Mother's behavior is the key to her father's care for children

Mothers play an important role in deciding how much fathers care about their newborn baby. A study of 97 couples found that fathers were more involved in taking care of babies every day if they received positive encouragement from their partners.

In fact, this encouragement is important even after considering the views of both parents about how much he should be involved, the overall quality of the parenting relationship, and the mothers doing How much outside work.

In addition, the belief of fathers about how they should be involved in child care does not make sense when mothers criticize their role as father. In other words, fathers do not materialize their beliefs when faced with mothers who are particularly critical.

According to Sarah Schoppe-Sullivan, co-author of the project and a lecturer in family science and human development at Ohio State University, ' The mother is the driver. They can encourage fathers and open doors for them to take care of their children, or decry and slam that door. This is the first real evidence that mothers, through their behavior, act as gatekeepers to determine how much fathers involved in child care. '

Schoppe-Sullivan conducted the study with Elizabeth Cannon, Ohio State PhD student, Geoffrey Brown and Sarah Mangelsdorf, University of Illinois, and Margaret Szewczyk Skolowski. Their results were published in the June 2008 issue of the Journal of Family Psychology.

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The study surveyed 97 couples in the Midwest, married or married couples and pregnant mothers when the study began. Before birth, the couples answered a survey about the father's beliefs and roles in caring for children. About 3.5 months after the baby was born, researchers conducted a family assessment.

Couples fill out a questionnaire that each person reports on the behavior of the mother. They were asked about the mother's response to the role of a father with encouraging attitude (for example, telling his father how much he made the child happy) or criticizing (irritating or rolling his eyes) so often Come on. They also filled out a questionnaire to investigate how much the father was involved in the care of the child and how well the parents were in caring for the child.

Finally, the researchers returned to the scene where the couples interacted with the child to see their father's role and ability to take care of their babies. Couples are required to change their clothes together and the researchers follow up to find out who is working mainly as well as how the father is exposed to the child.

Finding the importance of mothers with the role of fathers in caring for the child is important for many reasons. First, this is the first work to examine what mothers actually do on a daily basis that could have an effect on their behavior. While scholars suggest that 'door-to-door' behavior occurs, this work cannot be confirmed.

'Most of the other works have not considered the mother's actual behavior. In many cases, researchers used questionnaires to ask parents about how much fathers should be involved in raising children, and then relate to the answers in the report. of parents about mothers and the role of fathers in taking care of their children. "

In addition, the majority of maternal prevention theory focuses on how negative a mother's reaction will prevent fathers from taking care of children. But this work shows that mother's encouragement may also be important, or even more important, in forming the role of the father.'Encouragement is very important, and really makes a difference in how active the fathers are.'

Schoppe-Sullivan cautioned that the method of the project meant that researchers could not prove which action was the cause and what was the consequence. In other words, we cannot prove that mother's encouragement always brings the father's cooperation or vice versa, her father's cooperation influences her mother's encouragement.

It is possible that the results go in both directions.'For example, if fathers are reluctant to wake up in the night because of the baby, the mothers will stop asking after a while.' However, it is also reasonable to believe that mother has an influence on her father rather than the opposite. 'She is still considered the main caregiver in our society, so they can have a greater influence.'

However, Schoppe-Sullivan began a new study that will expand these findings. She recently received a $ 400,000 Career Award from the National Science Foundation, which will help her conduct long-term research on 170 couples who are expecting their first child to investigate the cause of the mother's prevention. These results can give more information about how mothers affect their behavior and vice versa.