Sample Synthesis Essay

Dear All,

Below is the outline and a sample of a synthesis essay taken from an exercise from page 217 of your textbook. Please take note that the word limit is 400 words and not 240 words as i mentioned in class. There is a change in format. Take note that my outline follows closely the words from the passage. However, when i compose my essay, i do not follow the words used in my outline as paraphrasing is needed.

Thesis statement: Divorce affects children in many ways, which are psychological, emotional, financial and sociological.

Psychological
§ Unable to love freely / afraid of becoming attached to other people
§ Low self-esteem / keep blaming themselves for the fault of others
§ Feel rejected, unwanted and burdensome to other people
§ Do not receive proper care and attention

Emotional
§ Children may develop a fear to love freely
§ Children may turn into difficult, spoilt and demanding people

Financial
§ Single parents unable to support the family
§ Teenagers resort to find work and support the family

Sociological
§ Children become less sociable and prefer solitude
§ They become afraid to be involved in relationships
§ They may become socially dysfunction adults

Many studies have reported that children of divorced parents experience more problems in adjustment than children who grow up in intact families. Much of the research suggests that children of divorce are more likely to have more difficulties in school and to be more sexually active, more aggressive, more anxious, more withdrawn, less pro-social, more depressed, and more likely to abuse substances and participate in delinquent acts than their peers from intact families. Children of divorced parents are affected psychologically, emotionally, financially and sociologically.

Psychologically, children of divorced parents will be indulging in guilt as they feel that they are to be blamed for their parents divorced. Often, these children grow up with low self-esteem as they feel unwanted as they can only choose to live with one parent. Thus, they are constantly afraid of giving their love to others as they have experience the pain of losing the love of their parents through divorce.

Children of divorced parents are also emotionally unstable as they feel indignantly aggrieved by the divorce. This causes them to be easily irritable and angry most of the time. Divorce will force a parent to pamper their child as they feel it’s a method to substitute the guilt he/she feels towards his/her child which eventually leads to spoiling the child. This causes the child to rebel every time his/her wishes are not met, making it difficult for the single parent to control.

Divorce also affects the financial stability of a family. A single parent will have to work extra hours to be able to make ends meet. This causes children of divorced parents feel neglected as their sole parent will focus more on work in order to earn the extra money to support the family. Children will be faced with difficulty to buy books and other necessities due to financial constrain, which leads to disinterest in learning as life gets too difficult. This could cause children to lose interest in studying and take up jobs to help up in the finances of the family.

Children of divorced parents will eventually develop ‘social withdrawal’ and prefer solitary lives. Sociologically, these children are very much affected. In later life, these children will grow up afraid of marriage as they feel that their marriage will be in shambles, like how their parent’s marriage is and will only bring unhappiness and problems.