The children of incarcerated men are at high risk for poverty, community violence, poor school performance, gang participation, and delinquency. However, incarceration presents many challenges to parent-child relationships, including loss of income and ability to provide financial support, restrictive visitation policies, transportation for families, and literacy skills. States have a vested interest in strengthening families as a strategy for preventing the future criminal involvement of children at risk and for motivating men to succeed when they are released from prison. Innovative…
This report contends that father absence matters. While the poverty rate for two-parent families is 8.4%, it is 31.3% in divorced families and 64.1% where parents never married. Children raised without fathers perform more poorly in school, develop emotional problems, engage in risky behavior, and experience more violence. Children raised with fathers have higher self-esteem, learn better, and are less likely to be depressed. Some 23 million children live in homes without fathers. This report, tracing the history, accomplishments, and current needs of the fatherhood field, is addressed to…
Data was used from the 1997 Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities to investigate risk factors that are present in the lives of incarcerated parents and their children, and how these differentially relate to children's living arrangements. The final sample for the study included 6,870 fathers and 2,047 mothers who were incarcerated in State or Federal prison in 1997. Results indicate children are increasingly likely to be placed with someone other than a parent, and are particularly likely to be placed in foster or agency care, as the number of risk factors rises. The…
Relying on new data from fathers in the Fragile Families and Child WellBeing survey (n=2,903), the author examines fathers reports of the most important perceived paternal role among six different domains: providing economic support, direct care, love and affection, protection, discipline, and teaching the child about life. Approximately half of all fathers identified providing love and affection as the most important thing that fathers do. A substantial minority said that teaching the child about life was the key activity; whereas a relatively small proportion said that economic support and…
This policy brief explores the impact of parental incarceration on young children and how communities, social service agencies, health care providers, and the criminal justice system can work collaboratively to better meet the needs of the families left behind. It begins by discussing the characteristics of incarcerated parents and the consequences of imprisonment on children. It cites research indicating short-term effects on children including: feelings of shame, social stigma, loss of financial support, weakened ties to the parent, change in family composition, poor school performance,…
A study investigated the characteristics of fathers whose children are participating in the Early Head Start program, their level of involvement with their families and children, and how and why involvement changes over time. Two interviews and associated observations were conducted with 108 men, identified by mothers as involved in their child's life, within the first 14 months of their children's lives. Findings indicate almost all of the fathers were the biological fathers and most were living with their children. The fathers were involved in multiple ways with their children, including:…
Almost one-third of all children and 70% of African American children in the U.S. are born to parents who are not married. At the time of children's births, almost all unmarried fathers have contact with their infants, but this connection drops over time. This study presents a study of 55 unmarried low-income African American couples in the early months after the birth of a child. The study considers the implications of the quality of parents' couple relationship, as well as of parents' demographics, personal resources, and family structure for understanding variation in fathers' involvement…
This study reviewed research about fathering to develop a framework for understanding the variables that influence the level of father involvement in the life of a child. The contextual analysis is intended to inform responsible fatherhood initiatives and programs. Research findings indicate that father involvement is affected significantly by environmental factors, such as the man's relationship with the mother of his child, employment status, and income level. The study suggests that the contextual nature of fatherhood indicates that cultural, economic, institutional, and interpersonal…
This paper reports findings from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to examine union formation among unmarried parents who have just had a child together. Multinomial logistic regression was used to estimate the effects of economic, cultural/interpersonal, and other factors on whether parents are romantically involved living apart, cohabitating, married to each other, or not romantically involved one year after the child's birth. Net of other factors, women's education and men's earnings encourage marriage. Cultural and interpersonal factors also have strong effects. Women's trust…
This prospective study of a birth cohort was conducted to identify the factors that predict the age at which young men make the transition to fatherhood and whether those characteristics predict how long young men live with their children. The research also examined the link between individual differences in the amount of time fathers spend living with their children and fathers' psychosocial characteristics in young adulthood. Data from the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study in New Zealand were analyzed for the project. Findings revealed that by age 26, 19 percent of the…
