Do lesbians make better parents than mums and dads?

Civitas, 17 November 2009

Professor Stephen Scott is Professor of Child Health and Behaviour at the Institute of Psychiatry at the Maudsley Hospital. He is also director of research at the National Academy for Parenting Practitioners. This is a quango that the DfES gave Professor Scott and two colleagues £30 million to set up in 2007. In a widely reported speech last week, Professor Scott claimed: ‘Lesbians make better parents than a man and woman.’

For a person occupying such an influential position as Professor Scott to make such a claim is to lend it enormous credence. One would have to assume that it would not have been made without Professor Scott having weighty evidence in its support.

One wonders what that evidence might be.

Newspaper reports of the speech do not state on what evidence Professor Scott based his claim. They do, however, refer to research  said to support it.  They state that children raised by lesbians have been found to be ‘more aspirational and more confident champions of social justice’ than are other children. In particular, they claim that ‘daughters of lesbians are more likely to aspire to professions that were traditionally considered male, such as doctors or lawyers.’

Let us assume that being ‘aspirational’ and a ‘confident champion of social justice’ are desiderata anyone would wish to see children acquire in the course of their upbringing. Assume also that children raised by lesbians are more likely to acquire such traits.

As they stand, this pair of facts, if facts they be, would not show that lesbians made better parents than biological parents. For one thing, suppose that lesbian couples who raised children tended, on average, to be more middle-class than heterosexual parents.  Suppose further that the more middle-class individuals are the more likely it will be that aspiration, self-confidence and a concern for social justice are instilled in any children whom they raise.

In such circumstances, it might well be that lesbians tended to raise  more aspirant, confident and socially responsible children than did heterosexual couples. It would not follow that they did because they were lesbian.

Suppose, however, one could control for social class and that it turned out that, regardless of it, lesbians tended to raise  children who were more aspirant, confident and committed to social justice than were those raised by heterosexual couples. Would such a research finding establish lesbians made better parents than heterosexual parents?

Again, not necessarily. This is because aspiration, self confidence and a commitment to social justice are by no means the only positive attributes anyone would hope to see children acquiring in the course of their upbringing.

Suppose that being raised by lesbians increased the likelihood a child would acquire these three attributes, but was also correlated with the acquisition of other less desirable attributes. Then, whether lesbians made better parents than heterosexuals would be altogether less clear-cut.

Newspaper accounts of Professor Scott’s speech were quick to deny  any disadvantages attached to being brought up lesbians. For example, the Times cited ‘research… [that] says there is no evidence to show children of lesbian parents are disadvantaged in any way.’

One would like to know exactly what research had come up with this finding.

There certainly appears to be evidence that children raised in the absence of a caring father miss out as a result.

Consider, for example, the findings of three Swedish researchers in the field of children’s health and development, published in 2008. They surveyed 24 longitudinal studies to ascertain the effects on children’s development of the involvement of their father’s in their up-bringing. The review ‘spanned 20 years of studies and included over 22,000 children.’

This is what emerged from the study:

‘22 of these described positive effects of father involvement… There is certain evidence that cohabitation with the mother and her male partner is associated with less externalising behavioural problems. Active and regular engagement with the child predicts a range of positive outcomes… Father engagement seems to … reduc[e] the frequency of behavioural problems in boys and psychological problems in young women, and enhanc[e] cognitive development, while decreasing delinquency and economic disadvantage in low SES [socio-economic status] families… There is evidence to support the positive influence of father engagement on offspring social, behavioural and psychological outcomes.’

I don’t pretend to know how far the benefits found to arise from  a father’s involvement in the upbringing of his children result from his gender rather than from his merely being an extra caring adult involved in their upbringing. Clearly, if the benefit flowed only from the latter, then children raised by lesbian couples could be expected to fare no less well.

To date, apparently, there have only been two longitudinal studies of children raised by lesbians. That seems far too few to be able to claim confidently on their basis that fathers do not make a positive contribution to the upbringing of their children that female partners of lesbian mothers cannot match.

One looks forward to the publication by Professor Scott, or by others who share his view about the relative merits of lesbians and fathers and mothers as parents, of some account of the evidence for it.