Costs and Benefits of Active Fatherhood

The Costs and Benefits of Active Fatherhood Evidence and insights to inform the development of policy and practice www.fathersdirect.com A paper prepared by Fathers Direct to inform the DfES/HM Treasury Joint Policy Review on Children and Young People Author: Adrienne Burgess Sponsored by: The costs and benefits of active fatherhood evidence and insights to inform the development of policy and practice Foreword Duncan Fisher, Chief Executive, Fathers Direct In the UK in 2006, in a ‘Call for Evidence’, the Joint Policy Review on Children and Young People set up by H M Treasury and the Department for Education and Skills expressed a wish to identify risk and protective factors in four areas: family prosperity; parenting and parents’ behaviour; neighbourhood; and public services. A particular focus was to be on ‘Prevention’ (including ‘breaking the cycle of deprivation’) and on the needs of ‘High Cost, High Harm’ families.1 Such policy areas are, of course, of interest to all governments concerned with the well being of children in the context of social justice. There was, however, a novel If policy makers (and researchers We are grateful not only to our element in this project: in the and practitioners) were to funders - Lloyds TSB, BT and the document on which the Joint include fathers in their thinking, Tudor Trust - who made this Policy Review’s Call for Evidence it was clear that fathers’ impact Research Review possible, but was based - Support for Parents, on children and families needed also to our Reference Group of the best start for children (H M to be laid out in a systematic distinguished and very busy Treasury/DFES, 2005) - way, and in a document which academics. All those whose fatherhood was identified as a could be easily made available names are listed on the next key concern; and the importance to them. page commented on an earlier Duncan Fisher, of public services’ considering Were anyone hoping for simple draft; and most of their Chief Executive, how best to ‘support fathers and headline facts to point the way, enormously useful observations Fathers Direct other male carers as well as we must, sadly, acknowledge in have now been addressed. Of mothers’ was identified. advance their disappointment. In course they have not been able The Research Review we present this context, simple would mean to examine every aspect of such here was at first conceived as simplistic. To help readers a long document; and our Fathers Direct’s response to the negotiate the often complex choice of research, the ways in Call for Evidence. But soon a material, we have made which we have presented the wider function emerged, as we substantial use of bullet-point evidence and the inferences we began to document policy areas lists, with footnotes expanding have drawn from it, must remain where failure to address fathers’2 discussion that would otherwise our responsibility. behaviour and concerns was clutter the narrative Like some of our Reference resulting in less than adequate unacceptably. We have also Group, readers of this Report provision for mothers and created very detailed contents may feel it has been put together children. While the fatherhood pages to assist readers to cherry- in a rather idiosyncratic way, issues raised by the Government pick the material they need at with considerable detail in what in Support for Parents, the best any given time, in the policy, may seem, at times, to be start for children had perhaps research and practice areas that insignificant areas. But there is been conceived out of a are their primary concern. method in our madness: we ‘fairness to fathers’ agenda, our have focused on topics that we vision was rooted in the impact know to be of particular concern fathers were having on their for public policy in the UK and, families, and, in particular, on we believe, in many other their children - an impact that countries. was sometimes positive and sometimes negative, and that was, on the whole, going unrecognized. 02 www.fathersdirect.com What will you find here? Having In Section 5 - Fathers and Family At the end of our Research 1 At the same time these policy areas set the scene (Section 1 - Active Change our focus becomes Report we broaden our focus out were featuring as key issues for other Fatherhood in Context) and children whose parents do not again, first in Section 8 - departments, including the Home Office, the Department for Work and reviewed key research issues, live together, although much of Fathers, Mothers, Work and Pensions, the Department for including the research base for the research in Section 4 is also Family, and finally in Section 9 - Constitutional Affairs, and the this Report (Section 2 - Rationale relevant to this group, many of Fathering the Future, where we