Report: lesbian families have zero rate of child abuse

Researchers at the UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute reported that a 24-year study of American lesbian families found a zero rate of child abuse.

While 26 percent of adolescents in the U.S. report parent or caregiver physical abuse and 8.3 percent report sexual abuse, none of the 78 children of lesbian moms studied reported incidents of either.

Researchers also found the children of lesbians are on average more open and well-adjusted.

The study found that the same percentage of children raised by lesbians grow up to be gay as in the larger population. Although they begin having sex significantly later than their peers, lesbians’ kids are more open to same-sex experimentation as adolescents.

Although lesbian moms separate at a higher rate than heterosexual couples, they’re better divorced parents too, researchers said. Lesbian moms share child custody at greater rates and their children don’t show signs of trauma at the same level as the children of straight divorced parents.

The researchers concluded that lesbian parents represent a kind of paradigm of family values and create homes that are free of violence. What seems to make these homes safer for children, researchers said, is the absence of straight men, who are the main physical and sexual abusers of children.