The Dark Side Of Divorce

A model intellectual self-correction. Scott had been persuaded by The Nurture Assumption that divorce's bad effects on kids are genetic (the dead-father-in-a-car-accident vs divorce comparison). He double-checks and finds it isn't true. Amato & Keith's meta-analysis (92 studies, effect size 0.14) supports the FAMILY-CONFLICT hypothesis over too-few-parents or too-little-money: remarriage doesn't help much, income controls don't eliminate the effect, effects fade over time (consistent with conflict-stress dissipating), and controlling for family conflict removes most of it. Four studies specifically test the genetic explanation (Brodzinsky; O'Connor/Plomin; Burt's divorced-before-vs-after-birth design; Turkheimer's children-of-identical-twins study) — all support significant NON-genetic, environmental effects. So Scott publicly apologizes to mainstream psychology (which had, after ~2000, actually figured this out) and concludes shared environment isn't harmless (the sanity check: divorce at 16 -> failed classes -> worse college -> real downstream effects). He stays skeptical of the Nurture Assumption's birth-order dismissal too.

Quality 73 · Strong. Strong, high (73). A careful, intellectually-honest self-correction with strong evidence engagement (the meta-analysis plus four genetic-test designs) and a genuine substantive update (shared environment matters more than he'd thought) — a model of changing one's mind on evidence. Upper-Strong.

Claude’s paradigm shift 50 · Moderate. Moderate (50). An evidence-review and self-correction; the value is the careful synthesis and the honest update, not a new idea.

Real-world impact 2 · Minor. Minor (2). A within-subculture behavioral-genetics/parenting essay; no material effect.