Corrás Vázquez, TaniaSeijo Martínez, DoloresFariña Rivera, FranciscaNovo Pérez, MercedesArce Fernández, RamónGonzález Cabanach, Ramón2020-05-082020-05-082017Corrás T, Seijo D, Fariña F, Novo M, Arce R and Cabanach RG (2017) What and How Much Do Children Lose in Academic Settings Owing to Parental Separation? Front. Psychol. 8:1545. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01545http://hdl.handle.net/10347/22158The literature has firmly established an association between parental separation and school failure. Nevertheless, parental separation does not affect academic aptitudes. Thus, mediators explain such relationship. A field study was designed to identify and quantify damage in the mediating variables between parental separation and school failure (i.e., external school adjustment, aversion to institution, aversion to learning, aversion to instruction, aversion to teachers, indiscipline). A total of 196 children, classified into three age cohorts: 109 in level 1 (from 8 to 11 years), 46 in level 2 (from 12 to 14 years), and 41 in level 3 (15 or more years), were assessed in school adjustment and in underlying dimensions of school (mal)adjustment. The results showed significant effects of parental separation in school adjustment and in the underlying dimensions to maladjustment in the three classification levels. The magnitude of damage increased with age, i.e., small in level 1, moderate in 2, and large in 3. Damage in all the sub-dimensions underlying school (mal)adjustment was quantified. The implications of the results for the design and implementation of prevention and intervention programs for children from separated parents are discussedeng© 2017 Corrás, Seijo, Fariña, Novo, Arce and Cabanach. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these termshttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Parental separationSchool (mal)adjustmentAversion to learningAversion to teachersSchool (dis)satisfactionIndisciplinejournal article10.3389/fpsyg.2017.015451664-1078open access