Department of Health. and Research Issues) we take a whom spend formative years look briefly at active fatherhood 2 In line with the National Service developmental approach to the with both parents and/or sustain and community development, Framework for Children, we define father’s role in child and family substantial contact with both and at fathering in older age. ‘fathers’ to include biological dads, stepdads, nonresident dads, dads with functioning. parents in separate households. What you will not find here are and without legal Parental This begins with Section 3 - Section 6 - Vulnerable Fathers implications for policy. Although Responsibility: in fact any man who is Fathers in the Perinatal Period and their Children explores we have derived a substantial important to a child, or who impacts on and is pursued in Section 4 - fathers’ roles in the kinds of programme of policy thier welfare. Fathers’ Roles in Child families described by the recommendations based on the Development where we address government as High Cost / High evidence and insights afforded fathers’ contributions, (mainly in Harm, with particular attention by this Review, these are two parent families) to the paid to ‘breaking the cycle of necessarily subject to change social, emotional and cognitive deprivation.’ Some of the issues and development. Instead of development, the education and raised here are also relevant to including them here we have achievement, and the physical less socially excluded families. made them available on our health of the children in their Because of the importance of website, where you can access care, from infancy, through High Cost / High Harm families them at www.fathersdirect.com - elementary school age, to to public policy, we continue to see ‘Related Documents’ at the adolescence, young adulthood focus on them in Section 7 - bottom. and - in a few instances - to Working with Vulnerable Fathers. middle age. Reference Group Professor Jacqueline Barnes Dr Eirini Flouri Professor Jane Lewis Professor Jacqueline Scott Birkbeck, University of London Institute of Education London School of Economics University of Cambridge Professor Stephen Frosh Professor Jay Belsky Birkbeck, University of London Professor Jane Millar Professor Jane Waldfogel Birkbeck, University of London University of Bath London School of Economics / Professor Jo Green Columbia University Professor Cary Cooper University of York Professor Margaret O’Brien Lancaster University University of East Anglia It should be noted that while Management School Lindsey Hayes members of the Advisory Group Royal College of Nursing Institute Professor Sir Michael Rutter provided valuable feedback, not Professor Brid Featherstone Institute of Psychiatry every member agrees with every University of Bradford Professor Michael Lamb statement of interpretation of the University of Cambridge Dr Wendy Sigle-Rushton research set out in this document. Richard Fletcher London School of Economics These represent the views of Family Action Centre, University Fathers Direct and must remain of Newcastle (NSW, Australia) our sole responsibility. 03 The costs and benefits of active fatherhood evidence and insights to inform the development of policy and practice Page Page 1_ ACTIVE FATHERHOOD 06 4_ FATHERS’ ROLES IN CHILD 28 IN CONTEXT DEVELOPMENT 1.1 Trends in father involvement 4.1 An overview 1.2 Politics and policies 4.2 Infancy & pre-school 4.3 Childhood and adolescence 10 2_ RATIONALE AND 4.4 Education and achievement RESEARCH ISSUES 4.5 Beyond adolescence 2.1 Good dads/ bad dads 4.6 Child health 2.2 Understanding fatherhood research 4.6.1 Engaging fathers in their children’s healthcare 2.2.1 Theoretical frameworks 4.6.2 Childhood obesity 2.2.2 Quantity v. quality 4.6.3 Fathers, and children with disabilities 2.2.3 The ‘paternal vulnerability hypothesis’ 2.2.4 Dependent variables 38 2.2.5 Caveats in fatherhood (and motherhood) 5_ FATHERS AND FAMILY CHANGE research 5.1 Parental conflict 2.3 The research base for this review 5.2 Father involvement in separated families 14 5.3 Child support 3_ FATHERS IN THE 5.4 Father figures PERINATAL PERIOD 5.5 Father involvement and family stability 3.1 A key moment for intervention 3.1.1 Fathers are uniquely available – physically and Continued> emotionally 3.1.2 Fathers may be receptive to health messages 3.1.3 Domestic abuse and other negative behaviours by fathers can be challenged 3.1.4 Fathers may become more involved in infant care 3.1.5 Patterns of involvement established early on may endure 3.1.6 Mothers’ experiences will often be improved 3.2 Information and support for men as fathers 3.2.1 Pre-conception 3.2.2 Prenatal 3.2.3 Postnatal 3.3 Fathers at the birth 3.4 Paternity establishment 3.5 Smoking 3.6 Breastfeeding

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