Teens With Same-Sex Parents Well-Adjusted

[yardwork]

Teens With Same-Sex Parents Well-Adjusted

Mon Nov 15, 5:02 PM ET

By Karen Pallarito
HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Nov. 15 (HealthDayNews) -- Adolescents who have two moms as parents are no different from teens growing up with a mother and a father, a new study finds.

On measures of psychosocial well-being, school functioning, and romantic relationships and behaviors, the teens with same-sex parents were as well adjusted as their peers with opposite-sex parents. The authors found very few differences between the two groups. A more important predictor of teens' psychological and social adjustment, they found, is the quality of the relationships they have with their parents.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=97&ncid=97&e=7&u=/hsn/20041115/hl_hsn/teenswithsamesexparentswelladjusted

[Technowitch]

1. Response by the Radical Fundamentalist Conservatives:

"Nuh-uh! No way! Not true not true not true! You can't SAY stuff like that, because it's evil and icky and makes me feel all tingly... I mean, it's BAAAAD!!! Lalalalalalala! I can't hear you!"

;)

[Roland99]

2. Keep an eye out for the Freeping of that article

[purduejake]

5. Yea...

They will find some kids with bad gay parents and then act as if "traditional" families don't have any issues. The freepers will get to it, but congrats to all the families with gay parents. I hope to see more of them for the good of children and gays!

[antistoic]

3. Stats

I would love to see the stats on this one. I think the difference between blue/red states and rural/urban would be interesting.

[Midnight Rambler]

4. more probable response

"Just a bunch of anti-family propaganda from the liberal media to advance the gay agenda and destroy our sacred institutions. Praise JEE-zus-AH!"

[Autobot77]

8. Either that or....

"Or lies from from pro-gay agenda researchers"
"People trying to further the radical gay agenda"
"The work of Satan"
"The researchers are (pedophiles/drunk/high/falsified data/ etc) so the study must be wrong!"

...take your pick

[daleo]

6. The sample size is fairly small, so it isn't definitive

"The study sample included 44 children, 12 to 18 years old, parented by same-sex couples and an equivalent number of peers with opposite-sex parents. The two groups had an equal number of girls and boys and other similarities, including ethnic background, family income, and parents' level of education."

But, assuming the sample was well drawn it seems like valid research.

"Overall, researchers found no significant differences between the two groups. Teens with two moms, for example, were neither more nor less likely than their peers with two opposite-sex parents to report having been involved in a romantic relationship during the past year or ever having sex. Both groups were generally well-adjusted, with relatively high levels of self-esteem, relatively low levels of anxiety, and good achievement in school."

[Maat]

7. The results of the study are certainly consistent with my ...

experience as a social worker ('93 to 2000). All the kids I visited with were certainly at least as well-adjusted. But I do live in Southern California and worked in an area not heavily influenced by the Relgious Right.

We were not allowed to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation when placing children. And I never encountered a bigot in the profession. No one wanted to discriminate. We were only too happy to support our LGBT friends. I guess I'm proud of SoCal in that respect.

I was saddened when Rosie O'Donnell spoke of being able to care for and adopt children in New York, but not in Florida (Randi Rhodes spoke of the same thing).

[daleo]

16. I don't doubt the research, just commenting on methodology

I think there are many family arrangements that work well for kids - ultimately kindness and consideration trump everything in my book. Frankly, plenty of church going traditional marriage parents have trouble in that respect (not to over-generalize, plenty of them are really good too).

[prayin4rain]

14. I had a Children in a Changing World Class and we learned the same

thing. My teacher was from the Netherlands, and the article says "this is the first study to look at a national sample" blah, blah, blah..........Anyway, I had this class a couple of years ago and she brought in lots of studies showing children raised in same sex households are very well adjusted. Better than children raised in single parent houses, and comparable to heterosexual households.

[Brundle_Fly]

9. duh

[Lexingtonian]

10. It's actually quite nice

To read the context out from between the lines, this is the first post-gay marriage legalization study of the children of gay couples and it seems to me largely to have taken the children of Boston area couples as subjects. (Tufts University is on the town border to Somerville and close to Cambridge, Massachusetts, which are two towns with large gay populations and very accessible public and private schools.)

The secular/technical argument about legalizing gay marriage has a lot of pieces, but all of them (formally, anyway) do not compel a conclusion one way or the other until you get to child-parent rights. That's where (unmarried) gay couples are unambiguously treated as second rate parents or non-parents by government agencies and laws. The court proceedings in the Massachusetts lawsuit (Goodridge v DPH) were mostly testimony about the childraising qualities of gay parents- equal or (supposedly) net detrimental compared to the straight kind, and argument whether the distinctions and error-range statistical differences presented were of substantial enough to justify differential treatment.

The lawsuits preliminarily legalizing gay marriage in Washington State- now under review- took just about the same route, and the state judges used the majority opinion issued in the Massachusetts verdict close to verbatim.

This study is a straightforward confirmation of the facts and argument crucial to the legalization of gay marriage. The authors seem to know exactly this, and they seem to have made the effort to get all the pieces right and solid, even if it's only for a relatively small sample size. The attempt to invalidate it will focus on the sample size, but will hardly dent the major utility of the study. (1), it shows that 44 very normal children are easily found among the regional cohort of children of gay couples, (2) there can be a longitudinal study of them now (for 10-20 years) to see how they adjust and identify as adults, (3) the differences between those with married and those with unmarried parents can be looked at. In any case, it's hard to see this group of 44 as grossly nonrepresentative of the cohort. If so, there will probably be far more severe problems with the study than sample size alone.

Of course, this does nothing to change the efforts or claims of the 'religious' opposition, but that's not the point. This study is principally for the New York and California and Rhode Island state courts.

[xchrom]

11. lol

oh this is going to cause some heat.
rational will find this as no news.
the christian right will begin a heated debunking effort -- and will trot out as many badly adjusted teens as they can find.
i guess trotting badly adjusted teens from straight families won't count.

on a side note -- isn't well adjusted and teen mutually exclusive?

[yellowcanine]

12. I would think they would be better adjusted than teens with fundy

gay-bashing parents.

[Fleshdancer]

13. I can tell you who has the hardest time adjusting....

Kids who live in abusive homes. Physical, verbal, emotional, substance abuse, etc...that's what f*cks kids up.

I bet there are countless number of teenagers who would give anything for gay parents who treat them with respect over whatever situation they're currently in. And as far as the bible abusers are concerned, I'll bet every single one of them that the child victims of molestation at the hands of Catholic priests had a much harder time with adjustment than children of gay parents. :grr:

[Barkley]

15. Most gay teens have opposite sex parents...

[Nestea]

17. go figure

the kids are alrightttt. :)