Children of Previously Divorced Parents and Educational Outcomes: How Do They Fare in Comparison with Children Who Have Experienced Parental Divorce?

Anne Reneflot, Norwegian Institute of Public Health
Svenn-Erik Mamelund, Work Research Institute, Norway

Many investigations show that children from divorced families have poorer educational outcomes than those raised by both biological parents. It is not clear whether this association is an expression of a causal relationship or whether this relationship is mainly confounded. We take advantage of extraordinarily rich Norwegian register data covering all children born in 1974-79 to pursue a novel approach. We study children who grow up in a married family with previously divorced parents. These children are raised in an intact family, but are exposed to parents similar to children in non-intact families. Both groups of parents share some characteristics that make them more divorce prone than never-divorced parents. We compare the educational outcomes (the odds of taking higher education) of children who have experienced parental divorce with children in intact families. The latter group is grouped into two: children with never-divorced parents and children with previously divorced parent.