The promotion of wellness in children and families challenges and opportunities.

This article considers the effects of marital disruption on children and families, using a risk and resilience perspective. The challenges that parental divorce poses for children are widely recognized; however, less attention has been given to strategies for promoting children's resilience and healthy developmental trajectories. The purpose of this article is to redress that imbalance by highlighting the importance of understanding pathways toward risk and resilience in children in the aftermath of divorce and the ways in which this research can be integrated into effective, evidence-based preventive interventions and proactive social policies that foster supportive parent-child relationships and psychological wellness in children and families.

Role of parent-child relationships in mediating the effects of marital disruption.

Objective: This study sought to explore the long-term effects of and relationships between parental divorce, interparental conflict, and parent-child relationships on interpersonal and generalized trust, empathy, dependency, and depressive affect among late adolescents.

Method: Self-administered questionnaire data were collected from a sample of 288 college students (including 60 children of divorce). Participants were asked to rate current and past levels of interparental conflict, the current affective quality of their parent-child relationships, and present adjustment.

An evaluation of the efficacy of a preventive intervention for 4th-6th grade urban children of divorce.

This study evaluates the efficacy of the Children of Divorce Intervention Program (CODIP), a preventive intervention based on social support and coping skills, for 4th-6th grade urban children of divorce. Structure and content of the 14 group sessions were tailored to the developmental level and sociocultural make-up of the target sample. Pre-post comparisons of demographically matched groups of 57 CODIP participants, 38 non-program divorce controls and 93 children from non-divorced families revealed improvements on parent, child and group leader measures of adjustment.

Relationships between support and adjustment among children of divorce.

In a sample of 102 4th-6th grade urban children of divorce, low to moderate relationships were found between perceived support and child adjustment. This relationship held for several sources of support and across several types of adjustment measures. It was strongest when adjustment was assessed through child self-ratings.

Preventive intervention with latency-aged children of divorce: a replication study.

This replication study assessed the efficacy of a school-based preventive intervention for latency-aged children of divorce. The Children of Divorce Intervention Program (CODIP) emphasizes support, identifying and expressing divorce-related feelings, training situationally relevant communication, problem solving, and anger control skills, and enhancing self-esteem. Fifty-four children of divorce participated in the 11-session program conducted in small groups.