Father Absence and Adolescent Depression and Delinquency: A Comparison of Siblings Approach

Although associations between having a nonresident father and increased internalizing and externalizing behaviors in adolescence have been well documented, research has yet to establish the plausible causality of these links or identify underlying mechanisms. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 ‐ Young Adult survey, this study addresses these questions by comparing the depressive symptoms and delinquent behavior of siblings discordant for age at father departure. Findings indicate that father departure later in childhood is associated with increased adolescent delinquency but not depressive symptoms, whereas early childhood father departure was not associated with adolescent outcomes. Both findings suggests that parental monitoring—rather than socialization or emotional distress—may account for links between father departure and adolescent delinquency.     

Infancy and Childhood in India: A Critical Review

Empirical studies of childhood in India have been rare. Guided by universalistic theories of child development, developmental psychologists have seldom examined cultural variations in child-rearing patterns with Indian samples. Psychoanalytic studies of Hindu childhood have been influenced by therapeutic observations with segmented middle-class populations that are generally Westernized and educated, inviting a lively debate about the transferability of psychoanalytic individualism to non-Western contexts. Anthropological studies, invariably focused on cultural variation, have not searched for consistent cultural patterns in ethnographic materials on Hindu socialization. Based on fieldwork conducted in a village near Delhi, this article presents one of the first systematic quantitative and ethnographic studies of patterns of child care in Hindu extended families during the preschool years. The findings are discussed in terms of achieving a consensus between developmental, psychoanalytic, and anthropological observations of Indian childhood.     

Accounting for Patterns of Father Involvement: Age of Child, Father-Child Coresidence, and Father Role Salience

This study examines the extent to which fathers are involved in parenting their children under several conditions, using a multivariate regression model. The model includes the age of the child, father role salience, and the father and child's coresidential status as predictors of father involvement. Although nonresidential fathers tend to be less involved than residential fathers under most conditions, this is not the case for fathers of adolescents who find the father role to be at least moderately salient. Explanations for their greater involvement are proposed, focusing specifically on the unique characteristics of the parent-child relationship involving an adolescent child and a nonresidential parent.     

Exploring the relationship between mothers' and fathers' parenting practices and children's materialist values

Data on 2218 British secondary school age children were used to explore the relationship between parenting and materialism. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis carried out to explore the role of parenting in children's materialism showed that although father involvement was unrelated to materialism, mother's involvement was negatively and inter-parental conflict was positively related to child's materialism. Emotional and behavioural problems and goal-directedness were both positively associated with materialism in adolescents. Compared to girls boys scored higher in materialism. Age and materialism were positively related. Peer support was more strongly associated with children's materialism when both fathers' and mothers' involvement were low rather than high. Neither child's sex nor family structure moderated the relationship between parents' involvement and children's materialistic attitudes.     

American Indian Perceptions of Paternal Responsibility

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 father involvement intervention strategies may work for American Indians, it is important for practitioners to explore how American Indians define paternal involvement and to what extent they are willing to allow the nonresident father to participate in all aspects of the child's life.     

The Cronus complex

This paper studies a buried dynamic in psychopathology as it arises in family process: the child's loss of self through caring before being cared for. This role reversal which places childhood at the disposal of family need is conceptualized, and the related material, integrated, in terms of the myth of Cronus, who swallowed his children. Some tentative clinical probings of this subject are discussed as well as the resistive sources which have placed this subject, for the most part, beyond reach of research and education.     

White Racial Socialization: Progressive Fathers on Raising “Antiracist” Children

For the past 30 years, the definition of racial socialization has referred to how parents prepare children of color to flourish within a society structured by white supremacy. Drawing on ethnographic interviews with eight white affluent fathers, this study explores fathers' participation in white racial socialization processes. The article focuses on fathers who identify as “progressive” and examines the relationship between fathers' understandings of what it means to raise an “antiracist” child, the explicit and implicit lessons of racial socialization that follow from these understandings, and hegemonic whiteness. Findings illustrate how these fathers understand their role as a white father, how their attempts to raise antiracist children both challenge and reinforce hegemonic whiteness, and what role race and class privilege play in this process.     

The Development of Parent–Child Relationship Perceptions in Boys from Childhood to Adolescence: A Comparison Between Disruptive and Non-Disruptive Boys

The absence or weakness of the father role is considered by many authors as one of the principal explaining factors of disruptive behavior and other psychopathologies among children. However, empirical studies on the specific role of the father are rare. Boys with stable disruptive behavior from age 5 until age 15 were compared to boys who have never been disruptive during the same time period. The perceptions that boys have regarding their relationships with their fathers from childhood to adolescence was compared to, perceptions concerning their relationships with their mothers. The results indicate that boys from both groups generally feel less loved and less appreciated by their fathers than by their mothers in adolescence but not in childhood. The boys perceived that their two parents love and appreciate them a lot less at age 15, than at age 9 and age 11. They felt less loved and appreciated by their fathers than their mothers. At age 15, disruptive boys considered they were less loved by their two parents than non-disruptive boys did. The differences in the perceptions by the boys concerning the quality of relationships with their parents appear during adolescence.     

