Date of Award:

5-2026

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Human Development and Family Studies

Committee Chair(s)

Ryan Seedall

Committee

Ryan Seedall

Committee

Spencer Bradshaw

Committee

Diana Meter

Committee

Stephen Fife

Abstract

In this master’s thesis, I collected and analayzed data from 429 participants, 78 of whom reported having experience with parental infidelity, namely having at least one parent be sexually unfaithful to the other. The purpose of this study was to better understand the long-term impacts of experiencing parental infidelity during childhood. Participants with and without experience of parental infidelity were invited to complete an online questionnaire about potential experiences with parental infidelity, emotional well-being, attachment security in adult romantic relationships, couple satisfaction with current romantic partner, and attitudes (permissive versus accepting) towards potentially unfaithful behaviors of infidelity and pornography. I examined the relationship between parental infidelity and measures of individual and relational well-being, as well as attitudes towards infidelity.

I found that the experience of parental infidelity is associated with the moral disapproval of infidelity behaviors and higher concern and worry about being rejected or unloved in romantic relationships. Despite this fear, participants who reported experience with parental infidelity did not show variations in couple satisfaction or dyadic trust compared to those who had not experienced parental infidelity. This indicates that although those who experienced parental infidelity were more worried in adult romantic relationships, that fear did not stop them from enjoying meaningful, satisfying relationships. I also found that having a high level of satisfaction with parents was associated with several positive aspects of individual and relational well-being. However, this protective power of parental relationship satisfaction was not found for those with experience of parental infidelity.

These findings speak to the long-term power of experiencing parental infidelity during childhood and demonstrates its damaging effects on individual and relational well- being. Both immediately and later in life, this study highlights the need to attend to the experiences of children and involve the whole family unit in healing from infidelity.

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Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License

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