PARADA NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL

SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL DEPARTMENT

EFFECTS OF A SINGLE PARENTHOOD IN THE BEHAVIORAL

DEVELOPMENT AND ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF A STUDENT –

PARADA NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL - SENIOR HIGH

A Research Project
Presented to the Faculty of the
Senior High School Department
Parada National High School

In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the course
Inquiries, Investigations, and Immersion (III)

Researchers:
JunrielBalasta
Charles Dean Candelaria
Winston Panio
Randolph Rosales
LianBlance
Kristine Joy Olivar

Myron Willie B. Roque

March 2019
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Title

Dedication

Acknowledgement

Table of Contents

List of Tables

List of Figures

List of Appendices

Abstract
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CHAPTER 1

THE PROBLEM AND LITERATURE REVIEW

Background of the Study:

Single parent households are more likely to experience with poverty. Being the

employee can cause reasonablespace between your income and that of your two-

income view. Poverty can be terrify and tough for children, causing them to feel bother

and angry at the difference between them and their classmates or friends. The first is

learning to budget successfully, and adopting an attitude of looking for the most cost-

effective way to do things. The second is to focus on what you can give your child.

Maybe you can’t buy them the latest gadget, but you can inspireda good relationship

with them, and find fun things you can enjoy together for free. It’s not easy, but with

the right attitude, you and your child can get through this.Being from a single parent

family can have an impact on your child’s improvement or enhancement.

These problems involve: harshness towards the absent partner, loneliness, poverty

and self-doubt about raising children alone without a help. The research done by

Amoakohene (2013) in Ghana on relationship between single parenting and academic

performance of adolescents in senior high school in Parada national high school, found

that there are some problems that are uncommon, which are only faced by single-

parents, which create struggling to raise children.

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Over the past 35 years, United States of America’s children being raised in two-

parent homes has dropped significantly from about 85% in 1968 to 70% in 2003 while

the proportion of children living in single-parent homes has nearly doubled (Center for

Marriage and Families, 2005). According to the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS)

(2012), population which is 12 years older constitute 16,886,306.Out of total,

7,237,730 (42.9%) of them are married; 315,910 (1.9%) are separated; 574,271 (3.4%)

are divorced while 823,562 (4.9%) of them are widowed.Generally such studies have

tied academic performance of children to socio-economic status, parents’ educational

level, student attitudes to learning, school environmental factors, housing and

residential experience (Win and Miller, n.d.; Donkor, 2010; Farooq, Chaudhry, Shafiq

andBerhanu, 2011;Mahama and Campion, 2011; Insah, Mumuni and Bowan, 2013).

What these studies failed to realize is that the variable family structure.

What causes single parenting?

Rather than being defined as the cause of problems in development, single

parenting can be identified as one risk factor that can lead to unsuccessful outcomes.

The effect or causes of being single parent its have a damage in student can affect the

behavioral development and academic performance, its have possible can destroy the

behavioral development of a child. Well as a sociologist from my studies and research

I have been able to understand that parenting usually involves two or more people in

raising up a child or a ward of theirs but due to some unfortunate circumstances which

could have been avoided or cause by human nature,those factors are more than what
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we can ever be able to put down in paper , but am gonna be listing the important ones

as requested :1 death. This is usually an unavoidable phenomenon which is natural to

us and no man or woman can stop it when it happens hence If it occurs between a

couple and one is taken,thus this would lead to single parenting. 2 migration. A partner

may be fortunate to relocate to another region or country as a result of a new job or

change in career thus leaving behind a partner and the possibility of returning soonest

is not predictable or certain in a short period of time and as a result brings about a

temporary single parenting period. 3 divorce. This is also one cause of it, partners or

married couples might decide to divorce after having one or two children together and

later on they might decide to remain single thus arising into a single parent.

