In: Biology
Why might you expect stepparents to invest less in their stepchildren when compared to biological investment in biological children?
Various cases of mistreatment and abuse on children by stepparents have been reported across the world. In evolutinary psychology, this is termed as Cinderella effect. Compared to biological parents, 40 -100 times the chances of mistreatment for children is higher from step parents.
Step children does not carry any gene of the step parents, thus the chance of bonding between them is less. Parental love is higher when an individual gives birth to a child. Also, in a family which contain both step children and biological children, the parents have tendency to secure the life of biological children than step children. These attitudes lead to various disputes.
Divorce and remarriage is common in the society, thus the disputes regarding investment in biological children and step children is on rise. The studies prove that step children (step children from wife) gets less financial support than biological children. But, in rich families the disputes are lesser because the parents does not bother in investing money in step children.