A new typology of fathering: defining and associated variables
Contents
1. 1983 Socialization in the context of the family Parent child interaction In E M Hetherington Ed Handbook of child psychology Vol 4 Socialization personality and social development 4 ed New York Wiley Jain A Belsky J amp Crnic K 1996 Beyond fathering behaviors Types of dads Journal of Family Psychology 10 4 431 442 Magnusson D 1995 Individual development A holistic integrated model In P Moen G H Elder amp K Luscher Eds Linking lives and contexts Perspectives on the ecology of human development pp 19 60 Washington DC American Psychological Association McBride B A amp Rane T R 1998 Parenting alliance as a predictor of father involvement An exploratory study Family Relations 47 229 236 Minor L Karr S amp Jain S K 1987 An examination of the utility of the MMPI in 26 Father involvement predicting male prison innates abusive parenting attitudes The Psychological Record 37 429 436 Onatsu Arvilommi T Nurmi J E amp Aunola K 1998 Mothers and fathers well being parenting styles and their children s cognitive and behavioural strategies at primary school European Journal of Psychology of Education 13 4 543 556 Palkovitz R 1997 Reconstructing involvement Expandings conceptualizations of men s caring in contemporary families In A J Hawkins amp D C Dollahite Eds Generative fathering Beyond deficit per2. Bn 427 2p lt 01 35 40 4 96 106 54 23 73 4 41 36 2 46 39 5 17 1 17 4 65 64 2 15 94 3 17 1 28 12 37 2 81 1 79 1 15 11 84 2 36 38 39 6 49 78 21 14 88 27 47 4 26 45 87 8 09 29 93 4 67 n 406 p lt 001 34 92 5 29 109 77 19 70 4 45 30 2 56 41 5 16 1 21 4 469 79 1 77 1 00 3 30 1 25 13 43 2 80 2 22 1 23 12 53 2 77 37 70 5 74 67 68 14 50 27 30 3 73 42 47 7 74 28 64 5 23 Father involvement 34 23 4 83 111 99 21 17 4 58 31 2 46 37 5 34 1 12 4 57 71 1 815 80 3 14 1 21 13 21 3 06 2 09 1 27 12 94 2 78 37 08 5 47 67 34 13 11 29 81 4 04 43 46 8 32 28 64 5 83 36 19 4 78 105 71 23 08 4 43 34 2 55 37 4 92 1 35 4 30 85 1 96 94 3 16 1 20 13 60 2 68 2 33 1 26 13 49 2 66 37 95 5 73 76 34 13 77 27 32 4 15 45 99 7 73 29 37 4 70 d different letters means significant differences on two by two comparisons Scheff p lt 05 Oneway F 2 431 271 1 80 6 10 1 70 1 57 3 38 4 51 34 4 48 3 92 7 89 1 07 18 48 9 90 4 92 1 85 34 Father involvement Table 6 Summary of the discriminant function analysis Function Eigen Canonical After Wilks Chi square df Alpha value Variance correlation function Lambda 0 76 117 93 15 001
3. mothers responses to the 47 items contained in the Montreal Father s Involvement Questionnaire with regard to their own behavior Cronbach s alpha was 0 83 Socioeconomic characteristics 11 Father involvement Fathers and mothers were asked to report their annual income The choice of answers in Canadian dollars was 1 less than 10 000 2 10 000 to 19 000 3 20 000 to 29 000 4 30 000 to 39 000 and 5 40 000 or more Level of education was based on fathers and mothers statements as to the last year of schooling completed Results Intercorrelations between quantitative ans qualitative dimensions of fathering Table 2 presents the correlations between the dimensions of paternal involvement and fathers parental attitudes The table shows that the more fathers are in favor of physical punishment the more they are involved in imposing discipline and the less they are involved in providing emotional support Empathic attitudes toward children are positively correlated to involvement in emotional support opening to the world basic care and physical play Only discipline and evocations are not positively correlated to empathy Finally empathic attitudes are negatively correlated to attitudes toward physical punishment The greater the father s parental empathy the less likely he is to have a favorable attitude toward physical punishment Types of fathering A classification analysis hierarchical cluster
4. the father s cognitions and by the fact that they more frequently introduce their children to new activities These fathers are characterized by more secure social relationships The father s parental stress level was found to be the most important variable discriminating between different types of fathering Authoritarian and authoritative fathers are more at risk of maltreating their children because their more favorable attitude toward use of physical punishment is combined with greater parental Institut de Recherche pour le D veloppement Social des jeunes 1001 deMaisonneuve Est 7 tage Montr al Canada H2L 4R5 and Universit de Montr al Canada Universit du Qu bec Montr al Canada gt Universit du Qu bec Hull Canada Father involvement stress less parental involvement of mothers and a larger number of children in the home Authoritarian fathers are even more at risk of maltreating their children because of more difficult family socioeconomic conditions in particular lower levels of maternal education and income Key words father involvement authoritarian parenting physical punishment parental stress parental attitudes maltreatment risk Research has shown that the two main dimensions of parental behavior are warmth and control Warmth refers to the amount of responsiveness and affection whereas control refers to the amount of supervision and to the imposition of rules i e restrictions to t
5. 1 20 65 5 40 1 91 42 44 8 001 2 06 20 3 24 2 96 17 62 3 001 3 04 14 2 20 35 Table 7 Classification results number and percent Actual group membership 1 n 148 2 n 87 3 n 113 4 n 82 72 48 6 18 20 7 22 19 5 23 28 0 Father involvement Predicted group membership 2 23 15 5 36 41 4 26 23 0 20 24 4 3 30 20 3 20 23 0 49 43 4 16 19 5 23 15 5 13 14 9 16 14 2 23 28 0 36
6. 129 139 Grossman F K Pollack W S amp Golding E 1988 Fathers and children Predicting the quality and quantity of fathering Developmental Psychology 24 82 91 Hastings P D amp Rubin K H 1999 Predicting mothers beliefs about preschool aged children s social behavior evidence for maternal attitudes moderating child effects Child Development 70 3 722 741 Hazan C amp Shaver P R 1987 Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 52 511 524 Hetherington E M amp Martin B 1986 Family factors and psychopathology in children In H C Quay amp J S Werry Eds Psychopathology disorders of childhood 3d ed pp 332 390 New York Wiley Holden G W Coleman S M amp Schmidt K L 1995 Why 3 year old children get spanked parent and child determinants as reported by college educated mothers Merrill Palmer Quarterly 41 1 431 452 Holden G W amp Zambarano R J 1992 Passing the rod similarities between parents and their young children in orientations toward physical punishment In Parental belief systems A V McGillicuddy De Lisi and J J Goodnow Eds LEA 25 Father involvement Holden G W amp Edwards L A 1989 Parental attitudes toward child rearing Instruments issues and implications Psychological Bulletin 106 29 58 Iverson T J amp Segal M 1992 Social behavior of maltreate
