Bruce M Smyth- PhD
- Professor at Australian National University
Bruce M Smyth
- PhD
- Professor at Australian National University
About
95
Publications
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Introduction
Bruce M Smyth is Professor of Family Studies with the Centre for Policy Research, Australian National University. He is a social scientist working primarily in the area of family law and policy. Current research interests include: the high-conflict post-divorce shared time family; entrenched parental hatred; the meaning of 'home' to children after separation; digital divorce; children's transitions between homes after separation; and post-separation parenting, including child support.
Skills and Expertise
Current institution
Additional affiliations
March 1995 - March 2007
March 2007 - present
Publications
Publications (95)
The Routledge Handbook of Human Research Ethics and Integrity in Australia highlights why it is important to look at the subject of human research ethics and integrity within the Australian context, and what the Australian perspective can offer to all researchers in the social sciences and humanities globally.
Australia has one of the world’s most...
Research interviews—individual or group—remain one of the most popular data collection methods in the social sciences. This chapter focuses on three popular qualitative methods: One-to-one interviews; focus groups; and yarning and yarning circles (a hybrid qualitative method originating within Australian Indigenous cultural practices). While all th...
Socioeconomic status (SES) exhibits graded relationships with psychological resources. Dispositional optimism, a crucial psychological asset, encompasses both optimism and pessimism, two related but separated facets considered to be asymmetric in susceptibility to the impact of SES in adults. Little research has explored (a) the effects of SES disp...
In Norway, as in most Western countries, a growing proportion of parents living apart choose shared residence for their children. The aim of this study was to investigate trajectories of five interparental conflict dimensions across four child residence arrangement groups (and three combination groups) to improve understanding of different conflict...
This paper is part of an ongoing Australian project that seeks to explore the meaning of ‘home’
for children in separated families. No prior family law research has done so. This is despite the
personal and social significance of home, the reality that most Australian children now move to
some degree across two households if parents separate, and i...
Human research ethics review may be viewed by researchers as each of a boon and a curse; as a catalyst for thoughtful planning of research that respects the humanity of people engaged in the work, and as a barrier to simply getting important research done without delay. Such bouquets and brickbats perhaps misrepresent the integrated role ethics and...
Post-separation parenting apps are an alternative to mainstream digital communication (e.g. text and email) for separated parents. They vary in cost and features, generally incorporating a messaging tool, shared calendar, expense tracker, and the ability to export records for legal purposes. While often recommended in the context of family law, evi...
Background
The role of gender inequities in women’s ability to access maternal health care has mainly been analysed from either women’s or men’s perspective only. In this article, we explore the role of gender inequities in maternal health care utilisation from both men’s and women’s perspectives.
Methods
Thirty-six interviews were conducted with...
In recent years a bewildering array of smartphone applications (“apps”) has emerged to support separated parents' communication. Post‐separation parenting apps vary in cost and features; they typically comprise a messaging tool, shared calendar, expense tracker and a means to export records for legal purposes. A key challenge for separated parents...
Mobile phones have become an essential part of modern family life. Their proliferation has been accompanied by a diverse range of apps, including apps for separated parents. Family law professionals are increasingly being asked about post-separation parenting apps by clients. Yet the empirical evidence about their potential benefits and risks is sp...
Evolutionary social science is having a renaissance. This volume showcases the empirical and theoretical advancements produced by the evolutionary study of romantic relationships. The editors assembled an international collection of contributors to trace how evolved psychological mechanisms shape strategic computation and behavior across the life s...
The rapid proliferation of smartphones has led to a bewildering array of post-separation parenting apps, especially since the Covid-19 pandemic. These apps usually comprise a messaging tool, shared calendar, expense tracker, and a means to download messages and documents for courts. In Australia, as elsewhere, family law professionals are increasin...
