Researchers from the American Sociological Association recently found that when parents are in the middle of a divorce, their children can fall behind others in interpersonal social skills and mathematics. The study also indicates that these youths typically do not catch up to their peers after this setback.

After studying these results, researchers believe that there are many possible reasons why children who have divorced parents would suffer developmentally. They speculate that it could be the stress of seeing their parents get divorced, an unstable environment or being forced to move with one parent after the divorce.

The study used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Class 1998 to 1999. Using this national information, researchers were able to track the progress of over 3,500 children between kindergarten and the fifth grade. They could also compare the academic histories of those children who have divorced parents and those who do not.

Parents who are concerned about how their children's intelligence compares to that of their peers may want to consider having them take an IQ test.