Initial Coparenting Patterns and Postdivorce Parent Education Programming: A Latent Class Analysis

ABSTRACT

Many judges now require divorcing or legally separating parents with children under age 18 to attend parent education programs (PEPs). Evaluations of these programs have shown their effectiveness, although these have often not been rigorous. Individuals display different patterns of coparenting following divorce, yet researchers have not empirically assessed participants’ coparenting patterns prior to participation in PEPs. Using data from participants in a PEP class (N = 1,540), we describe participants’ coparenting patterns prior to participating in PEP and consider pre–posttest differences in parenting and coparenting outcomes for each coparenting pattern. Results from this evaluation suggest a need for a more tailored approach to parent education programming and have broader implications for family life education.

KEYWORDS:

• Coparenting
• divorce education
• family life education
• parent education