Literature Review

Variations in family structure have been accompanied by a changing

socialstructure, such as a change in work force, norms, and values& Several key

changes inthe family that began to occur in many countries around the world, including

Philippinesfrom the latter half of the twentieth century on, have captured the attention

of those studying family patterns. One of these is changing union formations that

include a delayin entry into marriage, a decline in marriage, a rise in unmarried

cohabitation, anincrease in divorced and annulled families, and a rise in single:headed

households.Thisstudy has changed on single:headed household families,

specificallysinglemother/father families. Where is a complexity of problems

facing singlemothers/fathers that have beenstudied while a number of important

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variables that affect the success or failure of children, who grew up in these family

formation are also being explore. This chapter discusses literatures and research

findings that indicate a variationof quality of home environment and child outcomes

within single parent households.

In human context, the family is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity,

affinity or co-residence. In most societies, a normal family is considered to be the

“immediate group of father,mother and children living together ‟‟.This may be more

specifically defined as “nuclear family” (Berelsen and Steiner 1964). The idea of a

normal family has now been affected by the rapid growing of single-parent family in

mostsocieties.Single-parenthood can be defined as when one out of two people who is

responsible for thenurturing and child rearing is not available and the work meant for

two people is now carried out by only one person.According Longman Dictionary of

Contemporary English, single-parenting has been defined as amother or father who

looks after children on their own without the other partner.Single-parenting can be

defined as a situation in which one of the two individuals involved in theconception of

the child is responsible for the upbringing of the child. (Whitting and Child

(1993),Eshelman (1981) and Henslim (1985)).In the United States, almost half of all

children age 15 will have lived under a single-parent(Andersson (2002). The

percentage of single-parent families have tripled in the past fifty(50)years and has

continued to be larger among Latino and African American families whencompared to

the general population ( U.S Census,2010).In 2000, 27% of all U.S children living
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were in single-parent families; among African Americanfamilies 53% were living with

only one parent. (Sigle-Rushton and McLanahan, 2004). The vastmajority of these

single-parents homes are headed by women. Debell (2008) reported that single-father

homes represent 7% of total single-parent homes in the country.

Single-parent may arise when either the male or female decides to produce and

rear a child outside wedlock (Ortesse, 1998). The charter of the organization of

“Partners without parents”indicated that single-parenthood is the result of death,

divorce, separation or who is unmarried. In Ghana, the existence of single-parenthood

was unknown and where they existed, they were ignored as exceptional cases.

However nowadays, there are rapid growing family patterns both in side and outside

Ghana. In Ghana, among our ethnic groups, the parental roles are culturally determined

and distributed. The maternal roles are that of child-rearing, home training and playing

of complimentary roles whiles that of the father role is of economic responsibilities. In

her work “Marriage and Families”, Nijole V Benokraitis PhD in sociology defines

mother as the expressive roles players who provide the emotional support and

nurturing that sustain the family unit. According to Nwachukwu (1998), children from

single-parents are more hostile, hyperactive and aggressive in nature. Many of the

problems faced by single-parent are similar to that of two parents but these problems

seen more difficult to bear or manage when the home is tutored by only one person.

For example, all children feel hostile toward their parents as they grow up and try to

be independent but in a situation, where the anger and rebellion are directed toward
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one person, it may seem worse if there is only one person to bear it not for two to share.

There are some problems which are only faced by the single-parents which make it

difficult to raise children. These problems include bitterness towards the absent spouse,

loneliness, poverty, insecurity about raising children without a help. The child is

morally upright, mentally upright and emotional balance when the caring

responsibilities are carried out by both parents. Sociology of Education makes us aware

that the first primary social group that the child belongs to, come in contact with and

this group has a greater influence on the child’s physical mental and moral mental and

moral development. The family lays the foundation of education before a child goes to

school and personality that the child tales to school is determined by the family

