Because this is just fascinating to me

[mag_pie]

"Children who have an involved father in their lives in the early years show up for school with more of the qualities needed for learning. They are more patient, curious, and confident. They are better able to remain in their seats, wait patiently for their teacher, and maintain interest in their own work."
- Building Blocks for Father Involvement, National Headstart Training Center

Well, that explains a lot about Barney...

Seriously, the more I learn about child development and welfare, the more I understand Barney as not a caricature, but as a real person. :)

Comments

[snogged.livejournal.com]

My only trouble with that statement is that it creates another divide in the heterosexual vs. homosexual issue.

[magpieinthesky.livejournal.com]

I TOTALLY agree that there isn't enough representation in research of same-sex couples, and that is a serious limitation in the research. At the same time, the literature is targeted to represent families where teen pregnancy has occurred, and you don't get that so much with homosexual couples.

I think what they're really getting at and have seen in the research is that TWO parents are really necessary to be in a child's life for better developmental outcomes, and when 84% of families where parents have split up (or were never together in the first place) have no father in the picture, that can be problematic, especially where there's this history of social programs targeting help for mothers and completely ignoring that the fathers need to be a part of the child's development as well. In fact, in the 70s social workers would come into a household and LOOK for men's clothing, shoes, etc and if they found the presence of a man in the household they would cut services. That really contributed to this culture of "maybe it's better if the mother is on her own so she can get help" combined of course with a LOT of factors, but the goal of newer best practices is now to involve the fathers with their baby mommas and their babies so that they and their families have better outcomes.

I would LOVE to see a study on outcomes for same sex parents. My guess is that they're a bit older than the population that these programs deal with, just in terms of adoption laws.

[snogged.livejournal.com]

There's also the trouble of fathers who are absent or abusive. Those characteristics don't add much to the research either.

But for fathers who are involved (and yes, that includes stepfathers), I agree with the research and with you.

[magpieinthesky.livejournal.com]

Well, that's what they're saying - fathers who are involved with their children create better outcomes than when fathers are absent or abusive. This one quote doesn't really demonstrate the breadth of the studies. The pitfall of using one not-even-statistic-but-a-quote to represent a larger work!

We had a really good presentation from the director of a program to make sure COUPLES are involved with their children where possible - and the director addressed the fact that you have to deal with the abuse, the incarceration, alcoholism, drug addiction, any of those or other factors BEFORE they can be brought on board to take equal responsibility in parenting a child. Otherwise, that jeopardizes the family's stability even further as well as the child's safety.

We really understand as a culture that mothers are important to the development of a child. The major point of the research is that fathers (or stepfathers or father-figures) are too! Make them responsible! But I'm preaching to the choir :)

Honestly, this is a relatively new concept. So the research isn't necessarily there yet in covering all the populations that need to be addressed (like you said, same sex couples), and of course often it happens that socially based research - and especially those on social programs - can be difficult to evaluate when value systems are involved. This kind of research should always be taken with a grain of salt, because it does not capture all cases... but it can help to inform practices until we have broader and more diverse research available.

[snogged.livejournal.com]

I really hope I'm not making you feel like you have to defend yourself.

*hugs*

[magpieinthesky.livejournal.com]

Aw! I hope I don't sound defensive!

I just found this research and these concepts really interesting, and any chance to talk about it (and its limitations) is really good for me, because it means that I'm actually... I dunno, absorbing the information and gettin' me some BOOK LARNIN'!

:DDDDDDD

::hugs you back because I love that::

[snogged.livejournal.com]

I certainly understand the need for that!
I do that at internship sometimes with some of the staff members.