January 6, 2020 – Joint physical custody for young children and parents’ views

Introduction: There has been quite a gap. This “ESP Thought of the Day” will be coming out periodically on a go forward basis.

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Joint physical custody for young children and parents’ views

Bergstrom et al used an exceptionally small sample of Swedish parents in an effort to evaluate parents’ views with respect to Joint Physical Custody (JPC). On the other hand, the authors wrote that, ” Despite its possible selection bias, the sample size of 48 parents is unusually large for a qualitative study.” The authors defined JPC as having between 25 to 50% of the residential time. Such a broad definition (ie. down to 25%) would in Colman’s view detract from the efficacy of any observations and findings. This interview study explores parents’ perceptions of how they experience and practise equally shared JPC for their one to four year olds in Sweden. The authors report that m ost parents were pleased with the arrangements with the notable exception of couples experiencing ongoing conflict.

What is particularly useful in this article is the authors’ reports of how cooperative parents managed their child care and communication responsibilities. There is much for parents to learn here from the Sweden example.

Source: Source: Bergström, M., Sarkadi, A., Hjern, A., & Fransson, E. (2019). “We also communicate through a book in the diaper bag”-Separated parents´ ways to coparent and promote adaptation of their 1-4 year olds in equal joint physical custody. PloS one, 14(4), e0214913. https://www.complexfamilylaw.com/wp-contentdoi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0214913

Link to Gene C. Colman’s Equal Shared Parenting Web Page
Link to past issues of the ESP Thought of the Day publication