ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the sample’s attitudes towards marital dissolution prior to and following breakdown, before going on to examine whether the mothers felt that people in general looked down on lone parent families compared with the traditional two parent family. Mothers who originated from East Africa were the most likely group to have been sympathetic towards lone parenthood before their own marriages were dissolved. The chapter examines how the 90 mothers felt others perceived them as lone parents, by firstly looking at this issue in a general setting and focusess on the reactions of the Asian community. Asian literature points to the importance of the traditional family, so it may follow that it would disown lone parenthood as an acceptable status. The lone mothers of seven years or more had a greater likelihood than the other women of believing that they were not going against their culture through marital disruption.
