Influence of Marital Instability on Parenting

Marital instability leads to poor parenting and hurts child development consequently predisposing children to antisocial behaviours. The target population was parents with teenagers between thirteen to eighteen years. A survey quantitative research design was used together with purposeful random sampling. A self-reporting questionnaire was distributed to parents. Statistical Package for Social Sciences was used for data analysis. Data was analysed using both descriptive and Pearson’s correlations. The study found that marital instability and social cultural background have negative relationship with parenting. The study concludes that families free of marital conflicts bring up children who are well adjusted in life. The study concludes that good parenting is as a result of decrease or absence of some social cultural practices. Further, the study concludes that marital instability can lead to existence of negative relationship among children and with their parents. The study concludes that good parenting can greatly contribute to the overall child development. The study recommends that despite the conflicts that may exist, parents need to establish boundaries to ensure that their conflicts do not spill over to children. Though socio-cultural practices may contribute either negatively or positively to parenting, parents need to ensure that social-cultural differences do not affect child’ overall development. The study observed that even with presence of marital instability, parents need to make sure that they promote good child relationship at all time by having regular open conversations with children. This can promote revelation of hidden feelings, desires, and needs thereby resulting to good parenting.