Fathers' involvement and preschool children's behavior in stable single-mother families

The research testing bidirectional relationships between non-resident fathers' involvement and children's behavior usually models outcomes in school age children. It also tends to include both families in which fathers have never lived with their children and families in which fathers have resided with their children at least some of the time. In this study we used data from the first two sweeps of the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) to model bidirectional links between non-resident fathers' involvement and the behavior of preschool children growing up in continuously single-mother families (N = 930). Children's behavior was measured with the Carey Infant Temperament Scale at Sweep 1 (age 9 months), and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire at Sweep 2 (age 3 years). Non-resident father involvement was mother-reported. We found no evidence for father involvement effects on later child behavior, but strong evidence for the association between early and later non-resident father involvement.

► Toddlers in stable single-mother families were at contextual and psychological risk. ► Nonresident father involvement had no effect on their emotional/behavioral outcomes. ► There was evidence for child temperament effects on nonresident father involvement.