7 ways your dysfunctional relationship is affecting your kid's success

One of the biggest factors in determining whether kids grow up to be healthy, successful adults, is the relationship of their parents.

While there isn't a set recipe for ensuring achievement and happiness, psychology research has pointed to a handful of factors about marriage, divorce, and the interaction within a relationship that can predict a child's success.

Often, dysfunctional relationships are found to have negative effects.

                                          Here's some of what we know based on research:

Destructive conflict between parents can be detrimental to a child's psychological and physical well-being

E. Mark Cummings, a developmental psychologist at Notre Dame University, and his colleagues say there are a number of examples of destructive conflict, including: verbal aggression like name-calling, insults, and threats of abandonment and physical aggression like hitting and pushing.

Various research, Cummings tells Developmental Science, links homes with high levels of conflict to children having more physical health problems, emotional problems, and social problems later in life including vascular and immune problems, depression and emotional reactivity, substance dependency, loneliness, and problems with intimacy.

Passive fighting can cause a myriad of developmental problems, as well

According to the researchers, destructive conflict can also take on more passive forms, like avoidance, walking out, sulking, withdrawing, or capitulation.

Cummings said kids pick up on when a parent is giving in to avoid a fight or refusing to communicate, and their own emotional response is not positive.

"Our studies have shown that the long-term effects of parental withdrawal are actually more disturbing to kids' adjustment than open conflict," he says. He explains the children in this instance can perceive that something is wrong, which leads to stress, but they don't understand what or why, which means it's harder for them to adjust.

Chronic stress from repeated exposure to destructive conflict can result in kids that are worried, anxious, hopeless, angry, aggressive, behaviorally-challenged, sickly, tired, and struggling academically.

If you go through a nasty divorce when your kids are young, they're more likely to have poor relationships with you when they're adults

If you split up with a spouse when your kids are between three and five years old, your kids are more likely to have an insecure relationship with you when they're adults, especially if you're their father, according to a University of Illinois study. However, the divorce of parents doesn't predict insecure romantic relationships when kids become adults.

If you have a history of domestic abuse, your child has a higher risk of being obese as an adult

Several studies have shown a correlation between traumatic childhood experiences like witnessing domestic abuse and eating disorders.

The correlation may come down to psychology and physiology.

Traumatized children may turn to overeating as a form of self-medication since food can be a comforting escape.

And chronic stress caused by repeated traumatizing events can lead to consistently elevated levels of stress hormones like cortisol, which tells the body to deposit fat and store energy.

Divorce can lower household income, which could affect your child's working memory

According to a University of Illinois study review, following divorce, custodial parents (mostly mothers) generally have less income than most two-parent families. Due to limited economic resources, children in single-parent families may have more difficulties.

People who grow up in lower socioeconomic classes, for example, end up with a lower working memory — or the ability to hold multiple items in their minds — in adulthood, suggests a University of Oregon study.

If you or your partner abuses drugs, your kids will likely grow up to be super-serious adults

Kids that grew up witnessing their parents abusing drugs or alcohol probably ended up being the parent to their parents.

Because they skipped childhood altogether, they might become super-serious and not know how to have fun as an adult. They also tend to be overly responsible, says Portland Lifestyle Counseling.

Moving around a lot is linked to a higher probability of teen pregnancy or dropping out

Divorce can result in multiple life changes and stressors for kids, like a change in living arrangements.

One study from Western Washington University found that the more often children in single parent families moved, the more likely they were to drop out of school or become pregnant during the teen years.