http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-court-gay-parents-20130406,0,2117892.story
WASHINGTON — During last week's Supreme Court arguments on gay marriage, Justice Antonin Scalia asserted that "there's considerable disagreement" among experts over whether "raising a child in a single-sex family is harmful or not." Two other justices agreed that gay parenting was a new and uncertain development.
Those comments startled child development experts as well as advocates of gay marriage, because there is considerable research showing children of gay parents do not have more problems than others.
"This is not a new phenomenon. We have 30 or 40 years of studies, and there has been no hint of a problem," said Dr. Ellen C. Perrin, a professor of pediatrics at the Floating Hospital for Children at Tufts Medical Center.
"There is a fundamental, scholarly consensus that children raised by same-sex couples do just fine," said Stanford sociologist Michael J. Rosenfeld.
Perrin led a committee that examined research on gay parents and their children for the American Academy of Pediatrics. Its report in March, just before the court arguments, concluded that "children and adolescents who grow up with gay or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive, social and sexual functioning as do children whose parents are heterosexual."
WASHINGTON — During last week's Supreme Court arguments on gay marriage, Justice Antonin Scalia asserted that "there's considerable disagreement" among experts over whether "raising a child in a single-sex family is harmful or not." Two other justices agreed that gay parenting was a new and uncertain development.
Those comments startled child development experts as well as advocates of gay marriage, because there is considerable research showing children of gay parents do not have more problems than others.
"This is not a new phenomenon. We have 30 or 40 years of studies, and there has been no hint of a problem," said Dr. Ellen C. Perrin, a professor of pediatrics at the Floating Hospital for Children at Tufts Medical Center.
"There is a fundamental, scholarly consensus that children raised by same-sex couples do just fine," said Stanford sociologist Michael J. Rosenfeld.
Perrin led a committee that examined research on gay parents and their children for the American Academy of Pediatrics. Its report in March, just before the court arguments, concluded that "children and adolescents who grow up with gay or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive, social and sexual functioning as do children whose parents are heterosexual."
