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Liberal Study: LGBT Parents More Likely To Get Frustrated With Their Children

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A study published this month by the Williams Institute — a far-left think tank at the UCLA School of Law — found that LGBT parents are significantly more likely than typical (male-female) parents to become frustrated and even angry with their children.

As part of the study, researchers measured the “parental stress” of both LGBT and typical parents by averaging the three answers parents gave when asked how often (on a scale of 1-4) they:

  1. Felt their child is “much harder to care for than most children” their age
  2. Felt their child “does things that really bother” them
  3. Felt angry with their child

Same-sex parents, the researchers noted, “reported significantly more stress than did different-sex parents.” Put differently, the study found that same-sex parents are significantly: more likely to believe their child is “much harder to care for than most children,” more likely to be really bothered by their child’s actions, and more likely to become angry with their child.

Interestingly enough, the authors of the study threw out any results from gay male couples, using only data from 98 lesbian couples in their study. Additionally, those 98 lesbians were typically in their mid-forties and living in urban areas with pre-teen white children.

The authors also removed from the study any instances of children from divorced or separated lesbian parents–an interesting decision considering a) the detrimental impact divorce is known to have on children and b) the fact that lesbian couples are far more likely to divorce — one study puts it at 200 percent more likely — than heterosexual couples. The authors did not address the increased divorce rate among lesbian couples.

Despite the lesbian parents’ significant frustrations with their own children, they reported levels of emotional difficulties, coping skills, and learning skills in their children that were statistically similar to those reported by heterosexual parents.

Because both sets of parents claimed satistically similar outcomes in their children, the authors concluded that children do just as well when raised by same-sex parents as they do when raised by typical parents.

The authors did not, however, actually interview any children in their study on child outcomes. They also left unanswered whether increased levels of “parental stress” might affect a parent’s accuracy in reporting their child’s behaviors.

The Williams Institute’s purpose is to conduct “research on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy.” Much of their research is done in service of left-wing social goals.

Follow Peter Hasson on Twitter @PeterJHasson