Nonresident Fathers and Children's Well-Being : A Meta-Analysis.

We employed meta-analytic methods to pool information from 63 studies dealing with nonresident fathers and children's well-being. Fathers' payment of child support was positively associated with measures of children's well-being. The frequency of contact with nonresident fathers was not related to child outcomes in general. Two additional dimensions of the father-child relationship--feelings of closeness and authoritative parenting--were positively associated with children's academic success and negatively associated with children's externalizing and internalizing problems. (Author abstract).