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We often assume that parent-child relationships are lifelong and emotionally close. Yet, in reality, many families experience periods of emotional distance and little contact.
A number of robust studies in which researchers have analyzed data from larger samples that mirror the broader population document how common family estrangement is. In Germany, one study found that 20 precent of adults reported being estranged from their father and 9 percent from their mother. In the US, 26 percent of adults reported being estranged from their father and 6 percent from their mother in a 2023 study.
Notably, the US study also found that most estranged adult children eventually reconnected: 81 percent with their mothers and 69 percent with their fathers. The data suggest that estrangement is often temporary rather than permanent.
Studies conducted in such diverse regions as the US, Europe, and China have explored parent-child relationships in terms of emotional closeness, frequency of conflict, patterns of communication and contact, geographical proximity, and the exchange of practical, financial, or emotional support. One consistent finding stands out: There is no single “normal” or typical parent-child relationship in adulthood.
However many images of perfection may dance across our screens, lifelong closeness and regular contact are neither the default nor the norm. Many parents and adult children experience periods of little contact and periods of greater closeness. You may be fortunate to have a supportive family relationship, but you cannot assume that’s true for everyone.
Outsiders rarely know the full story of someone else’s family dynamics. What we often witness is the performance of family-curated moments shared at holidays, on social media, or in public spaces. Such performances can mask deep fractures, unresolved pain, or ongoing harm. Families maty appear close and functional from the outside world while privately experiencing conflict, coercion, or silence.
Instead, researchers identify a spectrum of relationship types, ranging from, in their own terms, “right-knit” to “detached,” with “sociable,” “intimate but distant,” and “obligatory” falling in between. Relationships between parents and adult children that are low in both contact and closeness are one pattern among many-and no study has concluded that it is becoming more common.
Although cut-offs between parents and adult children are often portrayed as a new phenomenon, family therapists have chronicled estrangement in their clients’ lives since the beginning, starting perhaps most notably with pioneering psychiatrist Murray Bowen in the 1960s. What likely has changed is how openly people talk about estrangement, with individuals feeling more comfortable today discussing what was once, and still often is, a source of shame.
Seeing estrangement in families on the global stage, such as the British royal family, may make people feel less alone in their own experience. Nevertheless, public narratives of estrangement often adopt a judgmental tone- casting millennials as self-absorbed snowflakes who cut off their patents on a whim and their parents, largely boomers, as emotionally rigid and resistant to change. The evidence, however, shows that no matter how common family cut-offs are, they are always highly painful for all those involved and rarely the result of a quick decision.
What I have observed in my own research is that estrangement rarely brings peace to people. It is always present in mind. Those who are estranged are constantly monitoring where they are in relation to each other.
Further, the pain of cut-offs is rarely localized to one relationship. Estrangement often has a ripple effect. When a parent-child relationship breaks down, it can afect sibling relationships, extended family ties, and broader family dynamics.
What Parents Say vs What Adult Children Say
From a handful of studies in the UK, US, and Australia, researchers have captured a snapshot of the lived experiences of estrangement.
Adult children often attribute estrangement from their parents to:
# Parental abuse and neglect in the past or present
# Authoritarian parenting in te past and/or present, marked by harsh criticism, many demands, and emotional volatility.
# Conditional parental affection, with parents showing love only when the children meet expectations.
# Parental rejection of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity.
Parents, for their part, commonly attribute estrangement to:
# The child’s choosing to maintain a relationship with the parent’s ex (the child’s only other parent) or the ex’s newer partner over and above maintaining a relationship with them. Some parents feel that their children were manipulated or pressured into making such choices by the other parent or that parent’s partner.
# A child’s mental health problem-anxiety, depression, personality disorder-or substance abuse problem.
# Disparate values and behaviors, such as difference in parenting styles, cleanliness, politics, or religion, leading to strained interactions in which parents feel they have to “walk on eggshells” to avoid conflict.
# The child’s punishing them for perceived wrongs, such as not providing financial support, leaving the family due to domestic violence, or being emotionally unavailable during childhood.
It might appear that parents attribute estrangement to the relationships that children have with their exes or their exes’ spouse, whole children attribute estrangement to their parents’ treatment of them. But That’s too simplistic a conclusion. The studies rely on volunteer samples, which likely come from those who are in the most pain and are primarily white women. None of the adult children and parents included are from the same family. No studies to date have examined the perspectives of parents and their own children, making it impossible to know for sure whether interpretations of estrangement differ or align between generations of a family.
Beyond the Individuals
Many additional factors contribute to estrangement between parents and children. Family structure plays a role. Estrangement is more common in families in which parents have divorced or a parent has died. Children are more likely to be estranged from one parent if they are already distant from another parental figure, demonstrating that family relationships are deeply interconnected.
What’s more, a mother’s difficult childhood can affect her relationship with her own children later in life. One large US study found that mothers who had more adverse childhood experience- being emotionally neglected or physically abused, growing up in a troubled home-are much more likely to have distant or estranged relationships with their children. In fact, children whose mothers had four or more adverse childhood experiences were more than four times more likely to be estranged from them. Early trauma may make it harder for mothers to manage emotions, build trust, and parent in healthy ways, which c an affect the quality of their relationship with their children even decades later.
Cultural tensions can also strain family dynamics. Families in which closeness depends on sameness may not tolerate a member’s differing lifestyle or political views, making estrangement more likely, a way for an individual to maintain their sense of self.
Whatever begins a cut-off, healing occurs when estrangement is no longer a central preoccupation.
Lucy Blake Ph.D. is a senior lecturer in psychology at the University of the West of England.
This article was first published in Psychology Today, December 2025
