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Journal Article
Although scholars have highlighted the differential impacts of father involvement on the outcomes of sons and daughters, less attention has been given to the impact of father involvement on Black adolescent females. This line of inquiry is important given the unique risks Black females face, such as increased likelihood of early unintended pregnancy, increasing rates of delinquency, and increased interaction with law enforcement. Given its potential impact, it is important to explore the ways in which father involvement matters to female adolescents’ intentions to engage in risky behaviors…
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Journal Article
Numerous studies have shown that children's temperamental characteristics impact the quality and quantity of parent–child interactions. However, these studies have largely focused on middle‐class samples, have not compared multiple domains of parenting across mothers and fathers, and have not considered the possibility of nonlinear associations between temperament and parenting. The present study addresses these gaps by examining the potentially nonlinear role of two temperamental characteristics—negative emotionality and sociability—in predicting the quality and quantity of low‐income…
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Journal Article
Literature in developmental psychology suggests that mothers and fathers both play unique and important roles in their children’s development. However, research investigating the unique contributions and psychological functioning of fathers of youth with developmental disabilities, and the role that fathers play in effective intervention, remains limited. Whereas evidence suggests that parent-mediated interventions for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can lead to increased engagement from parents, and reduced stress and psychopathology commonly experienced by parents of youth with…
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Journal Article
Despite high heritability, no research has followed children with ADHD to parenthood to study their offspring and parenting behaviors. Given greater prevalence of ADHD in males and lack of research involving fathers, this study evaluated offspring of fathers with and without ADHD histories for ADHD and disruptive behavior and compared fathers’ parenting behaviors. Male fathers (N = 29) from the Pittsburgh ADHD Longitudinal Study (PALS) participated with their preschool-aged offspring. Fathers completed self-reported measures, and father-child dyads completed an interaction task. ADHD…
Brief
In fiscal year 2018, noncustodial parents were obligated to pay nearly $33.6 billion in current child support on behalf of the 15 million children served by the Title IV-D child support program. One-third of that, or $11 billion, was not collected. Unemployment is the leading reason for non-payment of child support by noncustodial parents. This brief will explore the opportunities at the state and federal levels to provide employment services to noncustodial parents and increase child support payments in the process.
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Journal Article
This project explored the integration of Responsible Fatherhood within Foster Care Service within Philadelphia Pennsylvania. It was hypothesized that the key to reducing the number of children who are at risk of entering, re-entering and remaining in various systems of care are the social service programs and systems created to meet the needs of children. One element to improve the outcomes for children is to establish that engaging fathers of foster children can be important not only for the potential benefit of a child-father relationship but also for making placement decisions and…
Brief
Parent education reduces the risk of child abuse and neglect by encouraging positive parenting practices that promote safety, well-being, and permanency for children and families. The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA), as reauthorized in 2010, identifies parent education as a core prevention service. Many of the Children’s Bureau’s Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention (CBCAP) grants fund parent education programming as part of local community prevention efforts. Successful parent education helps parents and caregivers acquire the skills needed to build healthy families and…
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Journal Article
Taking a preventive father-inclusive approach, the Supporting Father Involvement (SFI) intervention aims to strengthen coparenting, parent–child relationships, and child outcomes. This study replicates four prior iterations of the program using the same 32-hour curriculum facilitated by clinically trained staff, case managers, and onsite child care and family meals. With its intentional outreach and inclusion of fathers, SFI offers an effective intervention for lower risk child welfare–involved families. Results argue for the utility of treating community and child welfare parents in mixed…
Parents who are involved with child welfare services (CWSI) often have a history of childhood adversity and depressive symptoms. Both affect parenting quality, which in turn influences child adaptive functioning. We tested a model of the relations between parental depression and child regulatory outcomes first proposed by K. Lyons-Ruth, R. Wolfe, A. Lyubchik, and R. Steingard (2002). We hypothesized that both parental depression and parenting quality mediate the effects of parental early adversity on offspring regulatory outcomes. Participants were 123 CWSI parents and their toddlers assessed…
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Journal Article
While research exists on maternal preferences and decisions about child care, fathers are an underrepresented population in this literature. In an effort to fill this gap, this study examines the types of child care preferred, the level of involvement in the decision-making process, as well as the importance of certain characteristics of nonparental care in a sample of 130 fathers of children under the age of 6 years (6.2% of whom did not live with the child). Sixty-four percent of fathers in this sample indicated active involvement in making child care decisions with the child’s mother and…