7. 3 48 4 26 53 5 31 40 3 34 46 4 57 61 3 25 51 3 86 59 Oneway F 3 430 84 99 89 62 63 68 46 46 87 30 33 59 42 93 36 90 N B A high score on physical punishment indicates that the father s attitude toward physical punishment does not tend to be favorable 31 Father involvement Table 4 Correlations between dimensions of fathering and their potential determinants n 434 Spouse Spousal relationship Maternal involvement Mother s age Father s work Involvement Satisfaction Mean nb hours week Children Nb per household SES Father s income Father s educational status Mother s income Mother s educational status Father s personal characteristics Age Parental stress Security Anxiety Avoidance a n 343 P n 427 n 406 1p lt 05 2p lt 01 p lt 001 Physical punishment 33 Table 5 Comparison of means standard deviation for different variables among the 4 groups of fathers n 434 Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4 authoritarian permissive stimulative authoritative Spouse Age Spousal relationship Maternal involvement Father s work Involvement Satisfaction Mean nb hours week Children Number SES Father s income Father s educational status Mother s income Mother s educational status Father s personal characteristics Age Parental stress Security Anxiety Avoidance n 343 Tp lt 05
8. 4 513 532 Baumrind D 1966 Effects of authoritative parental control on child development Child Development 37 887 907 Baumrind D 1967 Child care practices anteceding three patterns of preschool behaviour Genetic Psychology Monographs 75 43 88 Baumrind D 1971 Current patterns of parental authority Developmental Psychology Monographs 4 1 103 Bavolek S J 1984 Handbook for the Adult Adolescent Parenting Inventory Eau Claire WI Family Development Resources Bayer C L amp Cegala D J 1992 Trait verbal aggresiveness and argumentativeness Relations with parenting style Western Journal of Communication 56 301 310 Becker W C 1964 Consequences of different kinds of parental discipline In M L Hoffman amp L W Hoffman Eds Review of child development research Vol 1 New York Russell Sage Foundation Belsky J 1984 The determinants of parenting A process model Child Development 55 83 96 Bentley K S amp Fox R A 1991 Mothers and fathers of young children Comparison of parenting styles Psychological Reports 69 320 322 Bigras M LaFreni re P J and Abidin R R 1996 Manuel d utilisation de l Indice de Stress Parental North Tonaiwanda N Y Multi Health System Brems C amp Sohl M A 1995 The role of empathy in parenting strategy choices Family Relations 44 189 194 Bugental D Blue J amp Cruscoza M 1989 Percei
9. 89 Tiller 1991 Physical punishment is commonly viewed as a primary and essential disciplinary technique Buntain Ricklefs Kemper Bell amp Babonis 1994 20 Father involvement Holden Coleman amp Schmidt 1995 Lutenbacher amp Hall 1998 Holden and Zambarano 1992 found a positive correlation between mothers and fathers self reports of spanking and two indices of parental cognitions attitudes and behavioral intentions regarding punishment Our results also indicate that favorable attitudes to physical punishment are common among fathers at least those living with a spouse in a disadvantaged environment Thus 54 of our sample including not only authoritarian but also authoritative fathers were more favorable toward physical punishment Studies in the United States Straus 1991 and in Sweden Stattin Janson Klackenberg Larsson amp Magnusson 1995 have shown that physical punishment also appears to be widely used by parents The literature also shows that fathers believe more strongly in physical punishment Tiller 1991 There seems to be a very fine line between physical punishment and physical abuse of children Studies on physical abuse have shown that abusive interactions often take place in the context of discipline using physical punishment see Sternberg 1997 According to Belsky s 1984 model physical abuse can be linked to numerous distal and proximal factors However two factors seem particularly decis
10. A new typology of fathering defining and associated variables Daniel Paquette Institut de Recherche pour le D veloppement Social des jeunes 1001 deMaisonneuve Est 7 tage Montr al Canada Tel 514 896 3493 FAX 514 896 3400 E mail dpaquette g mtl centresjeunesse qc ca Christine Bolt Universit du Qu bec Montr al Canada Genevi ve Turcotte Institut de Recherche pour le D veloppement Social des jeunes Canada Diane Dubeau Universit du Qu bec Hull Canada and Camil Bouchard Universit du Qu bec Montr al Canada Father involvement A new typology of fathering defining and associated variables Daniel Paquette Christine Bolt Genevi ve Turcotte Diane Dubeau and Camil Bouchard Abstract Our goal was to identify types of parenting based on self report measures of fathers involvement and parental attitudes The present investigation studied 468 two parent French Canadian families with at least one child between 0 and 6 years of age living in a disadvantaged environment The present study conducted on a sample of fathers revealed the presence of the three basic types of parenting identified by Baumrind authoritarian authoritative and permissive and also of a new type of parenting stimulative parenting The fathers in this latter group provide more emotional support to children and are more stimulating as is evidenced by the greater psychological presence of children in
