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Journal Article Impoverished and African American fathers are often criticized by policy makers for lack of involvement in their children's lives. These criticisms are limited to defining responsible fatherhood as providing economic support while ignoring other forms of nurturing. Recent studies provide a broader perspective on how impoverished and African American fathers nurture their children. This article analyzes data from five studies carried out in Syracuse, New York, between 1996 and 2011. The studies support the contention that structural violence, inherent in the disproportionate incarceration of…
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Journal Article There is a potential high risk for child abuse by foreign-born mothers in multicultural families in Korea, particularly given that they experience acculturation and parenting stress at the same time. Further, the risk for child abuse by foreign-born mothers may be aggravated through the high rate of alcohol abuse among Korean husbands that may increase their spousal abuse and in turn the mothers' acculturation and parenting stress. Therefore, this study examined the associations between Korean fathers' alcohol use and spousal abuse and foreign-born mothers' child abuse in multicultural…
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Journal Article Compared with their White counterparts, preadolescent and adolescent males of color are disproportionately exposed to violence from multiple sources, including law enforcement, neighborhood community violence, and racially motivated attacks. Existing preventive and intervention strategies have primarily focused on the policing and/or reformation of individual youth. Alternatively, this article draws on both social-ecological and risk and resilience frameworks to argue for the mobilization of fathers, social fathers, and their sons of color, in a communication intervention strategy that…
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Journal Article This study describes a test of the Fathers and Sons Program for increasing intentions to avoid violence and reducing aggressive behaviors in 8- to 12-year-old African American boys by enhancing the parenting skills satisfaction and parenting behaviors of their nonresident fathers. The study included 158 intervention and 129 comparison group families. Structural equation model results indicated that the intervention was effective for improving fathers' parenting skills satisfaction, which was positively associated with sons' satisfaction with paternal engagement. Sons' paternal engagement…
Unpublished Paper
Guided by ecological resilience perspectives this study examined the association between various risk factors (neighborhood risk, discrimination, peer victimization, fathers' risk behaviors) and African American and Latino adolescent boys' physical and relational aggression. Fathers' parenting behaviors were examined primarily as mediators and moderators of those associations to determine how they might exacerbate or protect against those risks. Both adolescents and their fathers reported on fathers' parenting behaviors. Data were collected from 234 adolescents (mean age of 15.17, 34.2%…
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Journal Article This qualitative study represents one of the first efforts to examine how African American fathers protect their children from community violence. Eighteen African American biological and "social" fathers of preschoolers in the Washington, DC, metropolitan area participated in focus groups addressing parenting in violent neighborhoods. Fathers described seven protective strategies reflecting three major themes: monitoring children, educating children about safety, and improving community life. These strategies are discussed within the context of African American values, traditions, and…
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Journal Article Using an ecological framework, this study investigated African-American fathers' use of five protective strategies to keep their preschool children safe from community violence. Father, child, and contextual predictors of fathers' protective strategies were also examined. In-depth interviews with 61 African-American Head Start fathers and father figures revealed that participants were most likely to adopt the strategy of monitoring and teaching personal safety, followed by teaching neighborhood survival tactics, reducing exposure to violent media, engaging in community activism, and…
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Journal Article The salience of spirituality in African American family life is well documented. However, less is known about the role of spirituality in the parenting styles and practices of African American fathers generally or among those fathers rearing children in under-resourced, high-violence neighborhoods. African American families are disproportionately represented in communities characterized by violence, crime, and drug activity. This study explores how fathers residing in these neighborhoods rear their preschool sons and daughters and how spirituality relates to their fathering practices and…
