An important new research report from politically diverse scholars working from seven leading universities and think tanks explores the importance of fathers for healthy child development. The report’s scope focuses on the state of Virginia, but its implications are applicable across the nation and the world. It documents important ways fathers matter for child and societal well-being.
The report asserts, “A large body of research indicates that children who have the benefit of an engaged father are more likely to flourish.” And they flourish in every important measure of academic, physical, emotional and social well-being. University of Delaware scholar Rob Palkovitz explains early in the report,
Greater positive father involvement with young children tends to be associated with overall life satisfaction, happiness, and psychological well-being when offspring reach early adulthood and fewer behavioral problems for children and adolescents.
The report’s authors explain “Social scientists in recent decades have learned that the value of an engaged father extends well beyond his paycheck.” They add, “Their value derives in part from the fact that fathers often parent in distinctive ways.” This is because fathers, as males, parent differently. It is well-documented that fathers play differently, discipline their children differently, they protect them differently than mothers and they communicate differently. Each of these differences make essential and unique contributions to healthy child development.
Father engagement has a measurable effect on children earning top grades in school. The following chart shows how fathers’ involvement boosts superior grade attainment for boys and girls.
Greater fatherhood engagement also has a dramatic impact in reducing depression in children.
These scholars report,
When the association between paternal engagement and childhood depression is controlled for family intactness and demographic factors like race and parental education, the odds of a child being depressed are nearly four (3.7) times greater for children with uninvolved fathers as for those with highly engaged fathers.
What is more, fathers who live with their children and are married to their mother spend about 10 times more time with their children compared to kids with non-residential fathers.
Children living with their married mother and father are roughly five times less likely to be living in poverty compared to peers in fatherless families.
Minority Kids Benefit Even More
Data indicate both Black and Hispanic kids benefit more strongly from intact families and father involvement than White children do, as show in this graph.
Children living in homes where their mother is married to the father, creating a situation where dad is dramatically more likely to be involved in the lives of their children, translates into dramatic reductions in children ever experiencing or witnessing neighborhood violence. Of course, this is a marked positive indicator for child well-being.
Scholars explain the power of this statistic:
After controlling for parent education, family income, race of child, immigrant status, and sex and age of child, the odds of exposure to violence were 10 times higher for children in father-absent homes, than for children with both parents present in the home.
Policy Recommendations
The report offers six policy recommendations they believe will help serve the promotion of fatherhood involvement and child well-being in the decades to come.
The first is making schools more boy friendly. Boys are falling behind girls in both grade school and college achievement. Correcting this means making all levels of education more appealing to boys’ imaginations, interests and learning styles. It also means seeking out more male teachers, especially in the earlier years. This is particularly important given the share of male K-12 teachers declined nationally from 33% in the early 1980s to 23% today. We must reverse this decline. We should also be more open to single-sex schools where boys can learn together as boys.
Schools should also teach the Success Sequence, a research-supported and relatively simple formula for nearly guaranteeing that no one ever lives poverty. Simply put, the Success Sequence requires three basic steps:
- Finish high school.
- Maintain a full-time job once you finish school.
- Get married before you have children and stay married.
A full 97% of youth who follow these steps will never be poor as adults. It works just as powerfully for minority youth and those from broken and impoverished homes.
Their second recommendation is creating a more positive culture of fatherhood and father involvement. This can be done through policy changes, public service announcements and greater overall education on the essential importance of dads being married to their child’s mother and involved in their kids’ lives.
The third recommendation is limiting access to pornography. The scholars’ reasoning is simple:
The near-universal availability of pornography has deformed countless boys’ conception of healthy relationships. Through pornography, young men are trained to enjoy violence, domination, and the objectification of the opposite sex as part and parcel of relationships and a future marriage and family life.
They are precisely right. We cannot form good fathers and a healthy marriage culture in porn-saturated society.
Their fourth proposal is what they call “reviving civic effort to promote prosocial masculinity.” This means countering the vile and corrosive idea that masculinity is inherently toxic and replacing that with vibrant examples of what healthy, prosocial masculinity looks like, helping more boys and young men become “responsible, respectful, and hard-working family men in the future.”
Their fifth proposal is to help all dads, regardless of racial, economic or educational background, flourish in the lives of their children. The related sixth proposal involves helping previously incarcerated fathers re-enter the lives of their children and maximize their positive influence on their sons and daughters.
Richard V. Reeves, a Brookings Institution scholar, president of the American Institute for Boys and Men and co-author of the report, says of fathers,
Dads matter. Fatherhood is a load-bearing wall—for healthy families, flourishing kids and for strong communities. For too long, the debate over fathers has focused too narrowly on financial issues, as if dads are little more than walking ATMs. But fathers are providers of love, time, energy and laughter as much as of money.
Focus on the Family applauds every effort to educate citizens on the importance of fatherhood. This helpful report furthers that work in important ways.
Related Articles and Resources
The Important Parenting Differences Between Moms and Dads
Married Fatherhood Makes Men Better
Important New Research on How Married Parents Improve Child Well-Being
New Research Shows Married Families Matter More Than Ever
Why Marriage Really Matters – 3 Focus on the Family Reports
Reclaiming the Truth About Marriage
Research Update: The Compelling Health Benefits of Marriage
New Research: Marriage Still Provides Major Happiness Premium
Cohabitation Still Harmful – Even as Stigma Disappears
Don’t Believe the Modern Myth. Marriage Remains Good for Women
Don’t Believe the Modern Myth. Marriage Remains Good for Men.
Married Mothers and Fathers Are Happiest According to Gold-Standard General Social Survey
Image from Shutterstock.
