Dependent students must report their parents information, as well as their own, on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form. 
Find out who counts as your parent when you file your FAFSA form. If you are considered a dependent student for FAFSA purposes , you will need to provide information about your legal parent on the application. A legal parent is your biological or adoptive parent, or your legal parent as determined by the state for example, if the parent is listed on your birth certificate. If you have a stepparent currently married to your legal parent , you generally also must provide information about him or her. View text-only version 

Who is my parent according to the FAFSA form? 
If you need to report parent information , here are some guidelines to help you : If your legal parents your biological and/or adoptive parents, or parents as determined by the state [e.g., a parent listed on your birth certificate] are married to each other, answer the questions about both of them, regardless of whether your parents are of the same or opposite sex. If your legal parents are not married to each other and live together , answer the questions about both of them, regardless of whether your parents are of the same or opposite sex. If your legal parent is widowed or was never married , answer the questions about that parent. 

What if my parents are divorced or separated? 
In this case , how you fill out the FAFSA form depends on whether your parents live together or not. Keep the following in mind as you read this section : For FAFSA purposes , your married parents are separated if they are considered legally separated by a state, or if they are legally married but have chosen to live separate lives, including living in separate households, as though they were not married. When two married persons live as a married couple but are separated by physical distance or have separate households , they are considered married for FAFSA purposes. 

Divorce

user: I am trying to fill out my FAFSA form and I was wondering if my parents need to fill out any of it but I am not sure. Can you help me?

assistant: I can definitely assist you with this. Your parents do have a section that they need to fill out on the form. 

user: Ok, thanks. What will they need to fill out on it?

user: Also, I need to know if I have to have both parents fill it out. My parents are divorced and I live with my dad and won't see my mom in person until the summer. 

assistant: They can be listed as divorced on the form. You should have your father fill out information on the form since you live with him the majority of the time. 

user: Oh, that could be a problem. I don't think my dad wants to put any of his information on the form. I tried to tell him it was for college but he worries about having his private information in the hands of a stranger and he won't fill out my form. What do I do?

assistant: You can go to the myStudentAid app and there will be an option under a list of special circumstances to check if your parents refuses to provide the information needed. 

user: My friend is also filling out a form and wants to know what to do if their parents were never married, if that makes any difference.

assistant: They would still be your friend's parents regardless of marital status, so your friend should still try to fill out the form with their help.

user: You said there were special circumstances to not filling out the parent part. What are they?

assistant: If your parents are incarcerated, you have left the house due to abuse, you don't know where your parents are and you cannot contact them even though you are not adopted, or if you are between 21 and 24 and not living with family but homeless or at risk of homelessness, those are the special circumstances.