Living in several family configurations

In 2011, 900,000 of the 13.7 million minor children in metropolitan France live mainly with one parent and spend regular time with the other. They may experience a different family configuration in each parental home. When they move from one to the other, they may, at times, alter the family situation of other minor children. Thus, 140,000 children in “traditional” families spend some of their time in a recomposed family, when half-brothers and half-sisters who normally live elsewhere come to stay with them. Conversely, between 90,000 and 120,000 children living with both of their parents in recomposed families occasionally find themselves in a “traditional” family configuration when their half-brothers and half-sisters go to stay with their other parent. Adults living in more than one home can also, for a time, alter the family configuration of minor children. For example, 80,000 children live with just one parent because, even if their parents are still in a relationship, they do not live together. The single-parent family occasionally becomes a “traditional” family when the second parent lives in the same home. From an adult perspective, 330,000 parents — mostly fathers — live in a single-parent family for some of the time when their children come to stay, whereas they usually live alone without a partner or children. This concerns 490,000 minor children.