role of the father

• increasing expectation in western cultures that father should play a greater role in childcare due to increase in women working and change in norms
• mothers take on a nurturing role whilst fathers take on a playmate role, infants usually seek the father when positive in emotion and wanting to play but seeks the mother when distressed and needs comforting
• schaffer and emerson findings ?

  • fathers are much less likely to be the primary attachment figure, sole object (3%), joint first object (27%).
  • they suggested this was due to fathers spending less time on average with their children
  • Ross et al (1975) found the number of nappies changed was positively correlated to the strength of their attachment, this suggests responsiveness of the parent is the key to attachment not gender
• biological explanation for role of the father in attachment?

  hormones- men do not posses large amounts of oestrogen which underlies caregiving behaviours, women produce a large quantity of oxytocin after birth which aids bonding with the child which is why women are more likely to be the primary attachment
• social explanation ?

  societies expectations for men and woman are different, men may perceive certain behaviour as feminine like being sensitive and caring to the needs of others due to stereotypes,  Heermann et al (1994) found that men are less sensitive to infants needs on several scales 
• evaluation?

  evidence suggests that even though fathers are rarely a primary attachment they are still an important secondary attachment figure- they teach the child cognitive skills and provide challenging situations with problem solving skills, seen as positve as the child will develop greater cognitive skills if father is less responsive than mother
• evaluation?

  research has been done into both fathers being the primary and secondary role for attachment it is difficult to determine what the role of the father actually is due to differences in the studies. 

   
• evaluation?

  McCallum (2004) found children brought up in single mother or same sex families do not develop any different to children brought up with a mother and a father which suggests father's do play a secondary role in attachment which may not be as vital as the role of the mother 
• evaluation?

  emphasis on the mother is socially sensitive-It implies that children may be disadvantaged if their mother returns back to work early after birth, is absent, or lives with a single father. 

   
• research shows that when men are the primary caregiver they adopt behaviours more typical of a mother, field found primary caregiving fathers spent more time smiling imitating and holding their babies like primary caregiving fathers
• the key to attachment is responsiveness
• outline fields study?

  Field aimed to investigate the behaviours babies exhibit when the male is the primary caregiver, she filmed four-month-old babies interacting with primary caregiver mothers, fathers and secondary caregiver fathers. Field found that primary caregiving fathers (similar to mothers) spent more time smiling, imitating and holding their babies compared to secondary caregiving fathers, this concludes the key to attachment and its strength is the responsiveness of the parent not the gender. 

   
• role of the father conclusion?

  Men are still able to form secure attachments with their children especially in single father families but in couples where the father is a primary caregiver the mother also is, and they share the primary attachment. However, social stereotypes and biological factors may discourage this. 
• economic benefits to changing role of the father ?

  As there is less judgment around men being stay at home fathers when a child is born the partner with the highest salary is able to return to work regardless of if it's the mother or father, this will strengthen the economy as return is based on salary not gender. 
• cohn et al found stay at home dads have quadrupled over the last 25 years
• rise in stay at home dads may of not been voluntary due to economic recession as its predominately female workforces like healthcare and teaching that recover fastest and suffer fewer redundancies than predominately male workforces like construction and manufacturing