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Training Materials The one-day Social Worker Training Curriculum: Engaging the Non-Resident Father was designed to provide participants with knowledge to support a practice shift toward engaging non-resident fathers in child welfare cases involving their children. The need to engage fathers initially resulted from the federal Child and Family Service Reviews (CFSRs) and the “What About the Dads?” report, which identified a lack of meaningful engagement of fathers by child welfare systems. This curriculum was funded by the QIC-NRF, which was designed to develop knowledge and research that determine how…
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Journal Article Research on family structure has led some to claim that sex-based parenting differences exist. But if such differences exist in single-parent families, the absence of a second parent rather than specific sex-typed parenting might explain them. We examine differences in mothering and fathering behavior in single-parent households, where number of parents is held constant, and we describe individualist and structuralist perspectives for potential sex-based parenting behaviors. We compare 3,202 single mothers and 307 single fathers in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (Kindergarten Cohort…
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Journal Article Using a sample of 3,977 youths from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY97), this study examines the unique characteristics of single-custodial-father families with adolescents and the effects of single fathers' involvement and parenting on outcomes in emerging adulthood. Findings suggest that single-custodial-father families are distinct from single-mother and 2-biological-parent families in terms of sociodemographic characteristics, parenting styles, and involvement. Parenting styles and involvement mediate the differences between single-father families and 2-parent families in…
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Journal Article Jane Waldfogel, Terry-Ann Craigie, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn review recent studies that use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) to examine why children who grow up in single-mother and cohabiting families fare worse than children born into married-couple households. They also present findings from their own new research.Analysts have investigated five key pathways through which family structure might influence child well-being: parental resources, parental mental health, parental relationship quality, parenting quality, and father involvement. It is also important to…
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Journal Article To improve the quality and stability of couple and father-child relationships in fragile families, researchers are beginning to consider how to tailor existing couple-relationship and father-involvement interventions, which are now targeted on married couples, to the specific needs of unwed couples in fragile families. The goal, explain Philip Cowan, Carolyn Pape Cowan, and Virginia Knox, is to provide a more supportive developmental context for mothers, fathers, and, especially, the children in fragile families.The authors present a conceptual model to explain why couple-relationship and…
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Journal Article Since the mid-1970s the U.S. imprisonment rate has increased roughly fivefold. As Christopher Wildeman and Bruce Western explain, the effects of this sea change in the imprisonment rate--commonly called mass imprisonment or the prison boom--have been concentrated among those most likely to form fragile families: poor and minority men with little schooling.Imprisonment diminishes the earnings of adult men, compromises their health, reduces familial resources, and contributes to family breakup. It also adds to the deficits of poor children, thus ensuring that the effects of imprisonment on…
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Training Materials NFI has released Understanding Domestic Violence, a three session curriculum module that can be used to raise awareness about this critical issue. Through three, interactive sessions, fathers will learn more about domestic violence, its warning signs, and its cyclical nature and effects. (Author abstract modified)Note: For more information, visit https://store.fatherhood.org/fathertopics-booster-session-understanding…
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This updated edition explains what program evaluation is, why evaluation is important, how to conduct an evaluation and understand the results, how to report evaluation findings, and how to use evaluation results to improve programs that benefit children and families. (Author abstract)
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This brief describes efforts in Kansas, Texas, and Kentucky to implement innovative practices to engage fathers and paternal relatives in the lives of children involved with the child welfare system. Kansas has changed the word "parent" to the phrase "mother and father" throughout the Children and Family Services policy manual, provides training on father engagement, strengthened requirements for contacting relatives of children entering foster care, and sponsors an annual Fatherhood Summit. Texas has created the State-level position of Fatherhood Program Specialist to spearhead a…
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Journal Article This editorial article discusses various reports published within the special issue of Early Child Development and Care entitled Emerging Topics on Father Attachment: Considerations in Theory, Context and Development, which includes several articles on children's attachment to fathers.
