Divorce in Europe New Insights in Trends, Causes and Consequences of Relation Break-ups

This open access book collects the major discussions in divorce research in Europe.  It starts with an understanding of divorce trends. Why was divorce increasing so rapidly throughout the US and Europe and do we see signs of a turn? Do cohabitation breakups influence divorce trends or is there a renewed stability on the partner market?

In terms of divorce risks, the book contains new insights on Eastern European countries. These post socialist countries have evolved dramatically since the fall of the Wall and at present they show the highest divorce figures in Europe. Also the influence of gender, and more specifically women’s education as a risk in divorce is examined cross nationally. The book also provides explanations for the negative gradient in female education effects on divorce.  It devotes three separate parts to new insights in the post-divorce effects of the life course event by among others looking at consequences for adults and children but also taking the larger family network into account. As such the book is of interest to demographers, sociologists, psychologists, family therapists, NGOs, and politicians.

“This wide-ranging volume details important trends in divorce in Europe that hold implications for understanding family dissolution causes and consequences throughout the world. Highly recommended for researchers and students everywhere.”

1. Introduction

Dimitri Mortelmans

 

PART 1 DIVORCE TRENDS

 

2. Estimating Trends in Relationship Stability over Time: Conceptual and Empirical Challenges

Diederik Boertien

 

3. On Increasing Divorce Risks

Michael Wagner

 

PART 2 DIVORCE RISKS

 

4. Cohort trends in divorce in 8 post-socialist countries

Sunnee Billingsley, Juho Härkönen

 

5. The negative female educational gradient of divorce: Towards an explanation in four European countries

Maike van Damme, Pearl Dykstra

 

6. The More the Merrier? The Effect of Children on Divorce in a Pro-natalist Society

Amit Kaplan, Miri Endeweld, Anat Herbst-Debby

 

PART 3 CONSEQUENCES OF DIVORCE FOR ADULTS

 

7. Exploring Divorce in Later Life, Social Isolation, and Loneliness

Robin S. Högnäs

 

8. Do divorced elderly in Russia get help from their children ?

Ekaterina Tretyakova

 

9. Coping strategies of migrant women after divorce. Does work, family or a new partner helps you through the dark times ?

Dimitri Mortelmans, Layla Van den Bergh, Gert Tielemans

 

10. Multi-dimensional subjective wellbeing (SWB), lone parenthood and divorce. How do different post-divorce family dynamics influence different measures of SWB?

Sam Jenkinson, Koenraad Matthys, Hideko Matsuo

 

PART 4 DIVORCE AND CHILDREN

 

11. Childbearing Across Partnerships in Finland and Germany: Are There Any Gender Differences?

Marika Jalovaara, Michaela Kreyenfeld

 

12. Public attitudes towards the shared custody: Reflection of the rising notion of intergenerational commitment – the case of Czech Republic

Petr Fucík

 

13. Post-divorce multi-household living arrangements in Europe and child well-being

Michael Gähler, Peter Fallesen

 

14. Implications of grandparental divorce in grandchildren care

Marius Neagu, Cornelia Muresan

 

PART 5 FAMILY TIES AFTER DIVORCE

 

15. Parental Divorce and Father-Child Relationships: A Closer Look at Broken Ties

Matthijs Kalmijn

 

16. Knotting the safety net. A theoretical framework in studying interdependencies in post-divorce family networks

Dries Van Gasse, Vera de Bel, Dimitri Mortelmans

 

17. Quality of non-resident father-child relationship: between “caring for” and “caring about”

Aušra Maslauskaite, Arturas Tereškinas

 

 

Dimitri Mortelmans (1972) is Senior Full Professor in Sociology at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Antwerp (Belgium). He is head of the Centre for Population, Family and Health (CPFH). His research concentrates on family sociology and sociology of labour. He has published on divorce, new constituted families, gendered labour careers and work-life balance. He is also the main author of the Step in Statistics book series of which six volumes have been published (in Dutch). On qualitative methodology, he published the Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods and Qualitative Analysis with NVivo. In demography, he co-edited “Changing Family Dynamics and Demographic Evolution. The Family Kaleidoscope” and “Lone parenthood in the Life Course”.