11. Kejner 1965 a 4 point Likert scale This instrument consists of 20 items and has an internal consistency of 0 74 Fathers satisfaction with their work was assessed with the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire 10 Father involvement Weiss Davis England amp Lofquist 1967 a 4 item index with a 7 point Likert scale This instrument showed an alpha of 0 78 in our sample Finally fathers were asked to report the number of hours worked per week The response choices for hours worked were 1 less than 10 hours per week 2 from 10 to 20 hours per week 3 from 21 to 30 hours per week 4 between 31 and 40 hours per week and 5 over 40 hours per week Spouse related variables Spousal harmony is considered by a number of researchers as a determinant of paternal involvement The quality of the couple s relationship as assessed by the female spouse was measured using the Locke Wallace Marital Adjustment Scale Locke amp Wallace 1959 Cronbach s alpha was 0 72 16 items This instrument is highly correlated r 88 with Spanier s 1976 Dyadic Adjustment Scale Cowan and Cowan 1987 reported that women who made room for their husbands to become involved with their child through their own involvement outside the family home generally had husbands who took greater responsibility for childcare Maternal involvement might therefore be a possible predictor of paternal involvement Maternal involvement was evaluated by summing the
12. analyses show that the most distinctive feature of stimulative fathers is that they are more secure in their social relationships than other fathers Thus a father who is secure in his social relationships is not only more likely to have a warm relationship with his children but also to be more involved in stimulating them for example by initiating them into new activities or by creating new games for them Note that this type of stimulation is entirely distinct from the parent s ability to stimulate the child in the context of a learning oriented interaction To our knowledge this study is the first to present evidence of a direct link between fathering and personal characteristics related to the father s attachment history i e the 18 Father involvement working model of self as parent However it would be important to replicate this analysis using adult attachment scales with higher internal consistency Contrary to some other studies see Grossman Pollack amp Golding 1988 our study found significant relationships between quantitative and qualitative measures of fathering More specifically empathic parental attitudes were found to be positively correlated to dimensions of paternal involvement Fathers with more empathic attitudes toward children also tend to be more involved with them in terms of time Although Group 2 fathers are less involved in basic care and opening to the world than fathers in Groups 3 and 4 analysis of fath
13. analysis using Ward s method with square Euclidean distances as measures of dissimilarity was performed on the fathers using the z scores for the six paternal involvement factors and the two types of parental 12 Father involvement attitudes in order to establish the types of paternal parenting After excluding 34 cases with missing data the analysis revealed the existence of four groups Oneway analysis of variance among the four groups of fathers showed significant differences between group means for the six dimensions of paternal involvement and the two types of attitudes Table 3 Fathers in Group 1 34 896 of the sample had lower mean scores for emotional support basic care physical play and empathy than the three other groups and expressed more favorable attitudes toward physical punishment than Groups 2 and 3 Their parenting style therefore tended toward the authoritarian type Fathers in Group 2 2096 of the sample and group 4 19 196 of the sample had comparable high scores on emotional support physical play and empathy On the other hand Group 2 fathers were less involved in discipline and were less favorable toward physical punishment than the three other groups Therefore we believe that Group 2 corresponds to permissive parenting whereas Group 4 corresponds to authoritative parenting Finally Group 3 fathers 2696 of the sample had scores similar to those of Group 4 with regard to basic care physical play empathy
14. and discipline but had higher scores than the three other groups with regard to emotional support opening to the world and evocations This group can be said to engage in stimulative parenting Intercorrelations between dimensions of fathering and their potential determinants Table 4 shows that the only variable significantly correlated with quality of the spousal relationship is emotional support Maternal involvement on the other hand is positively correlated with the father s scores on emotional support opening to the world 13 Father involvement basic care physical play and evocations but not with the father s scores on discipline and parental attitudes The mother s age is negatively correlated with the father s scores on emotional support physical play and evocations whereas it is positively correlated with the father s empathic attitude As to variables linked to the father s work involvement satisfaction time the mean number of hours of work per week is negatively correlated to involvement in basic care The more the father works the less he is involved in basic care The number of children in the household is negatively correlated with paternal involvement in emotional support basic care physical play and evocations and positively correlated to favorable attitudes toward physical punishment Thus the greater the number of children the less fathers are involved with them and the more they tend to use phy
15. arental attitudes were evaluated with the Adult Adolescent Parenting Inventory Bavolek 1984 a questionnaire with a 5 point Likert scale 1 strongly agree to 5 strongly disagree The AAPI was developed initially as a screening tool to identify individuals at high risk for child abuse The two subscales selected for the present study were the Empathic Awareness Scale 8 items Cronbach s alpha 76 and the Physical Punishment Scale 10 items alpha 76 Empathy and punishment are two salient categories of parental attitudes which generally are negatively correlated Empathy is defined as an awareness of a child s needs which entails the ability of the parent to understand the condition or state of mind of the child without actually experiencing his or her feelings Bavolek 1984 Fathers Psychological Characteristics Several researchers have pointed to the relationship between fathers personality traits self esteem autonomy sociability etc and their involvement as fathers An increasing number of researchers also examine the concept of attachment across the lifespan The mental representations internal working models developed during infancy through interactions with parents are assumed to shape personality which in turn is believed to exert a direct influence on parenting We therefore decided to explore the effect of adult attachment on fathering The father s personality traits related to his Father involvement attachme