Father Involvement and Children's Early Learning: A Critical Review of Published Empirical Work from the Past 15 Years

ABSTRACT

Parent involvement research predominantly focuses on the involvement of mothers in children's educational experiences, and rarely speaks to the role of the “other” parent – fathers. Yet, there is building interest in the role that fathers play in children's development, and how this role may be especially salient during early childhood and the transition into formal schooling. This review critically evaluates father involvement literature from 1990 to 2005 within this early childhood population. In particular, it provides systematic evidence that to some degree researchers have been responsive to recent critiques, and lays out a path of sampling, methodological and conceptual challenges still left to be tackled.     

The development of nonverbal communication of emotion: A functionalist perspective

A functionalist perspective on the development of nonverbal communication of emotion is presented. This perspective is distinguished from other current conceptualizations by the following features: (a) Emphasis is placed on the functional implications of emotion-relevant movements for social regulation (communication), intrapersonal (internal) regulation, and behavior regulation. (b) Emotions are viewed as “members of families of emotions.” Emotion families are composed of emotion processes with similar functional relationships to the environment, which also differ in particular communicative features as a function of contextual demands, socialization history, and developmental abilities of the organism. (c) Facial movements are treated as only one of many forms of communication of emotion, rather than as having special status as “the” clearcut indicators of emotion. (d) Communication of emotion always is embedded in a context: There are no movements that can be considered clearcut, context-free expressions of emotion, at any period of development. (e) The role of socialization in the development of emotion and emotion communication is emphasized. (f) The multiple influences on communicative behavior, and the implications of such multicausality for clearcut communication, are acknowledged.     

Play,Games and Interaction: the Contexts of Childhood Socialization*

Classical and contemporary theories of childhood play are reviewed and evaluated. A symbolic interactionist conception of play, games, work, and socialization is offered. Naturalistic data drawn from the observation of children ages three to eight years are presented to support a processual model of socialization and interaction in early childhood.     

The use of the simulated father-son group to facilitate separation-individuation

Recently, there has been an increased appreciation of the importance of the role of father in childhood development. The first part of the article presents a review of the psychoanalytic, developmental literature on the role of the preoedipal father, dividing it into two categories. One concerns father's functions and the other concerns the results of father's failures during the preoedipal period. The second part of the article deals with the author's clinical experience. The author worked for several years with a group of young Vietnam era veterans in a Veterans Administration Mental Hygiene Clinic. All of these patients exhibited psychopathology indicative of disturbances during the preoedipal period and failure to complete the separation-individuation process. Their histories revealed physically or emotionally absent fathers. In light of father's psychological impact on his son, the author combined this group with a group of older veterans, who were all fathers themselves. The group was led by a male-female cotherapy team. The paper reports the experience of the group after a period of a year. One of the primary effects of the group was that a simulated father-son group developed in which the older men carried out parental functions, generally associated with fathering. According to the literature cited, such functions facilitate the separation-individuation process.     

The psychological measurement of childhood sexual development in Western societies: methodological challenges

Children can display sexual behavior or have sexual experiences. Different psychological research methods are available for studying these kinds of behaviors and feelings, such as interviewing or observing children (direct methods), asking adolescents or adults to retrospectively report their childhood memories or using intermediaries to observe children (indirect methods). Each of these methods has its own advantages and limitations. Based on a review of the literature, this work answers three questions: (a) What research methods are generally used to study childhood sexual development? (b) What insight do these methods give into the sexual behaviors or feelings of children? and (c) What are the advantages and limitations of each of these research methods in this research domain? Almost all studies on childhood sexual behavior and feelings use either observational or retrospective methods. In both types of studies, only behavior that is considered to be sexual from an adult perspective is reported. To gain insight into the child's perspective, one has to rely on methods other than observations or retrospective research, such as interviews with children that match their developmental limitations and competencies.     

