Shared parenting

Shared parenting, shared residence, joint residence, shared custody, and joint physical custody, all refers to a child custody arrangement after divorce or separation, in which both parents share the responsibility of raising their child(ren), with equal or close to equal parenting time. A regime of shared parenting is based on the idea that children have the right to and benefit from a close relationship with both their parents, and that no child should be separated from a parent. Shared parenting is increasing in popularity and it is particularly common in Scandinavia. Shared parenting, shared residence, joint residence, shared custody, and joint physical custody, all refers to a child custody arrangement after divorce or separation, in which both parents share the responsibility of raising their child(ren), with equal or close to equal parenting time. A regime of shared parenting is based on the idea that children have the right to and benefit from a close relationship with both their parents, and that no child should be separated from a parent. Shared parenting is increasing in popularity and it is particularly common in Scandinavia. The term Shared Parenting is applied in cases of divorce, separation or when parents do not live together; in contrast, a Shared Earning/Shared Parenting Marriage is a marriage where the partners choose to share the work of child-raising, earning money, house chores and recreation time in nearly equal fashion across all four domains. Shared parenting is different from split custody, where some children live primarily with their mother while one or more of their siblings live primarily with their father. Bird's nest custody is an unusual form of shared parenting where the child always lives in the same home, while the two parents takes turns living with the child in that home. Its long term use can be expensive as it requires three residences, and it is most commonly used as a temporary shared parenting arrangement until one parent has found a suitable home elsewhere. The popularity of shared parenting is increasing. The frequency of shared parenting versus sole custody varies across countries, being most common in Scandinavia. In a comparative survey of 34 western countries conducted in 2005/06, the proportion of 11-15 year old children living in a shared parenting arrangement versus sole custody was highest in Sweden (17%), followed by Iceland (11%), Belgium (11%), Denmark (10%), Italy (9%) and Norway (9%). Ukraine, Poland, Croatia, Turkey, the Netherlands and Romania all had 2% or less. Among the English speaking countries, Canada and the United Kingdom had 7% while the United States and Ireland had 5%. By 2016/17, the percentage in Sweden had increased to 28%; with 26% for children age 0-5 years, 34% among the 6-12 year old age group, and 23% among the oldest children ages 13-18. Epidemiological studies on the effect of shared parenting on children has been conducted using both cross-sectional and longitudinal study designs. Their conclusions are that children with a shared parenting arrangement have better physical, mental, social and academic outcomes compared to children in a primary parenting arrangement. These finding holds for all age groups, whether the parents have an amicable or high-conflict relationship, and after adjusting for socio-economic variables. With its early adoption of shared parenting and excellent health data, the largest studies on shared parenting have been conducted in Sweden. In a large cross-sectional study comparing over 50,000 children, ages 12 and 15, living in either a shared or sole custody arrangement, Dr. Malin Bergström found that children with shared parenting had better outcomes for physical health, psychological well-being, moods and emotions, self-perception, autonomy, parental relations, material outcomes, peer relations, school satisfaction and social acceptance. Using data from the same cross-sectional survey, Bergström did a follow-up study focusing on psychosomatic problems of concentration, sleeping, headaches, stomach aches, tenseness, lack of appetite, sadness and dizziness. They found that both boys and girls did better living in a shared parenting versus sole custody arrangement. Both studies adjusted for selected socio-economic variables. Based on a review of 60 quantitative research studies, Dr. Linda Nielsen found that in 34 of the studies, children in a shared parenting arrangement had better outcomes on all measured variables for well-being. In 14 studies, they had better or equal outcomes on all measures; in 6 studies that had equal outcomes on all measures; and in 6 studies that had worse outcomes on one measure and equal or better outcomes on the remaining measures. The results were similar for the subset of studies that adjusted for socio-economic variables and the level of conflict between parents. The variables for which shared parenting had the biggest advantage were family relationships, physical health, adolescent behavior and mental health, in that order. The variable with the smallest difference was academic achievement, for which only 3 out 10 studies showed an advantage for shared parenting. Among other things, Nielsen has concluded that Maintaining strong relationships with both parents by living in shared parenting families appears to offset the damage of high parental conflict and poor co-parenting and that such parents are more likely to have detached, distant, and parallel parenting relationships than to have co-parenting relationships. To fully understand the reasons for findings from quantitative epidemiological studies, biological and qualitative research is needed. Dr. Anna Machin has studied father-child relationships using evolutionary anthropology, asserting that human fatherhood would not have emerged unless the investment that fathers make in their children is vital for the survival of our species, and that just like mothers, fathers have been shaped by evolution to be biologically, psychologically and behaviourally primed to parent.