Aikani kuluksi hain muutaman tutkimuksen lisää jos kiinnostaa..
http://mentalhealth.about.com/od/gaylesbian/a/samesex1104.htm
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/12/health/webmd/main938234.shtml :
Researchers looked at information gleaned from 15 studies on more than 500 children, evaluating possible stigma, teasing and social isolation, adjustment and self-esteem, opposite gender role models, sexual orientation, and strengths.
Studies from 1981 to 1994, including 260 children reared by either heterosexual mothers or same-sex mothers after divorce, found
no differences in intelligence, type or prevalence of psychiatric disorders, self-esteem, well-being, peer relationships, couple relationships, or parental stress.
"Some studies showed that
single heterosexual parents' children have more difficulties than children who have parents of the same sex," Perrin says. "They did better in discipline, self-esteem, and had less psychosocial difficulties at home and at school."
http://www.sciencenetlinks.com/sci_update.cfm?DocID=245
http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/pediatrics;109/2/341 :
Increasing social acceptance of diversity in sexual orientation has allowed more gay men and lesbians to come out before forming intimate relationships or becoming parents. Lesbian and gay adults choose to become parents for
many of the same reasons heterosexual adults do. The desire for children is
a basic human instinct and satisfies many people’s wish to leave a mark on history or perpetuate their family’s story. In addition, children may satisfy
people’s desire to provide and accept love and nurturing from others and may provide some assurance of care and support during their older years.
Many of the same concerns that exist for heterosexual couples when they consider having children also face lesbians and gay men. All parents have concerns about time, finances, and the responsibilities of parenthood. They worry about how children will affect their relationship as a couple, their own and their children’s health, and their ability to manage their new parenting role in addition to their other adult roles. Lesbians and gay men undertaking parenthood face additional challenges, including deciding whether to conceive or adopt a child, obtaining donor sperm or arranging for a surrogate mother (if conceiving), finding an accepting adoption agency (if adopting), making legally binding arrangements regarding parental relationships, creating a substantive role for the nonbiologic or nonadoptive parent, and confronting emotional pain and restrictions imposed by heterosexism and discriminatory regulations.
Despite these challenges, lesbians and gay men increasingly are becoming parents on their own or in the context of an established same-sex relationship. Most lesbians who conceive a child do so using alternative insemination techniques with a donor’s sperm. The woman or women may choose to become pregnant using sperm from a completely anonymous donor, from a donor who has agreed to be identifiable when the child becomes an adult, or from a fully known donor (eg, a friend or a relative of the nonconceiving partner). Lesbians also can become parents by fostering or adopting children, as can gay men. These opportunities are increasingly available in most states and in many other countries, although they are still limited by legal statutes in some places.
Children’s Emotional and Social Development
Because most children whose parents are gay or lesbian have experienced the divorce of their biologic parents, their subsequent psychologic development has to be understood in that context. Whether they are subsequently raised by 1 or 2 separated parents and whether a stepparent has joined either of the biologic parents are important factors for children but are rarely addressed in research assessing outcomes for children who have a lesbian or gay parent.
The considerable research literature that has accumulated addressing this issue has generally revealed that children of divorced lesbian mothers grow up in ways that are very similar to children of divorced heterosexual mothers.
Several studies comparing children who have a lesbian mother with children who have a heterosexual mother have failed to document any differences between such groups on personality measures, measures of peer group relationships, self-esteem, behavioral difficulties, academic success, or warmth and quality of family relationships.9,11,15,16,20,21 Children’s self-esteem has been shown to be higher among adolescents whose mothers (of any sexual orientation) were in a new partnered relationship after divorce, compared with those whose mothers remained single, and among those who found out at a younger age that their parent was homosexual, compared with those who found out when they were older.22
http://sexualhealth.e-healthsource.com/?p=news1&id=522343 :
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.
"This is the first study that has looked at adolescents with same-sex parents in a national sample, and it shows clearly across a wide range of variables that they're doing pretty well," said study author Charlotte J. Patterson, a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
The research, published in the November issue of Child Development, draws data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, a school-based study of the health-related behaviors of kids in grades 7-12.
Dr. Ellen C. Perrin, a professor of pediatrics at Tufts School of Medicine and an expert on the development of children with gay or lesbian parents, said that few studies have focused on adolescents of same-sex parents. What data there is has been subject to attack. Critics complain that the studies reflect researcher bias and non-random participant selection.
"In this case, neither of those critiques are valid," Perrin said.
The new study uses data from a broad population-based survey conducted for entirely different reasons. "That makes it very clean, so to speak; no one could argue that there was any bias involved."
Estimates of the number of teens living with same-sex parents are hard to come by. As of 1990, 6 million to 14 million children were living with a gay or lesbian parent, says the National Adoption Information Clearinghouse, a service of the U.S. Administration for Children and Families.
Perrin believes that a majority of these children were born into heterosexual families. "Only recently have there been increasing numbers of kids born or adopted into already stable same-sex couples," she explained.
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.
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.
The study reveals a minor difference:
"The kids of same-sex parents said that they feel more connected at school," Patterson said. In other words, they felt their teachers were more open to them, and that people at school were fair and cared for them. "I think that may be a chance finding, frankly," she said.
While family type wasn't a factor in how teens fared, family relationships were. When parents reported more positive relationships with their teenagers, for instance, the teens reported lower levels of depressive symptoms.
"The qualities of teenagers' relationships with their parents are much better predictors of their overall well-being," Patterson noted.
