red dot icon
Journal Article This article studied the relations of children's mental health problems to the warmth of their relationship with their noncustodial father and custodial mother and the level of conflict between the parents. Using a sample of 182 divorcing families, multiple regression was used to test the independent effect of father warmth, mother warmth, and interparental conflict. Results indicated that father warmth and mother warmth were both independently related to lower child-externalizing problems. However, the relations between mother and child warmth and child-internalizing problems were different…
red dot icon
Journal Article A stress-buffering hypothesis for parenting was tested in a county-representative sample of 218 divorced fathers. Social support for parenting (emergency and nonemergency child care, practical support, financial support) was hypothesized to moderate effects of stress (role overload, coparental conflict, and daily hassles) on fathers' quality parenting. No custody fathers relied more on relatives compared with custodial fathers, who relied more on new partners for parenting support. No differences by custody status were found on levels of support or parenting over time. Parenting support…
red dot icon
Journal Article Associations between preschoolers' attachment security, fathers' involvement (i.e. parenting behaviors and consistency) and fathering context (i.e. fathers' internal working models (IWMs) and use of social support) were examined in a subsample of 102 fathers, taken from a larger sample of 235 culturally diverse US families. The authors' predicted that fathers' involvement would mediate associations between children's attachment security and less proximal fathering context. Fathers completed questionnaires regarding their parenting behaviors, IWMs of adult relationships, their use of social…
red dot icon
Journal Article Accounts of fathers' reluctance to engage with locally based family learning groups rarely acknowledge the relationship between learning and identity. This tends not to be the case in parallel accounts of women's reluctance to become involved in groups or networks where the mainstream clientele is male. Drawing on the case study of a national initiative aimed at developing family literacy in local communities throughout the UK, it is argued that decisions to join or not to join these groups is primarily social and cultural rather than individual. This means that the attendance of fathers…
red dot icon
Journal Article This research links residence with biological and nonbiological married and unmarried parents to the cognitive achievement and behavioral problems of children aged 3-12, controlling for factors that make such families different. The data were drawn from the 1997 Child Development Supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Achievement differences were not associated with father family structure per se, but with demographic and economic factors that differ across families. In contrast, behavioral problems were linked to family structure even after controls for measured and unmeasured…
red dot icon
Journal Article Involving caregivers in their children's services often is assumed to make the delivery of child-focused services more effective. We examined the relation of caregiver involvement in children's early intervention programs (EIPs) with caregiver-child interaction. Participants were 99 low-income single caregivers whose children ( 40 months old) were enrolled in EIPs that provided opportunities for caregiver involvement. The results confirmed that caregivers who were more engaged with the programs (as rated by program staff) were more likely to demonstrate more responsiveness in interactions…
red dot icon
Journal Article This article uses a sample of 867 African American households to investigate differences in parenting practices and child outcomes by type of household. Results indicate that mothers provide similar levels of parenting regardless of family structure. Secondary caregivers, however, show a great deal of variation in quality of parenting. Fathers and grandmothers engage in the highest quality parenting, stepfathers the poorest, with other relatives falling in between. These differences in parenting do not explain family structure differences in child behavior problems. Results suggest that…
red dot icon
Journal Article We examine the relation between low-income fathers' presence in their children's lives and their children's early developmental outcomes using data from Early Head Start. We grouped 1,930 children into 5 "classes" using maternal reports of fathers' presence and conectedness with the child. We developed the 5 mutually exclusive classes based on biological relatedness, residence in the home or frequency of contact, and stability of the relationship over time. We regressed 6 child outcomes on these classes of father connectedness (controlling for covariates). We also examined differences by race…
red dot icon
Journal Article Departing from the typical focus of intervention studies on service use and program effects for mothers and children, this article examines the extent to which fathers are present as clients in Early Head Start intervention programs for infants and toddlers. The article uses descriptive findings from 2 studies: the first is a population survey of 261 Early Head Start programs (National Practitioners Survey), and the second is a father involvement demonstration program of 21 programs (Fatherhood Demonstration Study). Similar measures enabled comparability across the studies. The 2 studies…
red dot icon
Journal Article Policy makers propose to promote healthy marriage among low-income unmarried couples by providing services to improve relationship skills. This article uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to explore whether enhancing parents' relationship skills may have spillover effects on parent-child relationships. Drawing on findings that relationship quality is positively associated with parenting among married couples, the study examines whether a similar link holds for unmarried couples. A positive association is observed between parents' relationship quality at the time of a…
