One of the most complicated and often contentious issues for separating parents is whether or not very young children (under age 3) should spend the night in both households. On the one hand, many advocates of continued father involvement encourage dads to stay involved and some of these dads want to keep their children overnight. However, there is a growing body of scientific evidence that suggests that young children’s well-being may be adversely affected by frequent overnight stays for young children.
Samantha Tornello and colleagues (2013) published some important new evidence that suggests that frequent overnight stays by infants and toddlers with their non-reseidential fathers can contribute to insecure attachments. (Note: Attachment has been found to be a strong predictor of child and adult psychological adjustment and seems to be the foundation of positive relationships with others (See Bretherton, et al., 2011).
In February 2014, Paul Millar and Edward Kruk published an article taking issue with some of the analyses and interpretations in the Tornello et al. paper. Two of the authors of the original paper (Emery & Tornello, 2014) responded to the issues raised by Millar and Kruk. Some of the critique by Millar and Kruk appears to be confusion about whether the findings. Due to the mislabeling of a table (Table 5), Millar and Kruk interpreted these finding in the opposite direction of Tornello et al. Many of their other criticisms such as the validity of the attachment measure and the limits of the sample are important and require careful interpretation of the findings, but await other evidence to determine whether these findings hold up. At the moment 4 out 5 studies of this issue have found that overnight stays by infants and/or toddlers leads to attachment issues.
The one issue raised by Millar and Kruk that was not addressed by Emery and Tornello is the attachment of these children to other caregivers– the non-residential fathers, grandparents, child care providers, etc. I have not looked carefully at the other information we know about the participants in the Fragile Families study, but these families were “fragile families.” Could staying overnight with non-residential fathers represent the degree of chaos in the mothers’ household rather than “paternal involvement?” How are the residents in the “father’s household”– grandparents or not? i don’t know the answers to these questions, but it would be good to find out more about these issues.
Finally, all of the studies to date have some limitations and this evidence cannot be described as definitive. This is a complicated issue and no single study should be the basis for policy and practice by America’s court system, but this new work by Tornello and colleagues has provided a thoughtful analysis.
For references and further reading on these issues see the following:
Bretherton, I, Seligman, S, Solomon, J, Crowell, J. McIntosh, J. (2011). “If I could tell the judge something about attachment…” Perspectives on attachment theory in the family
law courtroom. Family Court Review, 49, 539-548. doi: 10.1111/j.1744-1617.2011.01391.x
Emery, R. E., & Tornello, S. L. (2014). Rejoinder to Millar and Kruk (2014): Who assumes the burden of proof when there is no neutral null hypothesis? Journal of Marriage and Family, 76(1), 237-240. doi:10.1111/jomf.12070
George, C., Solomon, J. and McIntosh, J, (2011). Divorce in the Nursery: On infants and overnight care. Family Court Review, 49, 521-529. doi: 10.1111/j.1744-1617.2011.01389.x
McIntosh, J., Smyth, B., Kelaher, M., Wells, Y., & Long, C. (2010). Post-separation parenting arrangements and developmental outcomes for infants and children. Canberra, Australia: Attorney General’s Department.
Millar, P., & Kruk, E. (2014). Maternal attachment, paternal overnight contact, and very young children’s adjustment: Comment on Tornello et al. (2013). Journal of Marriage and Family, 76(1), 232-236. doi:10.1111/jomf.12071
Solomon, J., & George, C. (1999). The development of attachment in separated and divorced families: Effects of overnight visitation, parent, and couple variables. Attachment and Human Development, 1, 2-33. doi: 10.1080/14616739900134011
Solomon, J., & George, C. (1999). The effects of overnight visitation in divorced and separated families: A longitudinal follow-up. In J. Solomon & C. George (Eds.), Attachment Disorganization (pp. 243-264). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
Tornello, S. L., Emery, R., Rowen, J., Potter, D., Ocker, B. and Xu, Y. (2013), Overnight Custody Arrangements, Attachment, and Adjustment Among Very Young Children. Journal of Marriage and Family, 75, 871–885. doi: 10.1111/jomf.12045
[…] for Divorcescience.org, Dr. Robert Hughes offered his own perspective on the debate, highlighting a series of articles published just in the past yearthat continue this […]
Commentators opposed to shared parenting and overnights for infants and toddlers post-divorce have been relying on misleading interpretations of very flawed research to argue that young children need to spend most of their time and every night in the care of one “primary” parent.
Properly disciplined research has safeguards built in to protect it from the prejudices of the researchers. This is not the case with the results-orientated research by Tornello and colleagues. (Nielsen 2014; Warshak 2014) Lawmakers and courts often take this research that forms the picture of society on which government policy is based, not to mention the general public, as being simply objective truth.
In order to clarify where social science stands on overnights and shared parenting for infants and toddlers, a February 4, 2014 study by Dr Richard Warshak, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, published in the prestigious American Psychological Association’s peer-review journal, Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, with the endorsement of 110 of the world’s top authorities from 15 countries in attachment, early child development, and divorce, concludes that in normal circumstances, overnights and “shared parenting should be the norm for parenting plans for children of all ages, including very young children.”
The consensus report ends with a number of recommendations and conclusions. Of particular note:
“We have no basis for rank ordering parents as primary or secondary in their importance to child development.” (p. 50)
“We recognize that many factors such as cultural norms and political considerations affect the type of custody policy that society deems as desirable. To the extent that policy and custody decisions seek to express scientific knowledge about child development, the analyses in this article should receive significant weight by legislators and decision makers.” (p 59)
“1. Just as we encourage parents in intact families to share care of their children, we believe that the social science evidence on the development of healthy parent– child relationships, and the long-term benefits of healthy parent–child relationships, supports the view that shared parenting should be the norm for parenting plans for children of all ages, including very young children.“ (p 59)
“3. In general the results of the studies reviewed in this document are favorable to parenting plans that more evenly balance young children’s time between two homes. …Thus, to maximize children’s chances of having a good and secure relationship with each parent, we encourage both parents to maximize the time they spend with their children.” (p 59)
“4. Research on children’s overnights with fathers favors allowing children under four to be cared for at night by each parent rather than spending every night in the same home.” (p 59)
“6. There is no evidence to support postponing the introduction of regular and frequent involvement, including overnights, of both parents with their babies and toddlers.” (p 60)
“7. Our recommendations apply in normal circumstances, for most children with most parents. The existence of parents with major deficits in how they care for their children, such as parents who neglect or abuse their children, and those from whom children would need protection and distance even in intact families, should not dictate policy for the majority of children being raised by parents who live apart from each other.” (p 60)
References
Warshak R A (2014) Social Science and Parenting Plans for Young Children: A Consensus Report. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, Vol. 20, No. 1, 46–67
Nielsen L. (2014) Woozles: Their Role in Custody Law Reform, Parenting Plans, and Family Court. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law. February 10, advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/law0000004