16. athers On the other hand authoritarian and authoritative groups have similar scores for parental stress and adult attachment psychological characteristics On average the families of authoritarian fathers are composed of a larger number of children than the permissive and stimulative groups Stimulative fathers are more secure in their social relationships and their spouses are more parentally involved than the three other groups Finally stimulative fathers parental stress level is comparable to that of permissive fathers A multifactorial model was used to identify the characteristics that distinguish between these four different types of fathering We performed a stepwise discriminant function analysis to explore the optimal interaction between variables in order to predict case allocation Independent predictor variables were entered using the overall Wilks lambda to select subsequent variables for inclusion The statistical criteria were set so that the probability of F to enter was 0 05 and of F to remove 0 10 Variables initially retained for analysis were those for which univariate analyses had shown significant between group differences To correct for problems arising from multicollinearity between independent variables only one of the two variables was retained in cases in which correlations were greater than or equal to 0 45 Thus we excluded father s level of education highly correlated with that of the mother We also excluded th
17. d children Exploring links to parent bahavior and beliefs In LE Segal A V McGillicuddy DeLisi and J J Goodnow Eds Parental belief systems pp 267 289 Hillsdale NJ Erlbaum Janssens J M A M 1994 Authoritarian child rearing parental locus of control and the child s behaviour style International Journal of Behavioral Development 17 3 485 501 Justice B Calvert A amp Justice R 1985 Factors mediating child abuse as a response to stress Child Abuse and Neglect 9 359 363 Lamb M E 1986 The changing roles of fathers In M E Lamb Ed The father s role Applied perspectives pp 3 27 New York Wiley Interscience Lenton R L 1990 Techniques of child discipline and abuse by parents Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology 27 157 185 Locke J H amp Wallace K M 1959 Short marital Ajustment and prediction tests Their reliability and validity Marriage and Family living August Lodahl T M amp Kejner M 1965 The definition and measurement of job involvement Journal of Applied psychology 49 24 33 Lutenbacher M amp Hall L A 1998 The effects of maternal psychological factors on parenting attitudes of low income single mothers with young children Nursing Research 47 1 25 34 Maccoby E E 1980 Social development Psychological growth and the parent child relationship San Diego Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Maccoby E E amp Martin J A
18. e A developmental Analysis Journal of Marriage and the Family 58 679 692 28 Father involvement Table 1 Psychometric properties of the Montreal Father s Involvement Questionnaire Internal consistency Temporal stability Explained variance alpha Gr 70 Emotional support 86 12 10 7 Opening to the world AS AT 7 0 Basic care d 50 6 4 Physical play 12 AS 6 4 Evocations 14 61 6 0 Discipline T5 14 5 7 Father involvement Table 2 Intercorrelations among dimensions of fathers involvement and parental attitudes of fathers n 434 1 Emotional support 2 Opening to the world 3 Basic care 4 Physical play 5 Evocations 6 Discipline 7 Attitude physical punishment 8 Attitude empath 30 Father involvement Table 3 Comparison of means standard deviation of dimensions of paternal involvement and attitudes among the 4 groups of fathers Emotional support Opening to the world Basic care Physical play Evocations Discipline Physical punishment Empathy p lt 001 abcd different letters means significant differences on two by two comparisons Scheff p lt 05 Group 1 n 151 authoritarian parenting 3 67 65 2 95 61 3 12 76 4 75 3 34 Group 2 n 87 permissive parenting 4 24 46 3 06 65 3 65 70 5 10 Group 3 n 139 stimulative parenting 4 62 31 Group 4 n 83 authoritative parenting 4 30 41 3 5
19. e mean 16 Father involvement number of hours worked by the father and maternal income because there were missing data for these two variables which lowered the total number of cases Discriminant analysis led to inclusion of five variables in the model in the following order 1 Father s parental stress 2 Mother s level of education 3 Father s level of security in social relationships 4 Number of children in the household 5 Maternal involvement Table 6 shows that three functions allow one to discriminate significantly among the four groups The first function which explains 65 5 of the total variance discriminates between the authoritarian and authoritative groups on the one hand and the permissive and stimulative groups on the other on the basis of three variables parental stress maternal involvement and number of children Authoritarian and authoritative families are characterized by fathers with a higher parental stress level mothers with lower parental involvement and a larger number of children compared to permissive and stimulative families The second function accounting for 20 3 of the variance reflects fathers level of security with regard to social relationships This function discriminates between stimulative fathers and the three other groups as stimulative fathers are significantly more secure in their social relationships than other fathers The third function 14 2 of the variance concerns the mot
20. ed with their own stress and problems that they have little time or energy to devote to child rearing Becker 1964 Maccoby amp Martin 1983 The children of these neglectful parents display both social and academic deficits and tend to become very hostile and rebellious adolescents who are prone to antisocial or delinquent acts Patterson DeBaryshe amp Ramsey 1989 Relatively little is known about the characteristics of families practicing different types of parenting apart from the fact that parents with lower socioeconomic status SES are more restrictive and authoritarian and that higher SES parents tend to be either permissive or authoritative Maccoby 1980 Moreover mothers are more likely to use reasoning and nurturing behavior to achieve their parenting goals while fathers use more forceful techniques based on parental authority and power Bentley amp Fox 1991 Pruett 1993 Volling amp Belsky 1992 Baker and Heller 1996 found fathers to be more authoritarian less permissive and more uninvolved than mothers Lamb 1986 proposed three main dimensions of paternal involvement interaction accessibility and responsibility Of the many possible categories of interaction the category most frequently evaluated by researchers through interviews questionnaires or daily logs is that of basic care feeding bathing changing diapers etc either in terms of absolute or relative frequency or amount of time Several researc
