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One
of the greatest tragedies children of divorce in California
face is the way courts allow custodial parents to move
hundreds or even thousands of miles away after divorce,
damaging or sometimes destroying the bonds between children
and their noncustodial parents. However, new research and a
case pending before the California Supreme Court may change
that.
In the case of In re: Marriage of Lamusga, a Contra
Costa County custodial mother seeks to move out of state
with her two young boys and her new husband. The boys'
father, who enjoys joint legal but not joint physical
custody, seeks to block the move, arguing that it is not in
his children's best interest because it will damage their
relationship with him. The mother, who first tried to move
to Ohio, now seeks to relocate to Arizona in order to
provide her new husband with better career opportunities.
Since the 1996 Burgess decision California custodial
parents, usually mothers, have had the presumptive right to
move. However, according to Arizona State University
researcher Sanford Braver, this decision and others like it
were made in a "vacuum" of information on the long-term
effects of move-aways.
Braver and his ASU colleagues Ira Ellman and William
Fabricius have begun to fill this vacuum with a newly
released study which shows that move-aways are correlated
with damaging long-term consequences for children. The
study, published in the June 2003 issue of the Journal of
Family Psychology, found that among 14 variables related
to a young adult's overall well-being, move-away status was
correlated to significant, negative impact in 11 of them.
These negative consequences include: greater inner turmoil
and distress from parents' divorce; health problems,
particularly in the case of girls; more hostility in
interpersonal relationships; negative feelings towards their
parents; greater conflict between divorced parents; and
greater problems in general life satisfaction and personal
and emotional adjustment. Not surprisingly, financial
support, including financial support for college expenses
given voluntarily by the noncustodial parent, was
significantly higher when children grew up within a one hour
drive of their noncustodial parent.
The study, conducted from a pool of 2,067 college students
enrolled in an introductory level class at a large
university, may even understate the damage of move-aways. As
the survey's authors point out, many of the children most
damaged by divorce and alienation from their noncustodial
parents were not measured because they probably never made
it as far as college.
The study's results also indict noncustodial fathers who
move away from their children, finding that such move-aways
are also correlated with long-term negative consequences for
children. Noncustodial fathers often justify their moves by
arguing that the custodial mother is already denying them
access to the children anyway, or that these moves are
necessitated by their child support obligations. The second
claim, however, is no more legitimate than custodial
mothers' claims that moving helps them financially.
While the study's findings on move-aways are new, studies
documenting the disastrous effects of fatherlessness on
children are not. Research shows that the largest single
factor in predicting whether a child will graduate high
school, attend college, become involved in crime or drugs,
or get pregnant before age 18 is the presence (or absence)
of a father in the child's life. Studies show that this
remains true even after adjustments for household income.
The Burgess decision and others like it ignore the fact that
children need more from their fathers than a check in the
mail--they need the love, guidance and strength which
fathers provide. Allowing a custodial parent to move away
often removes one of the two people in the world who love a
child the most from that child's life. How could that be in
a child's best interest?
This column first appeared in the
Pasadena Star-News & Affiliated
Papers (6/5/03).
Glenn Sacks is a men's and fathers' issues columnist and
radio talk show host. His columns have appeared in dozens of
America's largest newspapers. His radio show,
His Side with Glenn Sacks,
can be heard every Sunday on KRLA 870 AM in Los Angeles.
Glenn can be reached via his website,
at
www.GlennSacks.com
or by e-mail at
Glenn@GlennSacks.com.
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