The Two Parent Privilege

[Ronson]

Like I said biological parents make the greatest difference.

Just taking a guess, the presence of biological parents make babysitting easier and cheaper. A maternal presence helps a child's emotional development, and a paternal presence helps develop self discipline. I'm guessing older siblings help in some ways, and younger ones do too. My older daughters doted on my youngest daughter when she was very young, helping them hone their motherly skills.

The fewer positive role models available, the worse for the kids.

I'm going to write a book about it once I change from a conservative to a liberal. I will title it "Biological Parents Might Actually Be Good For Kids!" I will go on talk shows and be interviewed in the NYT.

[Starlight]

Just taking a guess, the presence of biological parents make babysitting easier and cheaper.

Eh? When you've got a divorced+remarried situation, babysitting is often free because you just send the kids to their other parent's house, and you've only got the kids at your place half the time in the first place.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

A maternal presence helps a child's emotional development, and a paternal presence helps develop self discipline.

Why not reverse them? Paternal presence helps emotional development and maternal presence helps develop self discipline?

And what about step-parents and step siblings? Does having four [or possibly more] parents and living with two of them albeit one is not their biological parent make for a better background for children?

[Starlight]

A maternal presence helps a child's emotional development, and a paternal presence helps develop self discipline.

I presume you're just making up that claim on the spot now?

A few years back when arguments over same sex marriage were topical, I read through some scientific research on child development, and it was pretty emphatic that the sex on the parent(s) had never been found to make any sort of difference in the development of children.

[seer]

Just taking a guess, the presence of biological parents make babysitting easier and cheaper.

I think it is more basic than that, more biological:

Evolutionary psychology theory

See also: Infanticide (zoology) and Kin selection
Evolutionary psychologists Martin Daly and Margo Wilson propose that the Cinderella effect is a direct consequence of the modern evolutionary theory of inclusive fitness, especially parental investment theory. They argue that human child rearing is so prolonged and costly that "a parental psychology shaped by natural selection is unlikely to be indiscriminate".^[6] According to them, "research concerning animal social behaviour provide a rationale for expecting parents to be discriminative in their care and affection, and more specifically, to discriminate in favour of their own young.

I think it is probably more natural or easier to love your own child.

[seer]

I presume you're just making up that claim on the spot now?

A few years back when arguments over same sex marriage were topical, I read through some scientific research on child development, and it was pretty emphatic that the sex on the parent(s) had never been found to make any sort of difference in the development of children.

Except with any gay couple one parent will necessarily be a step parent, if one is a biological parent. I don't see why the Cinderella effect wouldn't equally apply to them.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

I presume you're just making up that claim on the spot now?

A few years back when arguments over same sex marriage were topical, I read through some scientific research on child development, and it was pretty emphatic that the sex on the parent(s) had never been found to make any sort of difference in the development of children.

What children need is stability, parameters, and TLC. I honestly do not think it matters who provides that. Obviously two adults and presumably two incomes will offer children a better financial prospect but it may not provide other important things. A case in point being the Trump family. An affluent two biological parent household but just look at the early years of Donald and his siblings.

[seer]

What children need is stability, parameters, and TLC. I honestly do not think it matters who provides that. Obviously two adults and presumably two incomes will offer children a better financial prospect but it may not provide other important things. A case in point being the Trump family. An affluent two biological parent household but just look at the early years of Donald and his siblings.

The fact is, over all, by far, the biological family is better for children. And why people like you would deny or minimize that is beyond me.

Again:

Powerful evidence in support of the Cinderella effect comes from the finding that when abusive parents have both step and genetic children, they generally spare their genetic children. In such families, stepchildren were exclusively targeted 9 out of 10 times in one study and in 19 of 22 in another.^[4] In addition to displaying higher rates of negative behaviors (e.g., abuse) toward stepchildren, stepparents display fewer positive behaviors toward stepchildren than do the genetic parents. For example, on average, stepparents invest less in education, play with stepchildren less, take stepchildren to the doctor less, etc.^[5] This discrimination against stepchildren is unusual compared with abuse statistics involving the overall population given "the following additional facts: (1) when child abuse is detected, it is often found that all the children in the home have been victimized; and (2) stepchildren are almost always the eldest children in the home, whereas the general ... tendency in families of uniform parentage is for the youngest to be most frequent victims."^[3]

[Ronson]

I presume you're just making up that claim on the spot now?

A few years back when arguments over same sex marriage were topical, I read through some scientific research on child development, and it was pretty emphatic that the sex on the parent(s) had never been found to make any sort of difference in the development of children.

Hypatia_Alexandria

This is why I need to publish the book, to explain the bleeding obvious that conservatives already know.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

The fact is, over all, by far, the biological family is better for children. And why people like you would deny or minimize that is beyond me.

You and several others who post here really have issues with comprehension. I have not minimised anything. I have simply posed questions pertaining to the supposed ideal of a two biological parent family.

And as your own background indicates, had your two biological parents stayed together, would your childhood have been as positive? Your step-father [from what you have written] provided a better role model for you than your biological father would have done.

The Trumps are another example. Yes the children grew up with their two biological parents but the biological father was never around and the biological mother had, or later developed, psychological problems.

[seer]

You and several others who post here really have issues with comprehension. I have not minimised anything. I have simply posed questions pertaining to the supposed ideal of a two biological parent family.

