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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 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 The young adult years raise a number of intriguing questions about the relationship between fathers and daughters. How does the quality of their relationship throughout childhood manifest itself during a daughter's college years? In what specific ways is the 'well-fathered' daughter advantaged compared with daughters who had troubled or distant relationships with their fathers? What aspects of the daughter's college and early adult life are generally more influenced by her relationship with her father than by her relationship with her mother? This review of recent research provides intriguing…
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Journal Article Objectives: Postnatal depression affects approximately 15% of women in Western countries. There are conflicting findings about the effects on fathers as well as the extent to which fathers buffer against the negative effects of depression on children. This study sought to understand the ways in which maternal postnatal depression affects men and their ways of fathering. Design: Narrative interviews were conducted with 14 British fathers (mean age = 33.9 years) whose (ex)partners had experienced at least one episode of postnatal depression. Interviews explored how their partner's depression…
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Journal Article Intergenerational transmissions extend across a number of family-related behaviors, including marriage timing, fertility, and divorce. Surprisingly, few studies investigate the link between the fathering men experience and the fathering they ultimately engage in. I use data on the grandfathers and fathers of the 2001 U.S. birth cohort - measured in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (N=4050) - to test whether men's perception of the parenting they received influences their subsequent paternal self-assessments and behaviors. I find a nonlinear association between experiencing warm…
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Journal Article Men who have children with several partners are often assumed to be "deadbeats" who eschew their responsibilities to their children. Using data from the nationally representative National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 cohort (NLSY-97), we show that most men in complex families intensively parent the children of one mother while being less involved, or not involved at all, with children by others. Repeated qualitative interviews with 110 low-income noncustodial fathers reveal that men in complex families often engage with and provide, at least to some degree, for all of the biological…
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Journal Article Interventions for fathers are a recent growth area in family services. Although some specific approaches are beginning to be evaluated, there is little known about what kinds of interventions are more generally being used in practice. A web-based survey of practitioners was conducted in the UK, with contact being made via local authority service managers. Two hundred and twenty-one responses were received from 53% of local authorities. Both interventions specifically for fathers and services for both parents were targeted in the survey. Results are reported on organisational location;…
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Journal Article Our study investigated the relationship among daughters from father-absent homes, daughters' age of menarche, and daughters' first sexual intercourse. This study was conducted as a paper-and-pencil survey with a total of 12 questions answered by 342 undergraduate female students. Results indicated that females from father-absent homes reported experiencing menarche significantly earlier than females from father-present homes; significant correlations at the p
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Journal Article The absence of biological fathers in South Africa has been constructed as a problem for children of both sexes but more so for boy-children. Arguably the dominant discourse in this respect has demonized non-nuclear, female-headed households. Fathers are constructed as either absent or 'bad'. Thus it has become important to explore more closely how male care-givers have been experienced by groups of men in South Africa. This article examines discourses of fatherhood and fatherlessness by drawing on qualitative interviews with a group of 29 men who speak about their reported experiences and…
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Journal Article Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, this study examined the issue of American Indian nonresident father rights and obligations. Findings revealed that both American Indian mothers and fathers supported visitation rights, but decision-making rights were not highly supported unless the father was paying child support. Both American Indian parents were similar in their views regarding paternal responsibilities. Therefore, while general interventions to improve father involvement may work for American Indians, it is important for practitioners to explore how American…
