Contact/Shared Residence and Child Well-Being: Research Evidence and its Implications for Legal Decision-Making

This article considers the implications for legal decision-makingof one aspect of research on children’s adjustment toparental separation: the significance for child well-being ofmaintaining a relationship with both parents, either by wayof contact with a non-resident parent or by means of a shared(dual) residence arrangement (known in some jurisdictions as‘joint physical custody’). It is argued that policy-makerswho have rejected recent calls for a statutory presumption ofchild/non-resident parent contact, or of equal division of achild’s time between parents, have acted appropriatelyin the light of the research evidence.