13 Family Conflict
It’s just a family that loves each other, and as long as
they do that’s a happy family.— Eight- year- old girlBy the time they were 16, one- fifth of the 1970 birth cohort
had experienced the break- up of their family: their parents no
longer lived together.^1 Since then family break- up has become
even more common, and today 40% of British 16- year- olds live
in separated families.^2 In the United States the figure is 50%.
Break- up on this scale is a relatively modern phenomenon
— one of the more important changes over the last forty
years. So what is it doing to our children? ALSPAC provides
good evidence, and the broad answer is this: What matters
is family conflict, rather than family break- up, and, if the
conflict is bad enough, the break- up may help the children.
But the conflict is unambiguously bad, especially for the be-
havior of the children— parents who fight tend to generate
children who fight.
Measurement
To measure whether there is family conflict the mothers
in ALSPAC were regularly asked: In the past three months
have you or your partner
- argued with each other over 3 times
- been irritable with the other