One in five people whose parents divorce during their childhood lose touch with at least one of the partners, according to a study.

Fathers are overwhelmingly more likely to drop out of the picture because custody has tended to be awarded to mothers, the statistics agency CBS said. The study, carried out in 2017 in collaboration with the University of Amsterdam, looked at the effect of divorce on people now aged between 25 and 46.

‘It’s likely that the split with the parents is initiated at an early stage,’ CBS spokeswoman Tanja Traag told the Volkskrant. ‘Because children more commonly grow up with their mothers, their fathers become more distant after divorce. Fathers often have better contact with the children of their new partners than with their own children.’

The group’s age profile coincides with the ‘wave divorces’ that followed changes in the law in 1971 to make it easier for couples to separate. Mothers were given custody in 73% of divorces involving children born in the 1970s, but the figure fell to 63% in the 1980s, as joint custody arrangements became more common.