role of the father

• Bowbly 1988 - fathers can fill a role closely resembling that filled by a mother but it's uncommon.

  A father is more likely to engage in physically active play
• Schaffer and Emmerson 1964- found that a majority of babies attached to mother first at around 7 months

  additional attachments developed in proceeding months to secondary attachments including the father

  in 75% of infants studied by 18 months they made an attachment with the father
• Field 1978 - Role as PRIMARY caregiver

  • compared behaviours of primary caretaker mothers with primary and secondary fathers. Face to face interactions videoed and analysed with infants as young as 4 months
  • secondary fathers engaged more in game playing, held infants less
  • fathers engaged in more smiling, imitative grimaces, vocalisations
  • interactional synchrony
• Grossman 2002-

  • conducted a longitudinal study of 44 families comparing role of fathers and mothers' contribution to attachment experience at 6, 10 and 16 years old
  • quality of infant attachment with mother was related to children's attachments in adolescent, father's less important
  • HOWEVER found quality of fathers' play with infants was related to quality of adolescent attachment -> they play a diff role
• Brown et al. 2012-

  • investigated father involvement, paternal sensitivity and father - child attachment security at 13 months and 3 years
  • results: involvement and sensitivity influenced father - child attachment security at age 3
  • involvement was a greater predictor of secure attachment when fathers were rated as less sensitive
  • gender of a caregiver is not crucial in predicting attachment types but rather it's the extent of involvement
• Strength -> using findings in parenting advice

  • mothers may feel pressures to stay at home and fathers to focus on work
  • research on the flexibility of the role of the father can be used to offer advice to parents
  • this means that parental anxiety about the role of the father can be reduced and parenting decisions made easier
• Strength AND weakness - conflicting evidence from diff methodologies

  • been found that children growing up in single or same sex parent families don't develop any differently from those in two parent hetero families - other family structures adapt to not having fathers
  • there may be a distinct role for fathers when present but they aren't necessary
• Weakness - diff research questions

  • some researchers look at the father as a secondary figure, others as a primary
  • this means that some see the father as acting differently than the mother and a distinct role - others state that the father can take on a maternal role
  • therefore there is no agreement on the role of the father and psychologists cannot easily answer the question of the father's role
• weakness - conflicting evidence from diff methodologies

  • Grossman et al. 2002- suggests fathers have a distinct role in children's development involving play and stimulation
  • however, McCallum and Golombole 2004 found that children without a father didn't develop any differently
  • question remains unanswered
• what are the economic implications of research into the role of the father?


  • father's may stay at home instead of returning to work meaning they aren't contributing to the economy
  • mother's may go to work instead of the father meaning they are contributing to the economy
  • parental leave legislation may change and pay fathers for longer paternity leave