[Vision2020] Pediatrics Group Backs Gay Marriage, Saying It Helps Children

[Art Deco]

  [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>

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March 21, 2013
Pediatrics Group Backs Gay Marriage, Saying It Helps Children By CATHERINE
SAINT LOUIS<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/catherine_saint_louis/index.html>

The American Academy of
Pediatrics<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/a/american_academy_of_pediatrics/index.html?inline=nyt-org>declared
its support
for same-sex marriage<http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/doi/10.1542/peds.2013-0376>for
the first time on Thursday, saying that allowing gay and lesbian
parents to marry if they so choose is in the best interests of their
children.

The academy’s new policy statement says same-sex marriage helps guarantee
rights, benefits and long-term security for children, while acknowledging
that it does not now ensure access to federal benefits. When marriage is
not an option, the academy said, children should not be deprived of foster
care or adoption by single parents or couples, whatever their sexual
orientation.

The academy’s review of scientific
literature<http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/doi/10.1542/peds.2013-0377>began
more than four years ago, and the result is a 10-page report with 60
citations.

“If the studies are different in their design and sample but the results
continue to be similar, that gives scientists and consumers more faith in
the result,” said Dr. Ellen Perrin, a co-author of the new policy and a
professor of pediatrics<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/pediatrics/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>at
Tufts University School of Medicine.

Other scientists called the evidence lackluster and said the academy’s
endorsement was premature. Loren
Marks<http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X12000580>,
an associate professor of child and family studies at Louisiana State
University in Baton Rouge, said there was not enough national data to
support the pediatric association’s position on same-sex marriage.
“National policy should be informed by nationally representative data,” he
said. “We are moving in the direction of higher-quality national data, but
it’s slow.”

The academy cited research finding that a child’s well-being is much more
affected by the strength of relationships among family members and a
family’s social and economic resources than by the sexual orientation of
the parents. “There is an emerging consensus, based on extensive review of
the scientific literature, that children growing up in households headed by
gay men or lesbians are not disadvantaged in any significant respect
relative to children of heterosexual parents,” the academy said.

A large body of evidence demonstrates that children raised by gay or
lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive and social functioning
as peers raised by heterosexuals, the academy said.

One study in England compared 39 families with lesbian mothers to 74
heterosexual parents and 60 families headed by single heterosexual women.
No difference was found between the groups in emotional involvement,
abnormal behaviors in children as reported by parents or teachers, or
psychiatric disorders in them. Both mothers and teachers reported more
behavioral problems among children in single-parent families than
two-parent ones, whatever their sexual orientation.

A 2010 study of children born to 154 lesbian parents in the United States
compared mothers’ reports of their 17-year-olds to a national sample of
age-matched peers. The mothers’ reports indicated that their sons and
daughters had high levels of competence and fewer social problems, compared
with their peers.

“Marriage strengthens families and benefits child development, and it also
increases a parent’s sense of competence and security when they are able to
raise children without stigma,” said Dr. Nanette
Gartrell<http://www.nllfs.org/about/nanette-gartrell/>,
the lead author of the study and a visiting scholar at the University of
California, Los Angeles, School of Law.

The research on same-sex marriage has limitations, experts note, including
the relatively small sample sizes of gay or lesbian parents even in
long-term studies. Many studies have relied on parental assessments of
their children’s well-being, and there is relatively little data about the
well-being of children raised by gay men compared with lesbians.

“Many studies compare wealthy, well-educated lesbian mothers to single
heterosexual mothers instead of married couples,” Dr. Marks said. “This
matters, because children from married families do better on numerous
outcomes including psychological and physical health and avoidance of
high-risk behaviors than children of single-parent families.”

Timm Ryan-Young, a 48-year-old married Brooklynite and father of Zelia, 6,
found the academy’s support of same-sex marriage reaffirming.

“Whenever a formal institution validates or confirms that a same-sex family
is valid,” he said, “and there are no measurable negatives to it, or
deterrents to it, it means a great deal, frankly.”

Dr. Travis Kidner, 36, a surgeon in Los Angeles, and Hernan Lopez, 42, a
media executive, married in 2008 and adopted Nicholas, 2 1/2 years old, and
Zoe, 21 months. “It’s important for kids to know they are from a stable
home and that their parents are married,” Dr. Kidner said.

The pediatrics academy’s support for same-sex marriage heartened him. “The
arc is in our favor now,” he said.

Another reason same-sex couples should be allowed to marry, the academy
said, is that divorce law provides for a legally structured arrangement for
visits and custody.

“If people can’t get married, then they can’t get divorced,” Dr. Perrin
said. “That legal system that exists to protect our most vulnerable, namely
children, isn’t in play.”


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Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
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