3). Interacting directly with children living in single-parent homes, Dolmetsch and Shih understand immediately that diversity rather than unity defines family life for children with divorced parents. Interestingly, Dolmetsch and Shih working at almost ground-zero were less likely to make that assumption of near universality which has plagued more sophisticated sociological studies for decades.
Until very recently most studies of divorce were based on a sampling from a unique sector of the American population "usually small, non-representative, white, middle-class" which afforded "little generalizability" across the broader or more diverse population (McHenry, 1993, p. 100). Inadvertently, mainstream sociologists had derived their findings from a highly select population which could not generate findings equally valid across a diverse set of subpopulations. One of the most glaring drawbacks of this prejudicial stance was that a white middle-class cultural bias spread across the literature, especially damaging on the understanding of black divorce (McHenry, 1993, p. 100). A study by Cherlin in 1981 indicated that this false conclusion was derived from such prejudicial sampling methods: "the high divorce rates among blacks are a part of a subculture that fosters and condones marital instability" (Cherlin as quoted in McHenry, 1993, p. 100).
McHenry and Fine's study focusing on the black/white differential in divorce and single parenting actively seeks to overcome such prejudicial origins and false conclusions. They begin with the premise that there has existed a radical failure in the literature to separate socioeconomic class factors from those of race. They assert with vehemence that first, socioeconomic difference cannot be seen as equaling race difference and second, that the heavy reliance on pathological theory previously employed in scrutinizing black families must be abandoned (McHenry, 1993, p. 100). Th...