Sole custody
Child custody awarded to only one parent
Sole custody is a child custody arrangement whereby only one parent has custody of a child. In the most common use of the term, sole custody refers to a context in which one parent has sole physical custody of a child.
Types of custody
Depending upon the jurisdiction, custody may be divided into two components, legal custody and physical custody. Physical custody relates to the child's legal domicile and where the child resides. Legal custody involves the parents' participation in important life decisions pertaining to the child, such as significant medical decisions or where the child attends school. It is not uncommon for a parent with sole physical custody to share legal custody with the other parent, but it is uncommon for parents to share physical custody while one parent has sole legal custody.
History and prevalence
Historically, sole custody was the most common form of child custody granted after divorce. Since the 1980s, joint physical custody with shared parenting have become much more common, and in some jurisdictions there is a legislative preference or presumption in favor of joint legal custody, joint physical custody or both. Research indicates that children fare better in joint custody arrangements, or custody arrangements that allow a child to have good access to both parents.
Although women are granted sole custody more often than men, it is a popular misconception common in the men's rights movement that this is due to systemic bias; in reality it is because men infrequently contest or seek it.
“Sole custody” enters the record as child custody awarded to only one parent. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Sole, custody and Child can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Sole custody” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Sole, custody and Child provides the most credible route into that argument.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q7557477. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Sole custody”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Sole custody primary sources, Sole custody archive and Sole research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Sole custody”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Sole custody” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.