proximal factors and a lesser number of factors than young adults’ positive attitude toward divorce. Religious affiliation and parental conflict stood out as important factors. Recommendations are offered for future research.

Keywords

• romantic relationships, young adults, parental divorce