Same-sex parenting claims hotly contested

Portrait of a extended happy family standing in the park.

by NZ CATHOLIC staff
CHRISTCHURCH — A New Zealand pro-life commentator has blasted the methodology and findings of an Australian sociological study that found that children with homosexual, bisexual or lesbian parents are happier and healthier than kids from the average family.
Writing on his Leading Edge blog on July 22, Brendan Malone stated that the Australian Study of Child Health in Same-Sex Families, out of the University of Melbourne, was “ideologically motivated”.
The preliminary findings of the study were listed in an article in the Sunday Star Times in New Zealand on July 21.
The lead researcher was Dr Simon Crouch, a homosexual man with four-year-old twin boys. The study collected data on the physical, mental and social wellbeing of 500 children aged 5 to 17, from 315 homosexual, lesbian and bisexual parents.
Children from same-sex couples scored better than the national average for Australia in general health and family cohesion measures. There was no difference in physical and mental health, interaction with others and relationship with parents.
But Mr Malone wrote that the results were highly suspect given that the data for the research came from a survey form completed by parents themselves, and that participants in the study were recruited primarily from advertising that targeted homosexual and lesbian communities and events. That would lead inevitably to “an overabundance of ideologically motivated participants with a vested interest [in] becoming caught up in such a survey”, he observed.
Other problems with the study were that responses by children were optional and, since these were limited to children aged under 18, most would still be dependent on their parents, which was clearly a conflict of interest, Mr Malone wrote.
He added that a survey of 315 heterosexual parents done in the same way would easily refute the study’s findings, but concluded the study’s methods were not robust, and its conclusions not reliable.
“Anyone with half an ounce of commonsense, and who has ever been a parent, or read even just a little bit about parenting research, can tell you how ludicrous it is to claim that boys don’t actually need their dad, or their mother, in their life, or that the same is true for girls, and in fact, that children would be better off if either their mother or father wasn’t actually present for their parenting,” Mr Malone wrote.
He also cited research by University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus, published last year in the journal Social Science Research that suggested that adult children who had been raised, for at least a brief time, in families with a homosexual, lesbian or bisexual parent, were more likely to report dysfunctional adult outcomes than those who had been raised in other family structures, especially families with continuously married heterosexual parents.
The Regnerus study surveyed a random sample of 20,000 participants, rather than a few hundred as in the Australian study, Mr Malone noted.
Writing on the mercatornet.com website late last year, University of Kansas Professor of Family Studies Walter Schumm noted that Dr Regnerus’s study raised a huge cry of protest and there was an investigation by the University of Texas into the ethics used, but Dr Regnerus was cleared of any wrongdoing.
But Professor Schumm, while noting some methodological improvements Dr Regnerus could have used, also stated: “There is considerable research that notes the instability of lesbian and gay parental relationships, the tendency of their children to be involved in substance abuse, and the tendency of such children to experiment with or adopt same-sex sexual behaviours or identities — results similar to those that Regnerus reported.”
In another article on mercatornet this year, American academics Leon Kass from the University of Chicago and Harvey Mansfield of Harvard University warned that same-sex marriage is a very recent innovation, as is child-rearing by same-sex couples.
“Even if same-sex marriage and child rearing by same sex couples were far more common than they are now, large amounts of data collected over decades would be required before any responsible researcher could make meaningful scientific estimates of the effects,” they stated.
“There neither are nor could possibly be any scientifically valid studies from which to predict the effects of a family structure that is so new and rare. The necessary data simply do not exist.”

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  1. JeffreyRO5 says

    The Regnerus “study” has been overwhelmingly rejected in the US for its fraudulent funding and inaccurate data interpretation. Regnerus compared outcomes for the children of still-married different-sex couples, to divorced couples where one or both parents had a same-sex adulterous affair. Yet instead of blaming any negative outcomes on the divorce, Regnerus attributed all negative outcomes on the sexual orientation of the parent. Such shoddy work gets rejected pretty quickly in US academic circles.

    Common sense tells us that sexual orientation has no bearing on one’s ability to parent. That’s because parenting isn’t a sexual activity. The things that make one a good parent, achieving successful parenting outcomes, are unrelated to sexual orientation. Reading to a child regularly, for example, is an activity equally accessible to straight parents and to gay parents.

  2. Scott Rose says

    Walter Schumm is a known anti-gay bigot. He said, for example, that homosexuals shouldn’t be allowed to serve in the military, because it is easier for them to have oral sex. Additionally, he is a paid Regnerus study consultant — something that was not disclosed in his paper. And, his submission to the journal was not peer reviewed, but the editor nonetheless published it with the hallmarks of peer review, including an abstract and the notation “Original Research Article.” Moreover, the Regnerus paper itself was publishing in violation of peer review ethics. None of the peer reviewers were topic experts, and all have fiduciary conflicts of interest with Regnerus and his funders.

    • editor says

      Your comment as stated is not a fact, but an opinion. An opinion on military service does not of itself prove bigotry.

  3. Scott Rose says

    PS — Get your facts straight, please. Regnerus did not survey 20,000 people. He screened 15,000 from Knowledge Network’s online panel, of which 2,988 wound up taking the survey. Lies told to enhance one’s invalid argument do not help one to persuade those in the know that one is right.

    • editor says

      We have checked and found that an inadvertent, subtle change to meaning was made in editing. We have corrected that. Thank you.

  4. Gary Yates says

    All these arguments (and the study too) are irrelevant for Catholics. Homosexuality is forbidden in both the Old and New Testaments, and the Church dogma is that it is intrinsically disordered and against natural law (CCC 2357).
    Gary Yates

  5. Greg says

    Hi, 2019 here. Gosh six years already, gee where does the time go! We now have “virtue signalling”, “Drag-queen story time”, and the requirement to celebrate not just accept. We also have LGBT skittles groups at Catholic schools and single-sex Catholic schools that enrol “transitioning” students. Well, 2013, you’ve got alot to learn because we’re 2019 and because we are more modern we are better. Afterall, 2013 is sooooo long ago. We know better and, gee, we are better. Trust us we know what we’re doing in the future just as you all thought you knew what you were doing back riding dinosaurs.
    We’re currently resisting the last of visible issues, abortion and euthanasia, by hand waving at wider social issues rather than pointing to the inhuman monstrosity of it all. I’m sure things will be fine and 2025 will be a compassionate utopia of peace and justice because we are all very smart.

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