21. ering predictors confirm that Group 2 corresponds much more closely to permissive parenting than to uninvolved parenting Thus multifactorial analysis reveals that the permissive group group 2 is closer to the stimulative group Group 3 in that they both score lower on fathers level of parental stress and higher on maternal involvement Furthermore Group 2 fathers in addition to having an empathic parental attitude are as involved as Group 4 authoritative fathers in terms of emotional support and physical play Onatsu Avilommi Nurmi and Aunola 1998 showed that the more parenting stress reported by fathers the more their grade school aged children used maladaptive strategies The present study demonstrates that the father s parental stress is the most important variable for discriminating between types of fathering which supports Abidin s 1986 parenting model based on numerous studies of the mother child relationship Moreover the results show that fathers parental stress is linked to psychological characteristics of adult attachment This is consistent with Belsky s 1984 model according to which the personal and psychological characteristics of fathers are the 19 Father involvement main determinants of parenting and also possibly of child maltreatment Likewise Woodworth Belsky and Crnic s 1996 study of a sample of 64 fathers concluded that fathers personal characteristics were more predictive of parenting than distal var
22. family violence In Michael E Lamb Ed The role of the father in child development Third edition John Wiley amp Sons Straus M A 1991 Discipline and deviance Physical punishment of children and violence and other crime in adulthood Social Problems 38 133 154 Susman E J Trickett P K Iannotti R J Hollenbeck B E amp Zahn Waxler C 1985 Child rearing patterns in depressed abusive and normal mothers American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 55 237 251 27 Father involvement Tiller C M 1991 Assessment of the potential for maladaptive parenting in expectant fathers with the Adult Adolescent Parenting Inventory AAPI Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing 4 55 61 Volling B L amp Belsky J 1992 The contribution of mother child and father child relationships to the quality of sibling interaction A longitudinal study Child Development 63 1209 1222 Webster Stratton C 1985 Comparison of abusive and nonabusive families with conduct disordered children American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 55 59 69 Weiss D J Davis R V England G W amp Lofquist L H 1967 Manual of the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire Minneapolis University of Minnesota Work Adjustment Project Industrial Relations Center Woodworth S Belsky J amp Crnic K 1996 The Determinants of Fathering During the Child s Second and Third Years of Lif
23. he child s liberty In Baumrind s 1966 1967 studies interviews and observation of middle class parents with preschool aged children revealed three patterns concerning parents attitudes and values about parenting their values about children s nature and the specific practices they use to socialize their children Robinson Mandleco Frost Olsen amp Hart 1995 These well known patterns are authoritative parenting authoritarian parenting and permissive parenting Authoritative parents are generally sensitive and responsive to children s needs affectionate set clear limits while also allowing children to be autonomous They tend to be good arguers using reason to gain compliance and encouraging verbal give and take in reaching agreement with the child they use discipline when necessary to get children to comply Baumrind 1971 Bayer amp Cegala 1992 Authoritarian parents tend to be Father involvement unresponsive to children s needs and wishes and frequently resort to control to insure obedience and respect for authority They usually do not offer reasons when they issue directives and tend to be negative in affect Bayer amp Cegala 1992 Control may be exercised through threats and physical force as well as through depriving the child of objects or privileges Janssens 1994 Bayer and Cegala 1992 also found that verbal aggressiveness was positively related to authoritarian style A study conducted in Mexico showed that autho
24. her s level of education and discriminates between the authoritarian group and the three others Spouses of authoritarian fathers have a lower educational level than other groups Taken together these three functions allow correct classification of 4296 of the cases in each of the four groups Table 7 shows that the rate of correct classification into Groups 1 2 and 3 is well above chance respectively 49 41 and 43 but that the rate of correct classification into Group 4 2896 is no better than chance 0 25 17 Father involvement Discussion This study demonstrated that it is possible to establish a typology of fathers based on quantitative and qualitative self report measures of fathering The results of the present study conducted on a sample of fathers revealed the presence of the three basic types of parenting identified by Baumrind 1966 and in addition a new type of parenting stimulative parenting In fact stimulative fathers are a sub set of the authoritative group Fathers in the stimulative group about a quarter of the sample provided more emotional support to children and stimulated them more as is evidenced by the number of evocations outside of the home and involvement in opening to the world Evocations are an indicator of the psychological presence of children in the father s cognitions and according to Palkovitz 1997 constitute an important aspect of paternal involvement which has not yet been explored Our
