Australian Medical Association - No difference outcomes for kids of gays false.
“Not a single study has found children of lesbian or gay parents to be disadvantaged in any significant respect relative to children of heterosexual parents.”
However, Loren Marks’ 2012 paper in the journal Social Science Research systematically examines whether the APA’s conclusions are valid and precise, based on the cited scientific evidence.
Are we witnessing the emergence of a new family form that provides a context for children that is equivalent to the traditional marriage-based family? Even after an extensive reading of the same-sex parenting literature, the author cannot offer a high confidence, data-based ‘‘yes’’ or ‘‘no’’ response to this question.
To restate, not one of the 59 studies referenced in the 2005 APA Brief compares a large, random, representative sample of lesbian or gay parents and their children with a large, random, representative sample of married parents and their children. The available data, which are drawn primarily from small convenience samples, are insufficient to support a strong generalizable claim either way.
Such a statement would not be grounded in science. To make a generalizable claim, representative, large-sample studies are needed—many of them.
(Loren Marks, “Same-sex parenting and children’s outcomes: A closer examination of the American psychological association’s brief on lesbian and gay parenting” Social Science Research 41 (2012) 735–751.)
The American College of Pediatricians state:
The limited research advocating child rearing by homosexual parents has severe methodological limitations. There is significant risk of harm inherent in exposing a child to the homosexual lifestyle. Given the current body of evidence, the American College of Pediatricians believes it is inappropriate, potentially hazardous to children, and dangerously irresponsible to change the age-old prohibition on homosexual parenting, whether by adoption, foster care, or reproductive manipulation. This position is rooted in the best available science.
(American College of Pediatricians, Revised March 2012, http://www.acpeds.org/Homosexual-Parenting-Is-It-Time-For-Change.html)
The New Family Structures Study (NFSS) is the first large, long-term study to look at young-adults who were raised by parents that had a same-sex relationship. The NFSS fielded a survey to a large, random sample of American young adults (ages 18–39) who were raised in different types of family arrangements.
In the debut article of the NFSS, Mark Regnerus has found numerous, consistent differences on 40 different social, emotional, and relational outcome variables (including many that are obviously suboptimal such as education, depression, employment status, or marijuana use) between young-adult children of a parent who has had a same-sex romantic relationship and those with stillmarried (heterosexual) biological parents.
While the NFSS may best capture what might be called an ‘‘earlier generation’’ of children of same-sex parents, and includes among them many who witnessed a failed heterosexual union, the basic statistical comparisons between this group and those of others, especially biologically-intact, mother/father families, suggests that notable differences on many outcomes do in fact exist.
This is inconsistent with claims of ‘‘no differences’’ generated by studies that have commonly employed far more narrow samples than this one. (Mark Regnerus, “ How different are the adult children of parents who have samesex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study” Social Science Research 41 (2012) 752–770.)