(Maduewesi and Emenogu, 1997). Fadeiye(1985) pointed out that both parents have

their own roles to play in child’s education. The father is to provide every necessary

tool for the educational advancement while the mother is expected to supplement the

efforts of the father. Many studies have documented the challenges faced by single

parents and the disadvantages of their children relative to children raised from two

parent households. Although, some studies have been inconclusive, majority of studies

reviewed that children from single-parent homes score lower on tests of cognitive

functioning and standardized tests receive lower GPAS and complete fewer years of

school when compared to children from two parent -homes. (Bain, Boersma and

Chapman 1983, Balcom 1998, Biller 1970, Chapman 1977, Daniels1986, Downey,

Ainsworth-Darnell and Durfur 1984, Mandara and Murry 2006).Even when

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controlling for economic and racial differences of the family, children from two-

parents households outperform children from one-parent households across a variety

of measures. (Downey 1994, Kim 2004, Krein and Beller 1998, Mulkey, Crain and

Harrington1992 and Teachman 1987).McLanahan and Sandefur summarize the

research by writing: Children who grow up in a household with, only one biological

parent are worse off on average than children who grow up in households with both of

their biological parents, regardless of the parents‟ race or educational background,

regardless of whether the parents are married when the child was born and regardless

of whether the resident parent remarries. It is widely believed that children from broken

homes have high incidence of academic, emotional and behavioral problems than

children from two-parent family. An analysis of data by NAEP (National Association

of Educational Procurement) 1986, indicated that third graders living with one-parent

score considerably lower than third graders living with both parents.

FOREIGN:

•Academic Achievement Most single-parent households are run by mothers,

and the absence of a father -- coupled with lower household income -- can increase the

risk of children performing poorly in school. The lack of financial support from a father

often results in single mothers working more, which can in turn affect children because

they receive less attention and guidance with their homework. Researcher Virginia

Knox concluded from data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, that for

every $100 of child support mothers receive, their children's standardized test scores
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increase by 1/8 to 7/10 of a point. In addition, Knox found that children with single

mothers who have contact and emotional support from their fathers tend to do better

in school than children who have no contact with their fathers.

• Emotional Effects Having only one income earner in the home puts single

parent households at risk for poverty, finds research compiled by the University of

Washington's West Coast Poverty Center. Living in poverty is stressful and can have

many emotional effects on children, including low self-esteem, increased anger and

frustration and an increased risk for violent behavior. Besides financial constraints,

other emotional effects of growing up in a single parent household may include

feelings of abandonment, sadness, loneliness and difficulty socializing and connecting

with others. Effects vary from child to child, however, and the individual parenting

style of the single parent is also a big influence on the child’s development.

•Positive Effects Single parenting can have positive effects on children as

well, depending on other factors such as personality types and parenting techniques.

According to a study at Cornell University, positive single parenting did not show any

negative impact on the social and educational development of the 12- and 13-year-olds

participating in the study. In addition, children in single-parent families may exhibit

strong responsibility skills, as they are often called upon to help out more with family

chores and tasks. Children in single-parent families often form close bonds with their

parent, as they are closely dependent on each other throughout the child’s life. Children
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from single-parent families may also form closer bonds with extended family members

or family friends, as these people often help raise them.

• Due to the many issues that stem from single- parent families, some

students are unable to reach their full potential. Again, an analysis of data by the

National Association of Education Procurement (1986), indicated that third graders

living with one parent score considerably lower than third grades living with both

parents. It is widely believed that children from broken homes have high incidence of

academic, emotional and behavioral problems than children from two parent family.

Ideally, children are supposed to live with both parent in order for them to be assisted

with both academic and social activities that will help them to achieve full potentials

and become more than happy children in the society. However, there are situations

where children live or stay with only one parent. When it happens like this, children

do not get the necessary parental guidance. These children sometimes become

wayward by dropping out of school. Again, Fischer (2007) indicated that children who

grow up in household with only one biological parent are worse of average than

children who grow up in household with both of their biological parents. On the other

hand, some studies identified many positive effects of single parenting on the children,

parents and even on the society such as the ability and ease with which to take all

financial decisions, being close to children, undivided love thus maintaining closer

ties, easier to make rules, and enforce such rules for children to follow. Children in

single-parent family are believed to contribute and participate more in family activities
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and therefore children grow up with a sense of respect, responsible citizens, as well as

allowing parents spend quality time.

LOCAL:

•The Effects of a Single Parent Home on a Child's Behavior MARNIE

KUNZ 383 shares. According to 2012 U.S. Census Bureau information, the number of

children reared in single-parent households continues to rise. Children with two parents

in the home -- earning two incomes -- tend to have better financial and educational

advantages. The effects of a single-parent home on a child’s behavior can be far-

reaching and impact several areas of life, including academic achievement and social

behaviors.

