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Journal Article The study reported here evaluated the efficacy of Partners in Parenting (PIP), which, in collaboration with Colorado State University Extension, was implemented in seven counties across Colorado. A total of 54 parents took part in the study. A pretest/posttest design was used to assess short-term changes in parenting practices, parental attitudes, and parental stress following intervention. After PIP, parents demonstrated improvement in basic elements of parent-child relationships and parenting attitudes and skills. These promising results warrant further investigation into the benefits of…
Webinar
This webinar presented ideas, strategies and resources to use in working with dads to enhance their parenting knowledge and skills. Topics included: sharing strategies programs might use to show fathers the importance of early father-infant bonding; looking at ways to help fathers increase their understanding of child development and age-appropriate behavior; considering approaches to engage fathers in discussion about appropriate child discipline; and, providing examples of activities that two of your fellow grantees have used to help fathers with parenting knowledge and skills. (Author…
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Journal Article The current study investigated how fathering behaviors (acceptance, rejection, monitoring, consistent discipline, and involvement) are related to preadolescent adjustment in Mexican American and European American stepfamilies and intact families. Cross-sectional data from 393 7th graders, their schoolteachers, and parents were used to examine links between different dimensions of fathering and adolescent outcomes. Following an ecological multivariate model, family SES, marital satisfaction, and mothers' parenting were included as controls. In all contexts, fathering had significant effects…
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Journal Article This study explored first-time fathers' perceived child care skill over the transition to parenthood, based on face-to-face interviews of 152 working-class, dual-earner couples. Analyses examined the associations among fathers' perceived skill and prenatal perception of skill, child care involvement, mothers' breastfeeding, maternal gatekeeping, mothers' work hours, fathers' depressive symptoms, and fathers' beliefs about responding to a crying child. Involvement was also examined as a potential mediator between some predictors and perceived skill. Findings suggest that breastfeeding and…
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Journal Article Although scholars and policy makers herald the promotive influence of fathers' parenting involvement, limited research has carefully delineated effects of fathers' parenting on low-income children's development and whether early contributions from fathers confer long-term protective effects. Using data from the Three-City Study (N = 261), analyses assessed whether fathers' parenting practices during early childhood showed long-term links with low-income children's cognitive skills through middle childhood. Results found that fathers' warm and stimulating parenting predicted enhanced reading…
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Journal Article Considerable debate exists regarding whether religiousness promotes or impedes greater father involvement in parenting. Our study addresses this issue using a Midwestern longitudinal data set that tracks the transition to first parenthood for 169 married couples. We focus on performance of the "messier" tasks of infant care. We find little evidence that religiousness enhances father involvement in this domain. Biblically conservative couples exhibit a greater gender gap in child care than others, with mothers more involved than fathers. The gender gap is also greater the more fathers work…
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Journal Article Using longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study (analytic sample N = 712), we investigate how age, adult role acquisition and attainments, family resources, parent-child relationship quality, school attendance, and life events influence support received from parents in young adulthood. Parental assistance was found to be less forthcoming for those who had made greater progress on the road to adulthood, signified by socioeconomic attainment and union formation. The quality of mother-child and father-child relationships affected parental support in different ways, positively for…
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Journal Article OBJECTIVE: To examine the associations between depression in fathers of 1-year-old children and specific positive and negative parenting behaviors discussed by pediatric providers at well-child visits. METHODS: We performed a cross-sectional secondary analysis by using interview data from 1746 fathers of 1-year-old children in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. Positive parenting behaviors included fathers' reports of playing games, singing songs, and reading stories to their children 3 days in a typical week. Negative parenting behavior included fathers' reports of spanking…
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Journal Article This is a qualitative study documenting the experiences of fathers who participated in the Helping Our Toddlers, Developing Our Children's Skills (HOT DOCS) behavioral parent training (BPT) series and later agreed to participate in a focus group. Focus groups methodology was used to capture the voices and perspectives of fathers regarding the benefits and barriers to their participation in BPT. The focus group interviews were conducted in both English and in Spanish, with three cohorts of male caregivers who were participants in HOT DOCS from 2006 to 2008. An analysis of their responses coded…
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Journal Article We focused on coparenting support, partner relationship quality, and father engagement in families with young children that did not change structurally over 4 years of participation in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study (N = 1,756). There was a significantly stronger and more robust positive association between fathers' perceived coparenting support at age 1 and father engagement at age 3 among nonresidential nonromantic parents compared with residential (married or cohabiting) and nonresidential romantic parents. There was a significantly stronger and positive association…
