Doctoral dissertation: Bird’s nest parenting helps keep a child's life stable after parents have separated

When a family breaks up, many children lose their stable home and have to adjust to living between several households. This lifestyle can be exhausting for the child and can exacerbate stress and health problems associated with separation.

Rafaela Lehtme, a PhD student at Tallinn University's School of Governance, Law and Society, shows in her thesis that the solution may lie in bird’s nest parenting – a form of joint child custody where the children stay in one home after separation and the parents are the ones that move back and forth.

The child's needs come first

Although media coverage suggests that bird’s nest parenting is on the rise in Western countries, there has been little scientific research into its benefits or harms. So far, both positive and critical views have been based mainly on personal opinion. Therefore, the aim of the thesis was to gain a deeper understanding of the nature of bird’s nest parenting, based primarily on the needs and interests of the child, i.e. whether and how this living arrangement ensures the child's well-being.

To this end, Lehtme explored bird’s nest parenting from three different perspectives by interviewing child protection officials and parents and children living in this arrangement.

One house as the foundation for a sense of security

The experiences of the research participants suggest that a stable home environment is more than just a physical space. A fixed home can have a decisive impact on all aspects of a child's well-being. Although bird’s nest parenting requires a significant commitment from parents, the effort was well worth it for the parents who took part in the study. The conscious choice to put their children's best interests first made the living arrangements a meaningful and, in practicalterms, well-functioning solution that improved the well-being not only of the children but of the whole family.

The benefits of bird’s nest parenting:

• the children's lives were able to continue as usual without major reorganisation, ensuring both physical and emotional stability;
• the children were under no pressure to choose between parents or homes;
• the children still have a strong sense of home;
• living in the same home as their children increased a sense of equality between parents and helped to ease stress;
• for the parents, it reduced the burden of organising their children's lives, making life more comfortable for everyone, e.g. by reducing the stress of packing and transporting the children's belongings;
• knowing that their children were happy freed the parents to focus on what was important in their own lives;
• the parents' relationships with their children was strengthened through a conscious commitment, as opposed to 'hosting' them;
• siblings were able to grow up together as a family despite the divorce;
• the living arrangements provided children with various opportunities for independence, such as chores, practising independent living and planning their own time.

The child can be driven by inner need, not logistics

"While the contribution of bird’s nest parenting in maintaining the child's sense of security is easy to understand, what was more surprising was how strongly this living arrangement also supported the children's growing independence," explains Lehtme. The experiences of the families in the study show how living permanently in their own home gave children the security they needed, while also providing opportunities for gradual independence. Unlike other shared parenting solutions, children were able to base their choices on internal need rather than external pressures or logistics.

"Bird’s nest parenting shifts the focus from parental rights to parental responsibilities as the family breaks down," Lehtme stresses, underlining the important shift in mindset that the research highlights. It is in the best interests of the children that the changes that come with separation are the adults’ responsibility, not the children’s.

There is a growing need in society for child-friendly post-divorce solutions. Bird’s nest parenting is an innovative approach that raises awareness of children's well-being and supports social change.

At the same time, it is important to emphasize that if bird's nest parenting is not possible, shared parenting between two homes supports a child’s well-being more than a situation in which the relationship with one parent is severed.

 

The thesis defence

Rafaela Lehtme is a PhD student at Tallinn University’s School of Governance, Law and Society.

Her PhD thesis is entitled Bird’s Nest Parenting as a Child-centred Approach to Shared Parenting: A Phenomenological Study About the experiences of Children, Parents and Child Protection Workers.
The public defence of the thesis will take place on 19 January 2026 at 18:00 in Tallinn University Hall M648.
The public can also follow the defence and ask the degree candidate questions through Zoom.

The supervisors of the thesis are Karmen Toros, Professor of Social Work at Tallinn University, and Merike Sisask, Professor of Social Health at Tallinn University.

The opponents are Edward Kruk, Emeritus Professor at the University of British Columbia, and Dagmar Kutsar, Associate Professor at the University of Tartu.

The doctoral thesis is available in the ETERA digital environment of the Tallinn University Academic Library.