Father Involvement and Child Well-Being in Poor Families

描述（由申请人提供）：在过去的几十年里，无数的人口和经济变化导致了复杂的家庭系统，父亲的角色多样化和不明确，并显著增加了研究和政策对描述父亲对儿童福祉的影响的兴趣。目前的研究提出了一系列综合分析，使用来自“三城福利、儿童和家庭研究”的数据。“三城福利、儿童和家庭研究”是一个新的多方法纵向项目，主要研究城市社区低收入家庭中的非裔美国人和西班牙裔儿童。这些数据从各种来源（包括父亲、母亲和儿童报告、直接评估和观察）提供了关于居住和非居住父亲、家庭过程和儿童结果的丰富信息。拟议的研究将在经济和社会学理论框架内注入发展和家庭系统的观点，考虑父亲的财政、人力和社会资本对儿童健康发展轨迹的影响。本研究的主要目的是：(1)揭示父亲的经济资本、人力资本和社会资本对学龄前儿童认知技能、亲社会行为、情绪和行为问题的独立影响；(2)探讨父亲居住状况、父母冲突和父亲种族/民族的调节作用；(3)探讨父亲的影响是否通过家庭环境和母亲功能介导。根据以往的研究和理论，提出以下假设。(1)父亲的金融资本对居住和非居住父亲的作用相似，将通过家庭环境质量和母亲压力进行调节，并将对儿童的认知结果产生主要影响。(2)父亲人力资本对儿童认知和社会情感功能的影响更大，并受家庭环境质量的中介作用。(3)父亲的社会资本是儿童认知和社会情感结果的最显著预测因子，父母冲突会调节父亲的社会资本，家庭环境质量和母亲的功能会部分调节父亲的社会资本。多元回归和结构方程路径建模技术将被采用。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Numerous demographic and economic changes over the past decades have led to complex family systems with diverse and unclearly defined roles for fathers, and have significantly increased research and policy interests in delineating fathers' influence on child well-being. The current research proposes an integrated series of analyses using data from the Three City Study of Welfare, Children and Families, a new multimethod, longitudinal project on predominantly African American and Hispanic children in low-income families in urban neighborhoods. These data provide rich information on both residential and nonresidential fathers, family processes, and child outcomes from a variety of sources, including father, mother and child reports, direct assessments, and observations. The proposed research will inject a developmental and family systems perspective within an economic and sociological theoretical framework that considers the impact of fathers' financial, human, and social capital on children's healthy developmental trajectories. The primary goals of this research are: (1) to delineate the independent effects over time of fathers' financial, human and social capital on preschool children's cognitive skills, prosocial behaviors, and emotional and behavioral problems; (2) to delineate the moderating impact of fathers' residence status, mother-father conflict, and fathers' race/ethnicity; and (3) to address whether fathers' impacts are mediated through the home environment and maternal functioning. Based on previous research and theory, the following hypotheses are developed. (1) Fathers' financial capital will function similarly for residential and nonresidential fathers, will be mediated through the quality of the home environment and maternal stress, and will have a primary impact on children's cognitive outcomes. (2) Fathers' human capital will have a stronger impact on children's cognitive and socio-emotional functioning for residential versus nonresidential fathers and will be mediated by the quality of the home environment. (3) Fathers' social capital will be the most significant predictor of children's cognitive and socio-emotional outcomes, will be moderated by parental conflict, and will be partially mediated through the quality of the home environment and maternal functioning. Multiple regression and structural equation path modeling techniques will be employed.