Britain’s epidemic of broken homes is affecting its children | Kelseigh Powell-Hall

What, exactly does the family mean to children in 21st century Britain? According to the late philosopher Sir Roger Scruton in The Meaning of Conservatism, the conservative will find in the family a microcosm of civil society. Much like in society, the strength of all life relies on the support and structure of the life around it, and it’s through this lens that we can begin to understand how the stability of a family will underpin all that follows.

Families are the strongest influence in a child’s life. They can be a positive force, equipping them to socialise appropriately and contribute to society, or, they can be negative one, leading to significant disadvantages across the board. In the past, the family would usually consist of two married biological parents and their offspring. Yet as we dive deeper into the 21st Century, Britain has been seeing an extreme shift in the composition of the family. One that has, objectively, been far from wholly positive. Today, we see more couples choosing to cohabit and less couples opting to embark on marriage. In fact, there was a 25.8% increase in cohabiting couples between 2008 and 2018.

Why is this? Put simply, values are changing. The rise of secularism in the West has meant that the need to get married is less pressing for couples today. A spiritual sactity to a relationship has become widely regarded as an accessory rather than defining pupose, as it was before. Research indicates that this shift from the traditional family to cohabitation has left families vulnerable to breakdown, which can have a huge impact on children. 

The rate of family breakdown in the UK is notably higher than other Western countries, with only 68.9% of children living in a two-parent household, significantly lower than the average of 84%. Unfortunately, family break up is becoming more and more common. The Marriage Foundation state that “in the UK 450 out of every 1,000 children will experience the break-up of their parents before their 16th birthday”, a staggering statistic. 

But just how, exactly, does having a broken home cause damage to the lives of Britain’s children, and adolescents more generally?

One of the biggest areas to suffer as a result of an unstable home is in education. Research has shown that children’s academic performance is recurrently severely impacted by the breakdown of a family. A meta-analysis examined 92 studies that compared children from two parents households to children from broken homes, with the results showing that the children from broken homes consistently scored lower than children from two parent households on a range of measures including academic achievement, conduct, psychological adjustment, self-concept, and social relations. 

The abundance of information to support this shows us clearly that broken families too often result in children being at a disadvantage when it comes to their education which will, in turn, limit their opportunities in the future.

It is not only the emotional distress caused by family breakdowns that causes children to perform worse academically but also the lifestyle changes; research has found that the instability caused by a family’s breakdown can affect a child’s daily routine dramatically and therefore lead to stress and a compromised performance in other areas of their lives. 

As well as a stable home, the importance of a strong father figure cannot be overstated. A multitude of psychological and sociological research suggests that not having a father present can result in low self-esteem and a lack of confidence which has a negative impact on behaviour at school and therefore on academic performance. 

In addition to merely academia, we also see severe impacts in the emotional development of children as a result of divorce or unstable homes.

A family breakup can result in emotional trauma that causes serious issues for a child in later life, such as anxiety, aggression and a generally cynical outlook. This supposition is supported by a study carried out that analysed data from 10,929 mothers with 14-year old children, the study found that mental health problems are especially prevalent among children from broken families, and that mental health problems were on average even worse when the child was born out of wedlock. These emotional effects are not isolated to childhood but can continue throughout a person’s life and, disturbingly, research has shown that children from broken homes are even more likely to attempt suicide. 

The mental health issues combined with the lack of academic attainment leads to children from broken homes becoming more likely to turn to crime and deviance. Research found when a child comes from a broken home, it makes them more likely to engage in sexual activity, have children and cohabit at a far younger age than those who are from two-parent households. As well as this, they are more likely to smoke, drink and use illegal drugs.

This environment continually creates an instability that passes through generations, creating a cycle of poverty which is all too difficult to escape. The early intervention foundation found that children from broken homes are twice as likely to grow up poor, living in poverty increases the likelihood that one will seek illegitimate means of obtaining money. 

It’s an inescapeable fact that a wealth of research looking at the impact of family composition on the health and well-being of children has repeatedly shown that children who live with married biological parents score better on a range of emotional, physical and social measures. It’s a truth that we, as a nation and society, must not be coy about discussing as education on this issue could likely spare our children a significant deal of emotional pain, trauma, suffering and aid them to a much greater effect in their psychosocial development.

It is, of course, necessary to state that simply pointing out the ideal conditions for raising children is in no way shaming or ignoring the struggles of single parents, but instead promoting the traditional family as the prerequisite for optimal childhood development. Britons today must be educated on the benefits of stable families and encouraged to create an environment which will best allow for their children to succeed. Crucially, measures must be put in place to help families post-breakdown, so that a child’s life is their own to determine, and no child is the victim of circumstance.