406 Chapter 11There are a number of factors that
might influence the sex difference in re-
sponse to separation and divorce. One is the
presence of children. If there are no children,
women suffer fewer ill effects of separation
and divorce (Elliott & Umberson, 2004).
When children are involved, strains associ-
ated with raising children alone arise. Thus,
income and parenthood are important mod-
erators of the effects of divorce on women
and men.Explanations
Strains. Separation and divorce are as-
sociated with a number of strains, includ-
ing the change in roles that accompanies
divorce, single parenthood if children are in-
volved, and the potential for conflict with an
ex-spouse (Whisman, Weinstock, & Tolejko,
2006). These strains may differ for women and
men. Relationship dissolution may be associ-
ated with greater social strains for men and
greater economic strains for women. Marital
dissolution results in a loss of men’s primary
confidant. For women, the economic strain as-
sociated with marital dissolution is especially
large if they retain custody of children. Even
in cohabiting relationships, the economic
strains associated with relationship dissolution
are greater for women than men. One study
showed that men’s income declined by 10%,
whereas women’s declined by 33% after the re-
lationships dissolved (Avellar & Smock, 2005).
In that study, the greater strains for women
partly had to do with the presence of children.
If differential strains experienced by
women and men following separation/
divorce explain the effects of relationship
dissolution on health, one would expect the
dissolution of traditional marriages to have
stronger negative effects on women and men
than the dissolution of egalitarian marriages.men. At the end of the semester, when a
third of the couples had broken up (Time 2),
there was no sex difference in distress among
people who had broken up, but women
were more distressed than men when the
relationship still existed. An alternative way
of viewing these findings is that men who
broke up became more distressed, whereas
women who broke up became less distressed.
Women also reported better adjustment to
the breakup than men did.
In terms of the breakup of marital
relationships, findings are contradictory.
One indicator that women may adjust better
to the breakup of a marriage is that women
are less likely than men to remarry after
divorce. In 2001, 55% of men compared to
44% of women who had divorced were cur-
rently remarried (U.S. Census Bureau, 2005).
However, the research findings are not clear
as to whether one sex suffers more than the
other following separation and divorce.
Three studies showed that people who were
separated/divorced had worse health than
married people but the effects were stronger
for women than men—in terms of mortality
from heart disease (Molloy et al., 2009)
and self-reported health (Lindstrom, 2009;
Liu & Umberson, 2008). However, two
others studies showed stronger adverse ef-
fects of separation/divorce on men than
women—in terms of mortality (Sbarra &
Nietert, 2009) and psychological distress
(Hope, Rodgers, & Power, 1999). An older
cross-cultural study (United States, Canada,
Puerto Rico, Germany, Taiwan, Korea, Leba-
non, France, and New Zealand) showed that
separated and divorced individuals were two
to four times more likely to have major de-
pression than married individuals, but the
difference was greater for men than women
in all of the countries except Canada and
Taiwan (Weissman et al., 1996).M11_HELG0185_04_SE_C11.indd 406 6/21/11 12:43 PM