Children are susceptible to stress when parents decide to divorce. It is self-evident that the situation leading up to the decision may also be stressful. The child can be subject to many internal tensions : which parent is right and which is wrong or wronged? is one example. Whatever the age of the child at the time of the separation, there will be a number of emotional experiences with which the child will have to try to cope. The child will feel saddened by the parting and loss of one parent, in a similar way to bereavement. There will no longer be as easy an access to one parent, or even other loved members of the family, as there once was. A child may undergo stress through an inner anger which results from feelings about an event being outside their control. This will be especially difficult where a child has always been used to being the focus of attention and getting their own way. The child may have feelings of anxiety over the situation. It may worry about the consequences of the divorce and in some way feel some responsibility for what has happened and for what the child perceives will happen. The child can feel confused as to the reasons for the divorce and may suffer from stress associated with divided loyalties between the parents. For children in middle-childhood, there can be adverse effects on school performance when parents divorce, as a result of feelings for parents being uppermost in their minds. For some, it may have little or no effect on attitudes and work in school, as they are able to treat school and home as mutually exclusive entities. They may feel a desire to prove to themselves and others that they can succeed and feel comfortable and reassured in an atmosphere where there is now a distinct routine and order. For them , school has become their focus of stability. Child behaviour in the breakdown of a marriage cannot be predictable; there may be a rejection of the parent-carer, or there may be an over-protectiveness. This may cause the parent who has remained with the child(ren) to become stressed, which in turn can increase the stress on the child. Where there is more than one child in the family, the eldest child may assume the role of the parent who has left, a factor which can increase the pressures, and eventual stress, on itself, both physically and emotionally. A study of the impact of divorce on children, conducted in the United States of America, attempted to explore the feelings of 131 children and assess the effect of divorce on them after five years. They found that the initial phase was very stressful, with the effects reduced by the end of the first year, with boys being more affected than girls. This particularly affected boys between six and eight years of age when the father left home. This would appear to be consistent with role identification theory, in that there would no longer be a role model for boys at this crucial phase in their development. After the first year had elapsed, it seemed that the boys and girls entered a plateau, or transitional phase, in which there was a degree of acceptance that the parents had divorced. This phase was observed for two to three years. Following this, some, but by no means all, the families, had succeeded in making a happy home.

Adolescents may undergo stress during and after a parental divorce as they have now developed a moral code of their own. They may have to face up to questions such as : 'Who is right and who is wrong?' 'Which parent ought I, or do I, want to live with?' They may also have definite views on their parents morals and cannot come to terms with a succession of 'boyfriends' or 'girlfriends', or even one, who may become their step-parent. Step-parents can pose problems at any age, because, however willing the step-parent, may be to become a member of the family, he, or she, can never be the biological parent. It has been noted that there are no cases of little girls wanting to be step-mothers when they grow up, unless possibly, they have been brought up by one.

There will be undoubted problems for the child in a situation where there is a step-parent and then new step-siblings come along. This will be very evident in family where children from the new marriage appear to be given preferential treatment, or the child perceives that they are given better toys. Parents and step-parents need to exercise extreme caution in their dealings with the children in the new family, if stress is not to be raised to an unacceptable level.

Problems over child access can cause the child stress. Most children, from a divorce are in the custody of their mother. Some mothers will want father to have no further contact with children, perhaps because there has been a history of violence towards her and the children prior to the divorce, or for reasons, that she may simply want to begin again on her own. Where a father no longer has his own home, problems over contact can upset children. There can be problems over where to go and what to do during the contact time. There can be problems over being seen as too generous, by the other parent, if many trips take place, or many gifts are given at the contact time. There can be problems for the child over parental attitudes towards each other. It is not unknown for either parent to interrogate the child about the behaviour of the other, or to be very critical of whatever the other is doing. This can upset the child in that it has decisions to make over how to behave and what to say so as not to appear disloyal to either parent. It has been suggested that during contact visits, activities ought to be age-appropriate and reflect the children's current interests. This researcher also hold the view that children should not be placed in a situation where they have to have their loyalties strained or continually hear parental criticism. He goes on to say that where a child does behave badly, that parents need to understand this is a stress response to the situation and that the child's changing attitudes are related to developing maturity.

It seems to be the perceived wisdom, certainly from the adult perspective, that where a marital relationship has broken down, that to reduce stress all round, the solution is that the parents divorce. The corollary from this is that it is best for the child to be brought up by one parent in a non-stressful home, as opposed to being brought up by two parents who are continually arguing. American and British research indicate that children preferred a non-divorcing family and were prepared to accept a situation where the marriage was unhappy, as their perception was they were no worse off than families around them. It is likely that children who are brought up in such an environment, where aggressive behaviour, overt violence and possibly excessive drinking and substance abuse are the norm, will themselves display conduct disorders. In these situations, the conventional wisdom of divorce for the sake of all may be an appropriate choice to make. It has been shown that boys in a family who miss their father can become defiant and difficult, following the divorce, but show an improvement after about two years.