25. hers also appraise physical play and or quiet time socialization education affection or leisure activities Observational studies generally examine basic care play and or expression of affection Other researchers prefer to quantify the sum of activities involving interaction with the child Until now few studies have simultaneously examined the multiple dimensions of fathering including relations among child rearing attitudes Father involvement and practices role involvement and satisfaction De Luccie 1996 In short it is essential to explore many of the dimensions of fathers involvement in greater depth and more particularly the interaction among them Magnusson 1995 recommended a focus on the organization and patterning of individuals behaviors rather than a focus on discrete behaviors Jain Belsky and Crnic 1996 identified a four cluster solution of types of fathering based on the observation of interactions between 69 fathers and their child caretakers playmates teachers disciplinarians and disengaged fathers However analyses of variance of potential determinants provided evidence of differences only between two higher order groups The progressive fathers caretaker and playmate teacher groups were more educated had more prestigious occupations were less anxious hostile and irritable and experienced fewer daily hassles than the traditional fathers disciplinarian and disengaged groups This study of a large sam
26. iables SES social contextual factors etc Spousal harmony is considered by a number of researchers as the most important factor predicting paternal involvement Feldman et al 1983 Snarey 1993 Our results support those of Grossman et al 1988 in that no significant correlation was found between the spousal relationship and dimensions of paternal involvement except for a weak positive correlation with emotional support Feldman et al 1983 concluded that for their upper middle class highly educated sample the quality of the spousal relationship was consistently the most powerful predictor of paternal involvement and satisfaction Perhaps the spousal relationship is a more predictive variable for highly educated upper middle class families than for individuals from a low to average socio economic level such as our sample of families On the other hand for this type of study it may be more appropriate to use a variable such as the parenting alliance developed by Abidin and Brunner 1995 rather than a more distal variable such as the quality of the spousal relationship see also McBride amp Rane 1998 The positive correlation between attitudes toward physical punishment and involvement in discipline r 33 suggests that physical punishment is probably an important means for fathers to discipline their children Indeed in general people in industrialized countries tend to be tolerant toward the use of physical punishment Payne 19
27. ive cultural attitudes about the appropriateness of physical punishment and stress levels Parenting attitudes child rearing practices and child maltreatment are closely related to one another Lenton 1990 Susman Trickett lannotti Hollenbeck amp Zahn Waxler 1985 Webster Stratton 1985 A number of theorists have postulated that there exists an important relationship between the lack of parental empathy and abusive parental behavior Bavolek 1984 Feshbach 1989 Minor Karr amp Jain 1987 Brems and Sohl 1995 21 Father involvement report that individuals who scored higher on a measure of empathy were less likely to endorse physical punishment as an appropriate choice of intervention A strong belief in the value of physical punishment can also be an antecedent of abusive parenting Bavolek 1984 see Tiller 1991 As to the stress factor stressful life circumstances are now known to contribute significantly to abuse see Sternberg 1997 Parents who physically abuse their children report higher stress levels Justice Calvert amp Justice 1985 Thus the stress factor may explain the frequently observed escalation from physical punishment to physical abuse Our findings indicate that high levels of parental stress among authoritarian and authoritative fathers combined with attitudes favorable to physical punishment less maternal involvement and a larger number of children per household put this group at a higher risk
28. nd opening to the world the less he engages in evocations the less empathic his attitude and the more he is involved in discipline and favorable toward physical punishment Adult attachment scales are correlated with the various dimensions of paternal involvement Security is positively correlated to involvement in opening to the world physical play evocations and empathic attitudes and negatively correlated to punitive attitudes Anxiety is positively correlated to involvement in discipline and favorable attitudes toward physical punishment and negatively correlated to empathic attitudes Finally avoidance is positively correlated to favorable attitudes toward physical punishment and negatively correlated to involvement in basic care and empathic attitudes Familial characteristics of the types of fathering The oneway analyses shown in Table 5 indicate that the four groups differ significantly with regard to maternal age and involvement mean number of hours worked by the father the number of children three of the four socioeconomic variables 15 Father involvement the fathers parental stress and two of the three adult attachment variables Authoritarian fathers work longer hours and have a lower level of education than authoritative fathers Their spouses also have lower incomes than those in the authoritative group Spouses of authoritarian fathers have a lower level of education than spouses of stimulative or authoritative f
29. nge from 23 to 63 and mothers was 35 2 SD 5 0 range from 24 to 52 For fathers mean number of years of education was 13 0 SD 2 9 range from 3 to 23 compared to 12 6 years SD 2 7 range from 5 to 22 for mothers More precisely 57 996 of fathers and 66 396 of mothers had 12 years or less schooling Eighty percent 8096 of fathers and 66 3 of mothers were employed Overall in 43 596 of the families both parents had a job The annual income of 58 396 of fathers and 8596 of mothers was 30 000 CAN or less only 18 596 of fathers and 5 496 of mothers earned 40 000 or more per year The vast majority of the families 89 4 were made up of the two biological parents whereas 10 6 were reconstituted families Spouses had cohabited for an average of 8 5 years SD 4 3 range from 1 to 23 years The mean number of children per household was 2 with a range from 1 to 6 Father involvement Instruments Fathers involvement Fathers involvement was assessed using the Montreal Father s Involvement Questionnaire an instrument composed of 47 items with a 5 point Likert scale 1 never to 5 very often or a 6 point Likert scale 1 never to 6 every day divided into 6 scales Whereas involvement often refers to the general level of interaction with a child in the present study we examine it in terms of the different dimensions identified through factor analysis Emotional support was measured by 12 items pertaining to paren
