Based upon interviews with judges, lawyers, and divorced persons in California, and data collected from that state#x19;s court dockets, this volume presents the first systematic examination of the social and economic effects of divorce law reform. Sociologist Weitzman concludes that while the abolition of grounds, fault, and consent has eliminated much of the acrimony previously associated with divorce proceedings, this, together with the institution of gender-neutral standards for property awards and child support, has resulted in increased economic hardship and social dislocation for divorced women and dependent children. Weitzman does not intend to extrapolate her data, conclusions, and recommendations to the whole country; however, it is reasonable to believe that they have national implications. Merlin Whitemen, Dann Pecar Newman Talesnick & Kleiman, Indianapolis Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.#x13;amazon.com.

This book is a must read for seniors experiencing divorce. It will make you think, cry, laugh, and help you get to the other side.

Growing up in a divorced family leads to a variety of difficulties for adult offspring in their own partnerships. One of the best known and most powerful is the divorce cycle, the transmission of divorce from one generation to the next. This book examines how the divorce cycle has transformed family life in contemporary America by drawing on two national data sets. Compared to people from intact families, the children of divorce are more likely to marry as teenagers, but less likely to wed overall, more likely to marry people from divorced families, more likely to dissolve second and third marriages, and less likely to marry their live-in partners. Yet some of the adverse consequences of parental divorce have abated even as divorce itself proliferated and became more socially accepted. Taken together, these findings show how parental divorce is a strong force in people's lives and society as a whole.

With roller coaster changes in marriage and divorce rates apparently leveling off in the 1980s, Andrew Cherlin feels that the time is right for an overall assessment of marital trends. His graceful and informal book surveys and explains the latest research on marriage, divorce, and remarriage since World War II.Cherlin presents the facts about family change over the past thirty-five years and examines the reasons for the trends that emerge. He views the 1950s, when Americans were marrying and having children early and divorcing infrequently, as the aberration, and he discusses why this period was unusual. He also explores the causes and consequences of the dramatic changes since 1960--increases in divorce, remarriage, and cohabitation, decreases in fertility--that are altering the very definition of the family in our society. He concludes with a discussion of the increasing differences in the marital patterns of black and white families over the past few decades.

In the past decade there has been a remarkable cross-national convergence in the experience, research, and reaction to the "Divorce Revolution." As each country has experienced spiralling divorce rates and has adopted more liberal rules for divorce, it has begun to be concerned about the social and economic consequences of these changes. The twenty-six eminent contributors to this volume investigate how the new laws work in practice, analyze the societal effects of rapid change, and grapple with the policy implications of their results.

The effects of divorce on individuals and on society as a whole has been widely debated in public discussion of American life. The dialogue was sparked by the dramatic rise in the number of U.S. divorces which began in the 1960s: Figure 1 illustrates that the divorce rate doubled from 10.6 to 20.3 divorces per 1,000 married women between 1965 and 1975, and continued to rise until 1981. Scholars have also debated the implications of the 'Divorce Revolution' of this time period: the liberalization of divorce laws in a large number of states to a unilateral regime, which made divorce easier by requiring the consent of only one spouse to dissolve a marriage (e.g., Friedberg 1998, Weitzman 1995). Some policymakers, 14 social scientists, and advocacy groups have argued that this sweeping policy change was an important factor in a general decline of the American family (e.g., Kirkwood 1996, Parkman 1993). Gruber (2004) found that children exposed to the unilateral divorce laws have poorer outcomes in young adulthood. On the other hand, the easing of divorce laws made it easier for people to leave toxic marriages, and arguably increased the bargaining power of abused partners within marriages; Stevenson and Wolfers (2006) find large declines in domestic violence in states that adopted unilateral divorce. This paper contributes to the evaluation of the change in divorce laws by examining a less studied area: the long-term effects of this policy change on the well-being of men and women who were young adults when the laws were changing.