The Impact of Parental Divorce on College Students' Interpersonal Functioning

Course overview

Presenter: Rachel Davenport Date/time: 03/29/2024, 10:00 - 11:00 AM Summary: Research has shown parental divorce to have long-term impacts on various domains of children's interpersonal functioning, extending into young adulthood and beyond. The first component of this presentation includes a review of divorce literature and includes factors that may contribute to divorce, family adjustment after divorce, and short and long-term impacts to children and young adults. The second component of this presentation will review the results from the present study. The purpose of this study was to assess the potential impacts of parental divorce in college students and factors that may mitigate maladaptive outcomes (i.e., perceived social support). This study's sample included 82 college students subdivided into parental divorce (n=41) and no divorce (n=41) subsamples. The review of this study will aid clinicians in identifying the impacts of parental divorce on college students' interpersonal functioning as well as discuss potential treatment considerations. Objectives: 1) Describe factors that may contribute to divorce. 2) Identify impacts of divorce on parental until and the impact of divorce on couples' children. 3) Identify factors that may mitigate negative impacts of parental divorce on couples' children. 4) Utilize one new theory to conceptualize college students who have experienced parental divorce.