• Amato (2003) suggested that single parent is problematic for children

socialization because many with one parent receive less economic and emotional

support, less practical assistance less information, guidance and supervision, less role

modeling than children in two parent families those. Among children in single parent

families those from mothers absent household earn lower grades than children from

fathers absent homes and matter which are absent children from single parent families

generally find it difficult to connect with school activities both academically and

morally (Murkey et al 2004). The family is the first socializing agent; the child come

in contact with it has a great influence on the child’s physical mental and moral

development. The father is to provide the necessary tools for educational while the
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mother is supposed to supplement the father’s effort in this regard when the father is

absent and the mother is not privilege enough to cater for all the basic needs as well as

supervised the child educationally and morally will be backward. The teacher at school

commonly describe children from as more hostile, aggressive, anxious, fearful,

hyperactive and distractible than children from two parent families.

•Several good reasons exist for assuming that the number of parents in a

household affects children’s academic achievement (for reviews, see Amato, 2010;

Brown 2010; McLanahan and Percheski 2008). First, children in single-parent

households have a lower standard of living than do children in two-parent households.

Family income, in turn, is a good predictor of children’s school grades and test scores.

Second, parents are important sources of social capital and provide many resources to

children, including emotional support, encouragement, everyday assistance, and help

with homework. Parents’ provision of social capital, in turn, is positively associated

with children’s school success. Children who live with single parents, however, have

less access to these social resources, in general, than do children with two parents in

the household. Finally, most children with single parents have experienced the

disruption of their parents’ unions, and many of these children endure additional

parental transitions before reaching adulthood. The cumulative amount of household

instability or “turbulence” in children’s lives is associated with a variety of problematic

outcomes, including school performance and educational attainment.

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• Lisa Calderwood, from London University’s Institute of Education, says,

“Living apart from natural fathers can be associated with poverty and negative

outcomes for children”.(Calderwood, 2010). Though not all single-parents are

mothers, but Tim Casey, a senior staff attorney at Legal Momentum, (the U. S. ’ oldest

organization advocating on behalf of the legal rights of women and girls. )

“Employment isn’t keeping U. S. ingle parents — more than 80 percent of whom are

single mothers — out of poverty”. (Casey, 2012). Here it states that not only are the

majority of single-parent or single mothers, but that the income provided to these

mothers is generally still not enough to keep them above the poverty line even though,

“single mothers in the U. S. are employed more hours and yet have much higher

poverty rates than their peers in other high-income countries”.(Casey, 2012).

•Paul Amato, a Professor of Sociology and Demography at The

Pennsylvania State University, makes a good point saying due to lack of funds, “It is

difficult for poor single parents to afford the books, home computers, and private

lessons that make it easier for their children to succeed in school”. (Amato, 2005). This

is a direct linkage with the academic success of children from single-parent families,

which will be discussed later in the essay. Amato makes several good points, also

saying, “they cannot afford clothes, shoes, cell phones, and other consumer goods that

give their children status among their peers. (2005) Again this is in direct correlation

with self-esteem issues that are more common in children raised by single parents.

“Consistent with these observations, many studies have shown that economic
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resources explain some of the differences in well-being between children with single

parents and those with continuously married parents”. (Amato, 2005). Amato makes

the observation that many differences between children raised in single-parent

households versus children raised with both parents can be explained by the financial

difference brought on by a single income.

Theoretical or Conceptual Framework

I. Theoretical Framework:

Lev Vygotsky’s Theory of Cognitive Development (1978)

Vygotsky's cognitive development theory (1978) stresses that parents play a central

role in the process of making meaning. Vygotsky further states cognitive development

stems from social interactions from guided learning within the zone of proximal

development as children and their partners co-construct knowledge. For Vygotsky, the

environment in which children grow up will affect how they think and what they think

about (Roth & Lee, 2007). He also believed that there were certain higher functions

developed through the direct interaction with significant people in a child’s life. The

absence of the missing parent to guide, discipline, direct, model, and teach may be one

of the causes that a child from a single parent family may not perform at their full

potential (Rothstein, 2004). To Vygotsky, the development of the mind is the

interweaving of biological development of the human body and the appropriation of

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the cultural or ideal or material heritage which exists in the present to coordinate people

with each other and the physical world (Bronfenbrenner, 2002).