30. nt history were measured with the Attachment Style Questionnaire Feeney Noller amp Hanrahan 1994 This instrument consists of 40 items with a 6 point Likert scale 1 totally disagree to 6 totally agree It measures the general style of social relations and is not solely centered on romantic relationships as are numerous instruments that measure adult attachment The three factor solution corresponds to the three constructs central to Hazan and Shaver s 1987 conceptualization of adult attachment security alpha 53 with 7 items anxiety 71 with 14 items and avoidance 52 with 9 items The father s parenting stress was evaluated with the short version 36 items of the Parenting Stress Index PSI validated for the French speaking population of Quebec by Bigras LaFreni re amp Abidin 1996 The total stress score Cronbach s alpha 88 is the sum of three subscales parental distress dysfunctional parent child interactions and stress about a difficult child Fathers work A certain number of studies have shown that there are associations between the father s work and his paternal involvement Feldman Nash amp Aschenbrenner 1983 In this study we decided to evaluate the effect of three work related dimensions psychological involvement in work satisfaction with work and quantitative involvement or amount of time devoted to work Fathers involvement in their work was measured with the Job Involvement Scale Lodahl amp
31. of maltreating their children than fathers in the permissive and stimulative groups Although Baumrind concluded that authoritative parenting was the most favorable for child development it is highly likely that child development is linked to the interaction of the two parents respective parenting styles For this reason in future studies it would be important to take into account the attitudes and parental involvement of both parents Authoritarian fathers almost 35 of the sample are even more at risk of maltreating their children because the families socioeconomic situation is more difficult particularly with regard to the mothers level of education and income Note that authoritarian fathers income is not significantly different from that of authoritative fathers but the former have to work more hours per week which leads to a 22 Father involvement corresponding increase in their level of fatigue and stress and a decrease in the time they spend with their children Theory suggests that fathers who are more favorable toward physical punishment are likely to be more at risk of physically abusing their children whereas fathers who are less parentally involved are likely to be more at risk of neglecting their children Authoritarian fathers would be expected to be at higher risk of neglect and physical abuse given their lack of warmth and tendency to be controlling whereas authoritative fathers who also exercise control but are wa
32. ple of two parent families living in a disadvantaged environment with at least one child between O and 6 years of age was aimed at verifying the existence of different types of fathering on the basis of self report measures of involvement and parental attitudes Method Subjects and data collection procedures The present investigation studied 468 two parent French Canadian families with at least one child between 0 and 6 years of age living in a disadvantaged environment Spouses had to have cohabited for at least one year A representative sample of Father involvement subjects was recruited from two semi rural communities north of Montreal and from two Montreal neighborhoods Quebec Canada The four communities had to meet the following criteria 1 presence of over 300 families with at least one child under six years of age and 2 a total of at least 25 of families living under the poverty line A letter was sent to each of the families prior to the interview to inform them of a coming home visit Households were excluded from the study only after six unsuccessful attempts to meet the family Fathers biological and non biological and mothers participated in separate face to face interviews beginning with the father In order to avoid potential reading difficulties and confidentiality issues participants were simply asked to point to a number on a scale drawn on a card in front of them Fathers mean age was 37 8 SD 6 0 ra
33. ritarian parenting style was the most important predictor of use of physical punishment as reported by mothers Frias Armenta amp McCloskey 1998 Permissive parents are responsive to children s needs but set few limits and rarely exercise control over the child in order to allow free expression of feelings Authoritative parents tend to have children who as preschoolers are cheerful socially responsive self reliant achievement oriented and cooperative with adults and peers Baumrind 1971 This type of parenting is also more highly correlated with academic and social competence of children during grade school years see Hastings amp Rubin 1999 Authoritarian parents tend to have irritable children whereas permissive parents often have children who are more dependent self oriented and aggressive Other studies have confirmed that authoritative parenting is related to positive outcomes for children s social cognitive and emotional development Maccoby amp Martin 1983 Peterson amp Rollins 1987 and have shown that the two other parenting styles are associated with children s acting out behavior Hetherington amp Martin 1986 As the parents in Baumrind s sample were reasonably warm and accepting she did not identify a category that emerged in later studies uninvolved parenting an extremely lax non controlling approach displayed by parents who have either rejected Father involvement their children or are so overwhelm
