Most parents satisfied with contact arrangements

The number of children living with only one of their parents has increased for some time. In 2004, 25 per cent of children below 18 years of age lived with only one of their parents. In 2003, a new set of rules regulating child maintenance payments was introduced in Norway. The reform implies strong incentives for non-resident parents to spend much time with their children. According to the survey Contact arrangements and child maintenance 2004, 10 per cent of parents living apart have shared custody for their children. The child lives with the mother in 82 per cent of the cases and with the father in 8 per cent of the cases. Shared custody is far more common when the child is registered at the father's address than at the mother's address.

80 per cent have contact agreement

80 per cent of parents living apart have a contact agreement stating how often and for how long the non-resident parent should see the child. 43 per cent have a written agreement and 35 per cent have an oral agreement. Respondents who said that they do not have any type of agreement were asked whether the authorities had drawn up an agreement stating how much time the non-resident parent should spend with the child, and 3 per cent answered that this was the case. If we look at all types of agreements together, non-resident parents should spend 8.3 days with their child per month on average. Written agreements entail most contact and agreements drawn up by the authorities entail least contact.

Written agreements are most common among parents who used to be married and least common among parents who have never lived together. Parents who have been cohabitants are in an intermediate position. Oral agreements are more common among parents who used to live together than among parents who used to be married. Written agreements are less common among parents who have lived apart for a long time than among parents who separated more recently. This difference does not apply to oral agreements.

 

 

 

6.9 days contact per month on average

The majority of non-resident parents have regular contact with their children. In the 2004 survey, 97 per cent of the respondents said that the non-resident parent had seen the child after the separation/birth of the child, 93 per cent said that there had been contact in the previous year, and 79 per cent said that there had been contact in the previous month. Based on the answers of both resident and non-resident parents, we find that non-resident parents had spent 6.9 days with their child on average in the previous month. This figure includes parents with and without a contact agreement. Hence, the average number of contact days is somewhat lower than the number of agreement days. Non-resident mothers spent a significantly higher number of days with their child than non-resident fathers. In fact, a large proportion of non-resident mothers look after their children almost half of the time.

To some extent the picture of non-resident parents' contact with their children depends on whom we ask. In this survey and in former surveys we have seen that non-resident parents describe themselves as more actively involved with their children than do the resident parents. For instance, non-resident fathers reported that they had spent 8.0 days with their child last month, but according to the single mothers this figure was 5.3 days.

 

 

The amount of monthly contact between non-resident parents and their children varies considerably between different groups. Parents living close to their children see their children more often than others, parents with young children see their children more often than parents with older children, those who have been married to the other parent have more contact than those who have never lived with the other parent, and highly educated parents see their children more often than those with less education.

2.8 vacations on average

87 per cent of non-resident parents had spent at least one vacation with their child in the previous year. 26 per cent had spent one or two vacations with their child, 44 per cent had spent three or four vacations with their child, and 18 per cent had spent at least five vacations with their child. The average number of vacations was 2.8. Non-resident mothers had more vacations with their child than non-resident fathers.

 

 

Non-resident parents who spend much time with their children on a monthly basis have more vacations with their children than other non-resident parents. However, for some parents vacations compensate for little monthly contact to some extent. For instance, half of the parents who had not seen their child in the previous month reported that they had spent at least one vacation with them in the previous year.

Changing contact patterns rarely due to new alimony rules

Parents who had lived apart for at least two years were asked whether the non-resident parent had more or less contact with their child now than two years ago. 19 per cent answered that the non-resident parent saw their child more often than before, 26 per cent said that there was less contact, and 55 per cent said that the pattern was unchanged. Changes in the contact pattern were attributed to the child's age, the child's hobbies, the fact that one of the parents had moved, or that the child or one of the parents had wanted a change. Very few parents reported that the new rules for child maintanacne was the main reason for the change.

70 per cent satisfied with contact arrangement

70 per cent of the parents said that the contact arrangement works well for the children, 17 per cent said that it works fairly well, and 13 per cent said that it does not work very well. There was a small, but significant increase in the proportion who are positive to the contact arrangements compared with the results from a similar survey in 2002. However, the data were collected differently in the two surveys - mainly by telephone interviews in 2004 and mainly by postal questionnaires in 2002. Generally, there is a stronger tendency for people to give socially desirable answers in an interview than in a postal survey.

Single fathers and non-resident mothers tend to give a more positive assessment of the contact arrangement than single mothers and non-resident fathers. This is partly due to the fact that non-resident mothers have more contact with their children than non-resident fathers.