role of the father

• Early research suggests the father's role in attachment is the playmate
• Schaffer and Emerson


  Only 3% of babies have their father as their first attachment. they become more important at 18 months
• Grossman

  • Longitudinal study- 44 families
  • looked at both parents behaviour and compared it to the quality of the child's attachment
  • findings- quality of attachment with mothers had an impact on adolescent attachment, suggesting the fathers role is less important
  • quality of the fathers play related to adolescent attachment, suggesting fathers have a different role in attachment
• Field (refuting evidence)

  • tested mother as primary caregiver, father as primary caregiver and father as secondary caregiver
  • primary caregiver fathers spent more time smiling, imitating and holding the babies
  • this behaviour is important when building an attachment
• Supporting evidence (Grossman)


  Hrdy found fathers to be less able to detect low levels of distress in their infants compared to mothers. Supports the biological explanation that fathers are less nurturing because of their lack of oestrogen.
• Social injustices


  Evidence has shown that fathers are equally as capable to display sensitive responsiveness as mothers are, society still hasn't adapted to these views. E.g. many airlines don't sit men next to a child they are not related to, instead they sit them next to a woman. this is because society views women as more nurturing than men.