An Examination of Fathers’ Mental Health Help Seeking: A Brief Report.

Fathers’ mental health help seeking is an understudied area. Using participants (N = 1,989) from the Fragile Familiesand Child Wellbeing Study, this study hypothesized that few fathers would seek mental health services; and increasesin anxiety, depression, and parental stress would predict less mental health help seeking. Only 3.2% of the participantsreported seeking mental health counseling. Among the three independent variables, only depression emerged as asignificant factor that predicted less mental health help-seeking behaviors in fathers. Future research and clinical effortsneed to better understand the low rates of help seeking and to identify pathways that facilitate positive mental healthhelp seeking among fathers. (Author abstract)