A Cross-Cultural Assessment of Familial Factors in the Development of Female Homosexuality

Nonclinical samples of 224 heterosexual and 205 homosexual females were interviewed with regard to their recalled childhood experiences in Brazil, Peru, the Philippines, and the United States. Twelve items were used to examine differences between heterosexual and homosexual females. These are: "normal" family, absent motherlfather, wanner parent, stronger parent, hostile father, hostile mother, detached/distant father, detached/distant mother, seductive mother, seductive father, father's attitude toward sex, mother's attitude toward sex. Seven items produced no significant differences between homosexuals and heterosexuals in any of the four societies. Another five items resulted in some signif~cant differences between these groups; however, these differences were inconsistent in all four societies. Combining the data for all four societies resulted in only one item-the detacheddistant mother-exhibiting signif~cant differences between homosexual and heterosexual groups. It is not clear whether the detachedldistant mother is a cause of or a reaction to emerging homosexuality. On the whole, these cross-cultural data provide little support for the role of familial factors in the development of female homosexual orientation.     

Correlates of Self-Esteem Among College Students Offspring from Divorced Families:

This research examines whether factors found to be relevant to children's adjustment following parental divorce do indeed have a significant relationship to the self-esteem of young adult college students who have experienced parental divorce during childhood or adolescence. These factors include gender, social class, age at the time of parental divorce, remarriage of the custodial mother, the amount of contact between the non-residential father and his offspring, and feelings of closeness between the non-residential father and his offspring. The results of a multiple regression analysis indicate that contact with the non-residential father has a significant impact on the self-esteem of female offspring, whereas the age at the time of parental divorce is the most sigmticant factor contributing to the self-esteem of male offspring. Results also indicate there is no significant difference in self-esteem levels among male and female offspring from divorced families.     

In their own words: The life experiences of Mexican-American and white pregnant adolescents and adolescent mothers

The results of an ethnographic study of 32 Mexican-American and 17 White adolescents are presented. Fifty percent or more of the respondents in both groups experienced parental loss during their childhood years. Little information was provided by parents to the adolescents regarding menses and physical maturation. While parent-adolescent conflict arose in both samples, the conflict for the Mexican-American adolescents centered around choice of girlfriends and boyfriends while multiple sources of conflict existed between the White respondents and their parents. White respondents were more sexually active than the Mexican-American respondents, but the latter reported more stable relationships with the father of the baby. The experiences of the adolescents are both summarized and presented in their own words.     

Sex Stratification and Male Biography: From Deprivation to Ascendance*

This essay examines some of the implications of early childhood confinement to the household for the development of male character structure. The argument developed is that assignment to women and the household makes small boys outsiders, who receive less comprehensible and positive forms of socialization than small girls. This deprivation experience contributes to the competitiveness and assertiveness of the male response to more favored treatment during the school years, leading to their eventual ascendance, in contrast females greater centrallty and more supportive treatment in early childhood may contribute to "passive" acceptance of male ascendance.     

Mother–Adolescent and Father–Adolescent Relationships After Divorce: Relations with Emerging Adults’ Romantic Attachment

This longitudinal study examined relations between mother–child relationship quality and father support in adolescence (ages 15–19) and emerging adults’ (ages 24–28) romantic anxiety and avoidance in a sample that experienced parental divorce in childhood (n = 72). A significant interactive effect of mother–adolescent relationship quality and father support on romantic anxiety occurred. High levels of father support protected emerging adults from the negative effects of a low quality mother–adolescent relationship. These results highlight the importance of examining effects of one parental relationship in the context of the other and the role that nonresidential fathers play in influencing their offspring’s romantic attachment.     

Ethnic Differences in Women's Emotional Reactions to Parental Nonsupportive Emotion Socialization

Recent evidence suggests that the association between parents’ use of nonsupportive emotion socialization practices and their children's subsequent negative emotional outcomes varies based on ethnicity. The goal of this study is to test the proposition that African American women interpret parental nonsupportive emotion socialization practices less negatively than European American women. In this study, 251 European and African American women completed a measure on recalled feelings when their parents engaged in nonsupportive emotion socialization practices during childhood. Results indicated that African American women reported feeling more loved and less hurt and ashamed than European American women when their parents enacted nonsupportive emotion socialization practices such as ignoring, punishing, minimizing, and teasing them when distressed. Possible mechanisms for this difference and the need for additional research exploring ethnic differences in emotion socialization and its effects on adjustment are discussed.     

Social Fathering in Low‐Income,African American Families with Preschool Children

Although research increasingly focuses on nonresident biological fathers, little attention has been given to the role of other men in children's lives. The authors examine the factors associated with social father presence and their influence on preschoolers' development. Findings indicate that the majority of children have a social father and that mother, child, and nonresident biological father characteristics are all related to social father presence. These associations differ depending on whether the social father is the mother's romantic partner or a male relative. The social father's influence on children's development also depends on his relationship to the child. Male relative social fathers are associated with higher levels of children's school readiness, whereas mothers' romantic partner social fathers are associated with lower levels of emotional maturity.