In this article, we respond to commentary by Patrick Parkinson on our research into allegations of child sexual abuse in the Family Court of Australia (both published in AJSI, vol 56, 2021). Parkinson's primary focus was on two of our key findings: (a) that the child was deemed to be at an unacceptable risk of harm in only 12 per cent of fully cont...
1. INTRODUCTION
Child support (child maintenance) policy – in Australia at least – is designed to ensure that: (a) children of separated or divorced parents receive adequate financial support (‘adequacy’); (b) both parents contribute to the cost of supporting their children, according to their respective capacities to do so (‘equity’); and (c) gove...
1. INTRODUCTION
What are children’s experiences of home and homemaking after parental separation? How is home experienced when children spend time with a father who has perpetrated domestic and family violence? How might those experiences inform our understanding of the operation of the ‘best interests’ principle – that is, the principle that court...
This paper considers fathers’ understandings and experiences of home after relationship separation – an issue that has received little research attention to date – through interviews with four separated fathers conducted as part of a larger qualitative study. Key themes to emerge were: the significance attached by participant fathers to home and ho...
Allegations of child sexual abuse pose agonisingly difficult issues for families, family law professionals and the courts. We present data from the population (N=521) of Family Court of Australia judgements containing allegations of child sexual abuse published in the Australasian Legal Information Institute's Australian database. Our data cover al...
This paper explores 35 mothers’ understandings of home after relationship separation, along with barriers and facilitators to creating home post-separation. No previous research has done so. We found that for mothers, like their children, home was complex and multidimensional, and rarely defined just in terms of physical space. Rather, it was a rel...
Around the globe, many families are experiencing significant anxieties linked to COVID-19. These include health concerns and economic pressures, both of which are frequently taking place against a backdrop of various levels of social isolation. In addition, many parents have been juggling home schooling requirements in the face of radically differe...
This paper explores 68 Australian children and young people’s understandings of what ‘home’ means for them after their parents’ separation. Home – a familiar yet complex concept of great personal and social significance – has been a research focus for many other disciplines but not family law. We found that home, as an idea and lived experience, wa...
Much of the work on media multiplexity theory (MMT) is based on unestablished relationships, in which more channels are presumed to be indicative of higher relational closeness. But a different set of relational dynamics may be at play in preexisting acrimonious partnerships. In this article, we investigate the use of different modes of communicati...
Couple conflict, which includes conflict over parenting practices, continues to be a topic of considerable interest to family therapists. Following parental separation, resolution or management of conflict over children has a special urgency. ‘High‐conflict’ cases present some of the most complex systemic and clinical challenges. In this first of t...
In recent years Australia has seen increasing use of digital technology including smartphones and with that, increasing development and availability of online family law resources including digital applications (‘apps’). However, the extent to which online resources are being used – and are considered useful – by those experiencing relationship sep...
Shared-time parenting is an emerging family form in many Western countries. Legislative reform in Australia in 2006 introduced a presumption of “equal shared parental responsibility” and a requirement that courts explicitly consider the making of orders which provide for children to spend “equal time” or “substantial and significant time” with each...
The editors’ earlier book Delivering Family Justice in the 21st Century (2016) described a period of turbulence in family justice arising from financial austerity. Governments across the world have sought to reduce public spending on private quarrels by promoting mediation (ADR) and by beginning to look at digital justice (ODR) as alternatives to c...
Family life education is neither a formal discipline nor a formally recognized vocation in Australia. Rather, it comprises a loose amalgam of programs, services, and policies—with little reliable evaluation data to guide its activities. Education for family life in Australia has a complex disjointed story, characterized by a marked decline in coupl...
In 2006, sweeping changes to the family law system were introduced in Australia. A central plank running through the changes was the need for courts and divorce professionals to consider whether a child spending ‘equal’ or else ‘substantial and significant’ periods of time with each parent would be in the child's best interests and be reasonably pr...