Also, Vygotsky's concept of cognitive development suggests that the social world

defines the way children think. Vygotsky's (1978) believed that children learn more

when their learning is best supported at opportune times when the caregiver aides them

in learning new tasks.

“When children raised in single-parent households are left alone for long periods or

left in the hands of uninvolved caregivers, their academic skills are not being fully

supported” (Knox & Virginia, 1996).

Therefore, the researcher has employed Vygotsky's cognitive development theory

because it places parents as partners in their child’s life is crucial as he believed that

everything a child learns is through the interactions with knowledgeable partners, thus

children who experience cooperative and assistive, rather than punitive styles of

parenting, will quickly increase cognitive skills and be motivated to learn. This applies

to practical skills like writing or building things from blocks, as well as the learning of

ethical and problem-solving behavior (Brooks, 2011).

II. Conceptual Framework:

INPUT PROCESS OUTPUT

CAN AFFECT OF How does single

BEING SINGLE parenting affect parents
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Research Problem and Hypotheses:

 .Children from single-parent homes have poor academic performance.

 There is no significant difference between the truancy behavior of

students from single- parent homes and those from two-parent homes.

Definition of Terms:

Academic Performance- Achievement or (academic) is the extent to which a student,

teacher or institution has achieved their short or long-term educational goals.

Circumstances- A particular situation are the conditions which affect what happens.

Development- Is a process that creates growth, progress, positive change or the

addition of physical, economic, environmental, social and demographic components.

Single Parent- Is a person who lives with a child or children and who does not have a

wife, husband or live-in partner.

Chapter 2

METHODS
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Research Design:

This study use a survey method of research that was focus at collecting data for

the purpose of interest and knowing the effects of single-parenthood on the

academic performance and behavioral development of secondary and junior school

student.

Sampling and Participants:

A questionnaire was designed by the researchers to measure the effects of

single-parenthood on the academic performance and truancy behavior of Secondary

School Students. The questionnaire was basically designed to seek information from

the students that play absence, from intact homes and from single-parenthood family

The questionnaire is a one section questionnaire. The questionnaire seeks information

on age, name of respondents, name of school of respondents, gender, name of subject,

class and the family structure. The reason for adding name of subject is to able to marry

the names of the subjects and the academic performance after collection and prevalent

absence behavior. How to have the academic performance and the rate of absence of

the students. The researcher used sampling to select the schools and to select the

students from different family types for the study.

Instruments:
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Total enumeration sampling was used. Self-reporting questionnaire was used

to gather data on the factors effect of single parenthood in behavioral development of

academic purposes of junior and senior high school students along personal conditions,

study habits, home-related aspects, school-related aspects, and teacher-related aspects.

“Factors affecting the academic performance of the intermediate senior high school in

Parada National High School”.

Data Gathering Procedure:

Through survey to get the data gathered. The researchers will be using the

questionnaire that they made, and the researchers find all single parenthood in Parada

National High School Senior High. Then after get the data gathered the researchers we

need to check whether the data we had collected is legitimate so that it can be approve

by professional.

Data Analysis:

Content analysis was used to analyze the data which was gathered from

personal interviews. A main advantage of content analysis is that it helps in data

collected being reduced and simplified. Researchers analyze the data was gathered

through survey.

Ethical Considerations:

The current study was subject to certain ethical issues. As it was mentioned
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earlier, all participants report their written acceptance about their participation in the

research, through a signed Agreement and Information Letter. At the same time,

sample members were asked to sign a Interview and Removal Letter. The aim of both

letters was to reassure participants that their participation in the research is voluntary

and that they were free to leave from it at any point and for any reason.
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Chapter 3

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Results

Discussion
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Chapter 4

SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Summary of the Study

Summary of Results

Limitations of the Study

Conclusions

Recommendations
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References

Appendices

Curriculum Vitae