Causes of divorce

The article presents the outcome of research on causes of divorce conducted in the USA and in Poland, including the research carried out by the Author. In the 1950s and 1960s, the most frequent couses of divorce cited by American respondents were problems connected with disturbances in fulfilling by the family its instrumental functions (Jack of help, support, alcoholism, gambling, psychical and physical cruelty, neglect of home and children, financial difficulties). All those problems are "severe" problems, and they destroy the foundation (economic and emotional) of family life. The research conducted in the 1980s show a different image of marital problems cited as the cause of divorce. The most frequent causes are: lack of understanding, personality problems, incompatibility of characters, conflict of values and roles, emotional problems/The above Problems could be qualified as disturbances of the emotional and expressive function of family. It seems that one may rightly speek about the evolution of causes of divorce, i.e. that the significance of problems connected with the instrumental function diminishes, while the significance of problems connected with the emotional and expressive function increases. In Poland, among of causes of divorce the first place takes alcoholism, then incompatibility of characters and adultery. Those causes appear with relatively stable frequency. The major cause of marital disfunction is alcoholism; however, the pattern changes depending on the level of education and the lenght of marriage.Digitalizacja i deponowanie archiwalnych zeszytów RPEiS sfinansowane przez MNiSW w ramach realizacji umowy nr 541/P-DUN/201