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Journal Article Why do men tend to underutilize mental health services? One reason may be that men are less frequently referred to seek such services. Indeed, male friends and family members may be particularly unlikely to refer men to seek mental health services, as it means going against the traditional male gender role proscription of talking to other men about emotional issues. This study is the first to explore how men’s experiences of gender role conflict may be associated with an increased endorsement of stigmatization around mental health concerns and, subsequently, a decreased willingness to…
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Journal Article Problem eating is common during childhood, though much of what is known is based on maternal reports. The current study aimed to compare mother and father reports of child mealtime difficulties and associated parenting, by surveying parents of normally developing 1.5–6-year olds. Two samples were procured: The first, 110 mothers and 109 fathers of children with or without problem eating; the second, 44 mother/father pairs that each reported on the same child. Mothers and fathers of problem eaters, and those of non-problem eaters, did not differ significantly on reports of child behavior,…
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Journal Article Contemporary norms of fatherhood emphasize the dual demands of breadwinning and daily involvement in child care. Recent qualitative research suggests that working-class fathers find it difficult to meet these demands due to job instability and workplace inflexibility. Yet little quantitative research has examined how employment characteristics are related to fathers’ parenting stress, in comparison with mothers’. Analyses using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 3,165) show that unemployment and workplace inflexibility, but not overwork, multiple jobs, odd jobs, and…
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Journal Article Mixed methods were used to evaluate the effectiveness of the Fathers Offering Children Unfailing Support (FOCUS) program. FOCUS is a diversion program which is designed to offer an alternative to incarceration for fathers who are noncompliant with child support payments. Quantitative data were collected through a pretest/posttest design (n = 55) and qualitative data were collected through telephone interviews with FOCUS instructors (n = 2) and community key stakeholders (n = 5) and focus groups with FOCUS participants (n = 76). FOCUS appears to be benefiting children by increasing their…
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Journal Article Preschool children living in low-income families are at increased risk for poor outcomes; early intervention programmes mitigate these risks. While there is considerable evidence of the effectiveness of centre-based programmes in other jurisdictions, there is limited research about Canadian programmes, specifically programmes that include children and parents. The purpose of this study was to evaluate a single-site, two-generation preschool demonstration programme for low-income families in Canada. A single group, pre-test (programme intake) /post-test (programme exit) design with a 7-year-…
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Journal Article This issue of The Future of Children assesses past and current two-generation programs. But it goes much further than that. The editors identified six widely acknowledged mechanisms or pathways through which parents, and the home environment they create, are thought to influence children’s development: stress, education, health, income, employment, and assets. Understanding how these mechanisms of development work—and when, where, and how they harm or help—should aid us in designing interventions that boost children’s intellectual and socioemotional development, strengthen families, and help…
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Journal Article African American men are not commonly thought of favorably as fathers, especially in regard to their children's education. Using an adapted qualitative version of the quantitative fathering involvement scale, which is based on engagement, accessibility, and responsibility, this study investigates how 9 African American men attempt to be good fathers as well as what they do to help their children in school. The findings suggest that African American men can indeed be good fathers and positively influence their children's educational outcomes. The interviewed African American fathers' parental…
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Journal Article The authors performed a cluster analysis on data from 270 divorced or separated parents to classify their perceived coparental relationship with their ex-spouse and test if parents' perceptions of their children's postdivorce adjustment differed based on their perceptions of their postdivorce coparental relationship. The cluster analysis resulted in three types of coparenting relationships: cooperative and involved, moderately engaged, and infrequent but conflictual. Despite the expectation that children fare better if their divorced parents' develop a cooperative coparenting relationship,…
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Journal Article Almost two-thirds of children in non-relative foster care live in homes headed by married couples. However, the literature includes little about either the role of foster fathers or the complexity and importance of the marital context for fostering. This study examined family functioning, overt interparental hostility, depression, and parental acceptance in a sample of 111 heterosexual foster parent couples and the relationship between family context and potential to foster parent successfully. Latent class analysis revealed three distinct types of foster parent couples, ?Good Context? (33…
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Journal Article The present study used a qualitative approach to examine clinicians' experiences as trainees of an evidence-based parenting program, parent-child interaction therapy (PCIT). In order to explore factors related to successful implementation and maintenance of the PCIT program in a community setting, twenty-nine community clinicians completed phone interviews six months to four years after an initial forty-hour PCIT training workshop. Clinicians reported positive experiences with the training, but also described barriers related to agency, client, program, and training factors. Findings…