There is an emerging view that the term “high conflict” oversimplifies the nature of destructive family dynamics, especially with respect to the small but resource-intensive group of separated parents who remain deeply enmeshed in legal battles and parental acrimony. In this Article we propose that interparental hatred may be a key relationship dyn...
This report explores the behaviour of separated parents by exploring the psychology of post-separation parental disputes and then interrogating three independent data sets to see what further insights they provide on the issues.
The data sets are drawn from:
the Caring for Children after Parental Separation study (CFCAS; longitudinal Australian d...
Family life has undergone dramatic change in recent decades, especially in relation to family structure. Marked increases in union dissolution and nonmarital childbearing have resulted in a growing number of children living apart from one of their parents. Most nonresident parents are fathers but with shared‐time parenting (also known as joint phys...
The Australian Child Support Scheme aims to ensure that children continue to be supported financially should their parents separate or never live together. Sweeping changes to the Australian Child Support Scheme were introduced between 2006 and 2008, featuring a dramatically different system for the calculation of child support and a more rigorous...
Richard Warshak (2014) published a “consensus report” in this journal (Vol. 20, No. 1) documenting a policy position on infants and overnight care following parental separation. He asserts that “[t]here is no evidence to support postponing the introduction of regular and frequent involvement, including overnights, of both parents with their babies...
Child support compliance continues to be a thorny policy issue. In Australia, major changes to the Child Support Scheme were introduced between 2006 and 2008, featuring a markedly different and purportedly ‘fairer’ system for the calculation of child support. Extra resources were also provided to the Child Support Agency (CSA) to ensure that child...
The Labor federal Attorney-General’s plan, announced in May 2010, to extend the pre-filing requirement to attend family dispute resolution from parenting disputes to financial (property and spousal maintenance) disputes has encouraged us to think about the assistance currently available for separating parents who seek help to resolve financial issu...
Children living in a shared-time parenting arrangement following separation (also known as joint physical custody or dual residence) spend equal or near-equal amounts of day and night time with each parent. Little data exist regarding developmental sequelae of such arrangements for infants. The current study examined a theoretically driven question...
Despite widespread interest in patterns of parenting after separation over the past decade - especially in shared-time arrangements - few studies have explored the detail of post-separation parenting time schedules. This article: (a) provides a detailed snapshot of children’s overnight stays with each parent among a national random sample of 408 se...
In Australia, there has been considerable interest in recent years in the policy and practical implications of sharing parental care and responsibilities after separation - concepts that have culminated in the Family Law Amendment (Shared Parental Responsibility) Act 2006. While there is now good information on the prevalence, demography and dynami...
This article examines continuity and change in post-separation patterns of parenting across a three-year time span. We analyse longitudinal data from two recent Australian studies: the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey; and the Caring for Children after Parental Separation (CFC) Project. Mother-residence was found to...
Mental health issues permeate the family law system - at least according to anecdote. Yet such issues are rarely mentioned in family-law research, policy, and practice. This article aims to stimulate discussion about the sometimes close and complex links between mental health issues and family law, and suggests a framework for how the family-law sy...
This article explores patterns of contact between non-resident fathers and their children, and mothers’ and fathers’ satisfaction with contact arrangements in a nationally representative sample of separated parents in Australia. The data suggest that in Australia more than one third of children whose parents do not live together do not see their fa...
This chapter defines the meaning of risk in the context of shared-time parenting after separation, and details the current body of literature—particularly new Australian data—that addresses the issue of risk in shared-time parenting. The chapter is organized into five parts. Part I considers the problem of defining risk in the context of shared-tim...
When conducting parenting plan evaluations, mental health professionals must have an understanding of the most current findings in developmental research, behavioral psychology, attachment theory, and legal issues to substantiate their opinions. This online resource focuses on translating the research associated with the most important topics withi...
This article reviews research on post-separation shared time parenting and on outcomes of legislating to encourage shared time parenting, drawing mainly on Australian experience. The research shows that children benefit from continuing and regular contact with both parents when they cooperate, communicate, and have low levels of conflict. However,...