And as your own background indicates, had your two biological parents stayed together, would your childhood have been as positive? Your step-father [from what you have written] provided a better role model for you than your biological father would have done.

The Trumps are another example. Yes the children grew up with their two biological parents but the biological father was never around and the biological mother had, or later developed, psychological problems.

Of course the biological family is the ideal, on all levels. Are there exceptions, yes, but that doesn't change the fact that children almost always fare better with biological parents. Why would you argue against that?

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

Of course the biological family is the ideal, on all levels. Are there exceptions, yes, but that doesn't change the fact that children almost always fare better with biological parents. Why would you argue against that?

That there are so many exceptions does challenge your contention. Evidently. the biological parents are not always the best individuals to raise children.

You are making a generalised remark premised on your own biases towards marriage and the family, which reality [including you own experience] does not necessarily bear out.

[seer]

That there are so many exceptions does challenge your contention. Evidently. the biological parents are not always the best individuals to raise children.

You are making a generalised remark premised on your own biases towards marriage and the family, which reality [including you own experience] does not necessarily bear out.

No I'm making generalizations based on decades of studies.

The Cinderella effect

The Cinderella effect is a phenomenon in which stepparents abuse and kill their spouse's biological children at higher rates than they do of their own children (Daly & Wilson, 2007; Sariola & Uutela, 1992; Weekes-Shackelford & Shackelford, 2004).¹ Empirical studies have captured evidence of the Cinderella effect across different places (Alexandre, Nadanovsky, Moraes, & Reichenheim, 2010; Sariola & Uutela, 1992) and over time (Daly & Wilson, 1985; Nobes, Panagiotaki, & Russell Jonsson, 2019; Weekes-Shackelford & Shackelford, 2004). Overall, this body of research has consistently found that children in stepfamilies have a significant increased risk of being physically abused or killed compared to children in families with only biological parents (Daly and Wilson, 1985, Daly and Wilson, 1994; Daly & Wilson, 2007; Harris, Hilton, Rice, & Eke, 2007; Nobes et al., 2019; Radhakrishna, Bou-Saada, Hunter, Catellier, & Kotch, 2001; Sariola & Uutela, 1992; Turner, Finkelhor, & Ormrod, 2007; Weekes-Shackelford & Shackelford, 2004). In fact, some researchers argue that the presence of a stepparent in the home is the most paramount risk factor for serious child abuse (Daly & Wilson, 2007).

Past research has consistently supported the existence of the Cinderella effect, particularly in cases where the child is killed (Daly and Wilson, 1985, Daly and Wilson, 1994; Daly & Wilson, 2007; Harris et al., 2007; Nobes et al., 2019; Radhakrishna et al., 2001; Sariola & Uutela, 1992; Turner et al., 2007; Weekes-Shackelford & Shackelford, 2004). While murders are, of course, the most extreme acts of child abuse, they make up only a small subset of all acts of child physical abuse. According to the FBI's Supplementary Homicide Report data, under 400 people under the age of 18 were murdered by a parent or stepparent in 2019 (Kaplan, 2019). This is about 0.06% of the estimated 650,000 children in the United States who were abused or neglected in 2019 according to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), which is itself an undercount of the true number of abused children (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2020). Because non-fatal child abuse is far more widespread, and is predictive of abuse that may be fatal (Johnson, 2000), it is important to understand whether the trend of non-biological parents being more abusive holds for these less serious offenses.

Cinderella effect

Powerful evidence in support of the Cinderella effect comes from the finding that when abusive parents have both step and genetic children, they generally spare their genetic children. In such families, stepchildren were exclusively targeted 9 out of 10 times in one study and in 19 of 22 in another.^[4] In addition to displaying higher rates of negative behaviors (e.g., abuse) toward stepchildren, stepparents display fewer positive behaviors toward stepchildren than do the genetic parents. For example, on average, stepparents invest less in education, play with stepchildren less, take stepchildren to the doctor less, etc.^[5] This discrimination against stepchildren is unusual compared with abuse statistics involving the overall population given "the following additional facts: (1) when child abuse is detected, it is often found that all the children in the home have been victimized; and (2) stepchildren are almost always the eldest children in the home, whereas the general ... tendency in families of uniform parentage is for the youngest to be most frequent victims."^[3]

And the evolutionary fact that adults seem to prefer their biological children over non biological children. Which of course just makes sense.

"research concerning animal social behaviour provide a rationale for expecting parents to be discriminative in their care and affection, and more specifically, to discriminate in favour of their own young".^[7] Inclusive fitness theory proposes a selective criterion for the evolution of social traits, where social behavior that is costly to an individual organism can nevertheless emerge when there is a statistical likelihood that significant benefits of that social behavior accrue to (the survival and reproduction of) other organisms whom also carry the social trait (most straightforwardly, accrue to close genetic relatives). Under such conditions, a net overall increase in reproduction of the social trait in future generations can result.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

No I'm making generalizations based on decades of studies.




And the evolutionary fact that adults seem to prefer their biological children over non biological children. Which of course just makes sense.

And as noted there are many exceptions to this situation. Would your biological father have made a better parent to you than your step-father?

[Ronson]

And as noted there are many exceptions to this situation. Would your biological father have made a better parent to you than your step-father?

Of course there are exceptions. That's what defines exceptions, that combined they do not make a rule.