Nov. 29, 2018-Social science evidence demonstrates that failure to have a rebuttable presumption of Equal Shared Parenting risks harm to children’s emotional security and hence to public health

As Joan Kelly (2007) has pointed out, the current child custody statutes were written in the absence of evidence of how well they promoted children’s well-being. The evidence that is now available is compelling that failure to enact presumptions of equal parenting time risks unnecessary harm to children’s emotional security with their parents, and consequently unnecessary harm to public health in the form of long-term stress-related mental and physical health problems among children of divorce.

William V. Fabricius (2019), “Equal Parenting Time: The Case for a Legal Presumption”, Invited paper to appear in October 2019 in the Oxford Handbook of Children and the Law, edited by J.G. Dwyer, pre-publication online early 2019, Manuscript, p. 30