Father Involvement and Child Well-Being in Poor Families

描述(申请人提供)：在过去的几十年里，大量的人口和经济变化导致了复杂的家庭系统，父亲的角色多种多样，定义不明确，并极大地增加了对描绘父亲对儿童福祉的影响的研究和政策兴趣。目前的研究提出了一系列综合分析，使用了福利、儿童和家庭三城研究的数据，这是一个新的多方法纵向项目，针对城市社区低收入家庭中以非洲裔和西班牙裔为主的儿童。这些数据提供了关于居住和非居住的父亲、家庭过程和来自各种来源的儿童结果的丰富信息，包括父亲、母亲和孩子的报告、直接评估和观察。这项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，该框架考虑父亲的财务、人力和社会资本对儿童健康发展轨迹的影响。本研究的主要目标是：(1)描述父亲的经济、人力和社会资本随着时间的推移对学龄前儿童认知技能、亲社会行为以及情绪和行为问题的独立影响；(2)描述父亲的居住地位、父母冲突和父亲的种族/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的功能来调节。在前人研究和理论的基础上，提出了以下假设。(1)父亲的经济资本对居住父亲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发挥中介作用，并将对孩子的认知结果产生主要影响。(2)与非居住父亲相比，父亲的人力资本对孩子的认知和社会情绪功能有更大的影响，并受家庭环境质量的影响。(3)父亲的社会资本将是儿童认知和社会情感结果的最重要预测因素，将受到父母冲突的影响，并将部分通过家庭环境质量和母亲的功能发挥作用。将采用多元回归和结构方程路径建模技术。

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.