IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/dem/demres/v32y2015i31.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Post-divorce family trajectories of men and women in Flanders

Author

Listed:
  • Sofie Vanassche

    (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven)

  • Martine Corijn

    (Studiedienst van de Vlaamse Regering)

  • Koen Matthijs

    (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven)

Abstract

Background: Most studies investigating family life after a separation or divorce focus on single or competing events or transitions. Despite the growing popularity of the life-course perspective, few studies have given an overview of the sequence and timing of various post-divorce partner and parenthood trajectories. Objective: In this study we apply the technique of sequence analysis to describe the complete post-divorce partner and parenthood trajectory of divorced men and women in the first seven years following residential separation from their spouses. Methods: We use data from Divorce in Flanders, based upon a representative sample of first marriages drawn from the National Register. Our research sample consists of 1,530 men and 1,762 women who had been divorced for at least seven years at the time of interview. Ward’s method is used as a clustering method. Results: A large proportion of divorced men and women remain single or outside a union, and make no partner or parenthood transition at all. However, we identified eight patterns of post-divorce partner trajectory and eight patterns of post-divorce parenthood trajectory. These trajectories differ from each other in the occurrence, the order, and the timing of specific partner and parenthood transitions. Conclusions: Our results do not suggest complete de-standardization of the post-divorce family trajectories of men and women, but do suggest a substantial heterogeneity in post-divorce family life. This heterogeneity is often ignored or hidden by focusing on single events or family transitions.

Suggested Citation

  • Sofie Vanassche & Martine Corijn & Koen Matthijs, 2015. "Post-divorce family trajectories of men and women in Flanders," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 32(31), pages 859-872.
    • Handle: RePEc:dem:demres:v:32:y:2015:i:31
    DOI: 10.4054/DemRes.2015.32.31
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol32/31/32-31.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.4054/DemRes.2015.32.31?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Julie Jefferies & Ann Berrington & Ian Diamond, 2000. "Childbearing Following Marital Dissolution in Britain," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 16(3), pages 193-210, September.
    2. Isabella Buber-Ennser & Alexia Prskawetz, 2000. "Fertility in second unions in Austria," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 3(2).
    3. Gabadinho, Alexis & Ritschard, Gilbert & Müller, Nicolas S & Studer, Matthias, 2011. "Analyzing and Visualizing State Sequences in R with TraMineR," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 40(i04).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Christine Schnor & Sofie Vanassche & Jan Van Bavel, 2017. "Stepfather or biological father? Education-specific pathways of postdivorce fatherhood," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 37(51), pages 1659-1694.
    2. Inge Pasteels & Dimitri Mortelmans, 2017. "The socioeconomic determinants of repartnering after divorce or separation in Belgium," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 36(58), pages 1785-1812.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nicoletta Balbo & Francesco C. Billari & Melinda Mills, 2013. "Fertility in Advanced Societies: A Review of Research," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 29(1), pages 1-38, February.
    2. Sofie Vanassche & Martine Corijn & Koen Matthijs & Gray Swicegood, 2015. "Repartnering and Childbearing After Divorce: Differences According to Parental Status and Custodial Arrangements," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 34(5), pages 761-784, October.
    3. Ursula Henz, 2002. "Childbirth in East and West German Stepfamilies," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 7(6), pages 307-342.
    4. Marcel Raab & Emanuela Struffolino, 2020. "The Heterogeneity of Partnership Trajectories to Childlessness in Germany," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(1), pages 53-70, March.
    5. Ekaterina Mitrofanova & Alyona Artamonova, 2016. "The perspectives of family policy in Russia amid increasing cohabitation," European Journal of Government and Economics, Europa Grande, vol. 5(1), pages 47-63, June.
    6. Baccar, Mariem & Raynal, Hélène & Sekhar, Muddu & Bergez, Jacques-Eric & Willaume, Magali & Casel, Pierre & Giriraj, P. & Murthy, Sanjeeva & Ruiz, Laurent, 2023. "Dynamics of crop category choices reveal strategies and tactics used by smallholder farmers in India to cope with unreliable water availability," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    7. Joanne S. Muller & Nicole Hiekel & Aart C. Liefbroer, 2020. "The Long-Term Costs of Family Trajectories: Women’s Later-Life Employment and Earnings Across Europe," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 57(3), pages 1007-1034, June.
    8. repec:jss:jstsof:40:i04 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Zachary Van Winkle & Anette Fasang, 2021. "The complexity of employment and family life courses across 20th century Europe: More evidence for larger cross-national differences but little change across 1916‒1966 birth cohorts," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 44(32), pages 775-810.
    10. Moehring, Katja & Weiland, Andreas & Reifenscheid, Maximiliane & Naumann, Elias & Wenz, Alexander & Rettig, Tobias & Krieger, Ulrich & Fikel, Marina & Cornesse, Carina & Blom, Annelies G., 2021. "Inequality in employment trajectories and their socio-economic consequences during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany," SocArXiv m95df, Center for Open Science.
    11. Babette Bühler & Katja Möhring & Andreas P. Weiland, 2022. "Assessing dissimilarity of employment history information from survey and administrative data using sequence analysis techniques," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 56(6), pages 4747-4774, December.
    12. Gainbi Park & Zengwang Xu, 2022. "The constituent components and local indicator variables of social vulnerability index," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 110(1), pages 95-120, January.
    13. Elena Pirani & Daniele Vignoli, 2021. "Childbearing Across Partnerships in Italy: Prevalence, Demographic Correlates, Social Gradient," Econometrics Working Papers Archive 2021_15, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Statistica, Informatica, Applicazioni "G. Parenti".
    14. Marc A. Scott & Kaushik Mohan & Jacques‐Antoine Gauthier, 2020. "Model‐based clustering and analysis of life history data," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 183(3), pages 1231-1251, June.
    15. Zwiers, Merle & Kleinhans, Reinout & van Ham, Maarten, 2015. "Divided Cities: Increasing Socio-Spatial Polarization within Large Cities in the Netherlands," IZA Discussion Papers 8882, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Devillanova, Carlo & Raitano, Michele & Struffolino, Emanuela, 2019. "Longitudinal employment trajectories and health in middle life: Insights from linked administrative and survey data," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 40, pages 1375-1412.
    17. Marcel Raab & Anette Fasang & Aleksi Karhula & Jani Erola, 2014. "Sibling Similarity in Family Formation," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 51(6), pages 2127-2154, December.
    18. Ana Fostik & Mariana Fernández Soto & Fernando Ruiz-Vallejo & Daniel Ciganda, 2023. "Union Instability and Fertility: An International Perspective," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 39(1), pages 1-47, December.
    19. Kleinepier, Tom & van Ham, Maarten, 2018. "The Temporal Dynamics of Neighborhood Disadvantage in Childhood and Subsequent Problem Behavior in Adolescence," IZA Discussion Papers 11397, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Michaël Boissonneault, 2021. "Period measures of life course complexity," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 44(47), pages 1133-1148.
    21. Daniel Ciganda, 2015. "Unstable work histories and fertility in France," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 32(28), pages 843-876.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    divorce; repartnering; childbearing; stepparenthood;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics
    • Z0 - Other Special Topics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:dem:demres:v:32:y:2015:i:31. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Editorial Office (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.demogr.mpg.de/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.