The importance for children's wellbeing, long-term adjustment and maintenance of loving and supportive relationships with both parents after divorce is well documented. However, questions remain about links between parenting arrangements and relationship outcomes, specifically in terms of the ways that shared overnight care after separation may int...
The Australian family law system has generally not aimed to provide services to assist separated parents to discuss child support matters directly with each other. In this article we suggest that in an increasingly complex social landscape of diverse family forms and parenting arrangements, some families would benefit from facilitated joint discuss...
Sweeping changes to the Australian Child Support Scheme were recently introduced, featuring a dramatically different system for the calculation of child support. The reforms were intended to respond to ongoing concerns about equity and changes in social expectations and practices in gender, work and parenting. The extent to which the new Scheme is...
In Australia, decisions about the post-separation relocation of a parent (usually a mother) with children where the other parent (usually a father) has opposed this are increasingly controversial, and have attracted both media and academic attention, including in the pages of this journal. Unlike in the United Kingdom where restrictions even on int...
In recent years, sweeping changes to the Australian family law system — new services] legal processes, legislation, and a new child support scheme — have been put into place, accompanied by a large research evaluation program. A central plank running through the recent reforms is the need for courts, and those who work with separating parents, to c...
In Australia, there has been considerable interest in recent years in the policy and practical implications of sharing parental care and responsibilities after separation concepts that have culminated in the Family Law Amendment (Shared Parental Responsibility) Act 2006 While there is now good information on the prevalence, demography and dynamics...
This study compared outcomes over 1 year for two groups of separated parents, who attended two different forms of brief therapeutic mediation for entrenched parenting disputes. The two interventions each targeted psychological resolution of parental conflict, enhanced parental reflective function, and associated reduction of distress for their chil...
Family life has undergone dramatic change in recent decades, especially in relation to family structure. Marked increases in union dissolution and nonmarital childbearing have resulted in a growing number of children living apart from one of their parents. Most non‐resident parents are fathers but with resident fathers becoming one of the fastest‐r...
While there is good information on the broad patterns of parenting after separation in Australia, which parents opt for which patterns and why remains poorly understood. This article summarizes recent Australian research into five different post-separation patterns of father-child contact: (i) 50/50 shared care, (ii) little or no contact, (iii) hol...
Therapeutic divorce mediation is one of several interventions that hold promise for assisting highly conflicted parents to resolve disputes about their children. But how is it defined, what do we know about it, how is it constrained, and does it work? This article seeks to address these questions by reviewing the divorce mediation-therapy literatur...
This article examines methodological issues confronting the study of qualitative and quantitative differences in ways that separated parents share time with their children. Measurement issues explored include disentangling dimensions of contact, identifying economic implications of contact, and measuring quality of contact. Sampling issues relate t...
Drew on data from the 1997 Family Characteristics Survey in Australia to examine the impact of day-only parent-child contact versus overnight stays on parent-child relationships. Found that 34 percent of children who see their nonresident parent never stay overnight with them. The more contact children have with a nonresident parent, the more likel...
Abstract Drawing,on data from Wave 1 of the Household,Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey, this paper explores patterns of contact between,non-resident fathers and their children ‐ including patterns of day-only contact. It also examines,the impact,of repartnering on contact and mothers’ and fathers’ satisfaction with contact arr...
A decade or so ago, mothers (and their children) in Australia were found to be at an economic disadvantage after divorce compared with fathers. Since the late1980s, however, significant social and economic change may have improved the financial living standards of divorced women relative to divorced men. This change includes the introduction of the...
Divorce is a feature of modern family life, and disrupts the lives of parents and children. Preparing food and sharing meals is a daily routine that can ground family members amid family change and transitions. Food and cooking are often- neglected subjects in discussions about divorce, even though they have important implications for child develop...