34. rmer would only be at risk of inflicting physical abuse In future studies it would be interesting to verify these assumptions about specific types of maltreatment Although the risk of maltreatment varies from one type of fathering to another it would seem that all those in favor of physical punishment even stimulative fathers are at risk of physically abusing their children if the occasion arises However it is also important to remember that risk of maltreatment does not equal maltreatment It would be particularly interesting to examine in future studies whether various types of fathering differ in terms of the father s ability to regulate his stress in the context of parental discipline and also in other contexts Finally it would undoubtedly be highly interesting to use Baumrind s classification scheme in studies that directly scrutinize maltreating families using a systemic approach that examines both maternal and paternal involvement in a perspective of role complementarity 23 Father involvement References Abidin R R 1986 Parenting Stress Index PSI manual Oe ed Charlottesville VA Pediatric Psychology Press Abidin R R amp Brunner J F 1995 Development of a Parenting Alliance Inventory Journal of Clinical Child Psychology 24 1 31 40 Baker B L amp Heller T L 1996 Preschool children with externalizing behaviors Experience of fathers and mothers Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 24
35. sical punishment Fathers income is positively correlated to empathic attitudes and involvement in discipline but negatively correlated to opening to the world Level of education is positively correlated to involvement in basic care physical play and discipline as well as to empathic attitudes but negatively correlated to attitudes favoring physical punishment Mothers income is positively correlated to their spouse s involvement in basic care opening to the world and empathic attitudes but negatively correlated to the father s attitude toward physical punishment Mothers level of education is positively correlated to paternal involvement in basic care physical play discipline opening to the world and empathic attitudes In short higher socioeconomic status of fathers and or 14 Father involvement mothers tends to be linked to more empathic paternal attitudes and greater paternal involvement particularly in providing basic care The fathers age is negatively correlated to three dimensions opening to the world physical play and evocations The younger the father the more he stimulates his child and the more present the latter seems to be in the father s cognitions Parental stress is significantly correlated with seven of the eight dimensions only physical play is uncorrelated to parental stress The greater the level of parental stress reported by the father the less he is involved in basic care emotional support a
36. spectives Vol 3 Current issues in the family SAGE Publications Patterson G R DeBaryshe B D amp Ramsey E 1989 A developmental perspective on antisocial behavior American Psychologist 44 329 335 Payne M A 1989 Use and abuse of corporal punishment A Caribbean view Child Abuse amp Neglect 13 3 389 401 Peterson G W amp Rollins B C 1987 Parent child socialization In M B Sussman amp S K Steinmetz Eds Handbook of marriage and the family pp 471 507 New York Plenum Pruett K D 1993 The paternal presence Special issues Fathers Families in Societies 74 46 50 Robinson C C Mandleco B Frost Olsen S amp Hart C H 1995 Authoritative authoritarian and permisive parenting practices Development of a new measure Psychological Reports 77 819 830 Snarey J 1993 How fathers care for the next generation A four decade study Boston Mass Harvard University Press Spanier G B 1976 Measuring dyadic adjustment New scales for assessing the quality of marriage and similar dyads Journal of Marriage and the Family 38 15 30 Stattin H Janson H Klackenberg Larsson I amp Magnusson D 1995 Corporal punishment in everyday life an intergenerational perspective In J McCord Ed Coercion and punishment in long term perspectives pp 315 347 Cambridge University Press Sternberg K J 1997 Fathers the missing parents in research on
37. tal behaviors that clearly communicate to the child that he or she is appreciated loved supported and protected Opening to the world included 9 items such as initiating the child to new games or activities Basic care comprised 9 items such as bathing dressing feeding and nursing the child Physical play 7 items included tickling play wrestling or laughing with the child Evocations 6 items encompassed instances in which the parent talks to others about positive aspects of the child and or about pleasant times spent together Discipline 4 items concerned parental activities aimed at correcting the child s conduct or teaching age appropriate behavior Table 1 shows the internal consistency Cronbach s alphas temporal stability test retest correlations over a month for 33 subjects and the proportion of variance explained by each of the factors identified through factor analysis Fathers parental attitudes Attitudes may be defined as an individual s predisposition reaction to or affective evaluation of the alleged facts about an object or situation Holden amp Edwards 1989 Father involvement Attitudes are a function of beliefs both of which are social cognitions hypothesized to be causally linked to behavior Bugental Blue amp Druscoza 1989 Iverson amp Segal 1992 There is some evidence suggesting that parental beliefs and attitudes are associated with child rearing practices Holden amp Edwards 1989 P
38. ved control over caregiving outcomes implications for child abuse Developmental Psychology 25 532 539 24 Father involvement Buntain Ricklefs J J Kemper K J Bell M amp Babonis T 1994 Punishments what predicts adult approval Child Abuse and Neglect 18 11 945 955 Cowan C P amp Cowan P A 1987 Men s Involvement in Parenthood Identifying the Antecedents and Understanding the Barriers P W Berman amp F A Pederson eds Men s Transitions to Parenthood Longitudinal Studies of Early Family Experience pp 145 174 Hillsdale N J Lawrence Erlbaum De Luccie M 1996 Predictors of paternal involvement and satisfaction Psychological Reports 79 1351 1359 Feeney J A Noller P amp Hanrahan M 1994 Assessing adult attachment In M B Sperling amp W H Berman Eds Attachment in adults pp 128 152 New York The Guilford Press Feldman S S Nash S C amp Aschenbrenner B G 1983 Antecedents of fathering Child Development 54 1628 1636 Feshbach N D 1989 The construct of empathy and the phenomenon of physical maltreatment of children In D Cicchetti amp V Carlson Eds Child maltreatment Theory and research on the causes and consequences of child abuse and neglect pp 349 373 Cambridge University Press Frias Armenta M amp McCloskey L A 1998 Determinants of harsh parenting in Mexico Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 26 2
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