Fathers as ‘core business’ in child welfare practice and research: An interdisciplinary review

Highlights

• For the well-being of children, fathers in child welfare families must be engaged.

• Revised attachment theory and recent research indicate the unique role of fathers.

• Fathers influence children independently of, and equally strongly as, mothers.

• The theoretical and practical reasons why fathers are overlooked need to be addressed.

• Changes are needed in child welfare procedures, worker training, and research.

Abstract

This literature review draws from a wide array of interdisciplinary research to argue that fathers need to be included in child welfare practice and research to the same extent as mothers. Social work and child maltreatment literature highlight that fathers are often overlooked and viewed more negatively than mothers in child welfare practice. There are noteworthy theoretical and practical reasons for this poor engagement of fathers in practice. However, advances in attachment theory and recent research findings from developmental and fathering literature indicate that fathers influence their children independently from mothers and equally strongly. Further research demonstrates that fathers and father figures can be both potential risk factors and protective factors in the lives of vulnerable children. Therefore, children are placed at increased risk if dangerous fathers are not engaged, and are also significantly disadvantaged if supportive fathers are not engaged. The review concludes with practical implications for child welfare practice and research.

Introduction

In the last decade, many western countries have initiated public policies to raise awareness of the importance of father involvement in the lives of their children (e.g. The National Fatherhood Initiative in the US, The Father Involvement Research Alliance in Canada, The Fatherhood Institute in the UK, and the 2006 Family Law reforms in Australia). These initiatives are, at least in part, a response to the overwhelming research evidence that has accumulated over the past 30 years demonstrating that fathers play a vital role in the lives of their children (Lero, Ashbourne, & Whitehead, 2006). However, child welfare services appear to be quite resistant to father-inclusive practice. The lack of attention to fathers in child welfare services has been well-documented in general social work literature internationally and, according to some, ignoring fathers is deeply embedded in child welfare practice (Brown et al., 2009a, Dominelli et al., 2011, Strega et al., 2008). Scourfield (2006) posits that there is an assumption that men are not the ‘core business’ of child protection workers since women are considered the main client base. Others claim there is a pervasive negative stereotype of fathers and father figures in child welfare families and that, as a result, they are treated with suspicion and assumed to be absent, unimportant, dangerous and generally ‘bad’ (Bellamy, 2009, O'Donnell et al., 2005). These negative perceptions may lead to a lack of engagement by workers and a tendency to exclude fathers from at-risk children's lives. Therefore, despite the fact that in the wider public arena father involvement is being encouraged, child welfare policies and practices tend to promote uninvolved, rather than involved, fathering (Brown et al., 2009).

There are, however, valid reasons, from both theory and practice, why child welfare services and research have focused on mothers and not fathers for decades. From a theoretical perspective, Western society has embraced the traditional hierarchical model of attachment theory which postulates that attachment to the mother is most important for children's socio-emotional well-being (Lewis & Lamb, 2007). In practice, including fathers can be very challenging due to factors such as the complexities of modern family composition, mothers not wanting fathers involved, avoidance and resistance from fathers themselves, and the fear of violent men. Therefore, since there are significant reasons to avoid fathers in child welfare families, a very convincing argument is required to justify altering current practice and expending scarce resources to engage and study fathers.

It will be argued that there are persuasive theoretical reasons, as well as compelling research evidence, that do justify engaging and studying fathers from child welfare families. Attachment theory is being revised in the light of a solid body of research evidence demonstrating that fathers have an equally important and independent influence on children's well-being (Newland & Coyl, 2010). In addition, ecological theories of child maltreatment also highlight the need to include all significant adults in a child's life when addressing child-focused problems. Hence, by failing to routinely and comprehensively include fathers, child welfare services can profoundly fail children, since fathers can be just as much a protective factor or risk factor in the life of a child as the mother (Brown et al., 2009a, Strega et al., 2008). In essence, when fathers are overlooked, children may suffer the consequences.

This literature review addresses a gap in the child welfare literature by integrating research from a variety of different fields, including social work, child welfare, fathering and developmental psychology, to examine the problem of poor father engagement in child welfare practice, as well as the causes, importance to child outcomes, and possible solutions (see Fig. 1). By adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this problem can be analyzed holistically by drawing from a comprehensive body of literature. In particular, this review utilizes recent fathering and developmental research to challenge existing mother-focused theory, practice and research. It also aims to increase awareness of the research evidence demonstrating that fathers, just like mothers, play a vital role in their children's lives, since it is this research that provides the compelling argument for including fathers in all aspects of practice and research (Fleming, 2007). This review also augments the fathering literature as there is a dearth of research on fathers in child welfare families as a sub-group.