Dads Eager to Be Involved, Researchers Find

But many fathers feel isolated by mom-friendly policies, programs

BY RACHELLE COOPER

Instead of celebrating the superficial greeting-card version of Father's Day this Sunday, Canadians should recognize the diverse experience of fathers and the positive ways fathering is evolving, says family relations professor Kerry Daly, director of the national Father Involvement Research Alliance (FIRA).

“We can't talk about father involvement as a monolithic experience,” says Daly. “Fathering occurs under many conditions and many family contexts, depending on factors such as age, ethnicity, marital status and sexual orientation.”

After analyzing demographic trends, interviewing fathers from across Canada and reviewing myriad policies that affect father involvement, FIRA, a community/university research project involving 10 universities and more than 25 community partners, has uncovered the complex challenges facing fathers from different walks of life. FIRA's research focuses on issues faced by seven specific groups of fathers: separated/divorced, immigrant, young, aboriginal, gay, new fathers and fathers of children with special needs.

The first set of results from the five-year, $1-million research project shows that, regardless of background, dads are involved or want to be more involved in the lives of their children and are eager to discuss their experiences.

“What we're picking up is that there's a really strong desire from men to not only be involved but to also talk about their parenting experiences as something that's meaningful and important in their lives,” says Daly. “We had an overwhelming response of dads who wanted to talk to us.”

The fathers interviewed were keen to step out of traditional roles, but said they sometimes felt invisible or overlooked in the lives of their children, he says. “Fathers are well aware that mothering and parenting are used interchangeably and that services often focus only on mothers' needs and ignore fathers' needs.”

Daly and his colleagues will identify ways to support father involvement and also hope to draw more attention to the ways dads are being excluded in policies and parenting programs.

“Fathers are affected either directly or indirectly in the way policies and institutional practices perpetuate limited gender roles or fail to recognize the unique role of fathers,” he says. “It's important for community services and workplaces to recognize that dads bring a different perspective to parenting and experience work-family pressures in their own way.”

Fathers in many of the clusters said that, although their partners were likely to seek support from friends, families and community groups, they feel isolated by programs and policies that are often built on a model designed for mothers, says Daly. The researchers plan to explore different ways of supplying information and support to dads, such as creating parenting guides for immigrant fathers and videos for young fathers struggling to provide for a child while minimally employed.

Here are some of the findings from the seven research clusters:

• Indigenous fathers who were removed from their homes as children to attend residential schools have negative or no experiences of being fathered.
• Many immigrant and refugee fathers are at risk for stress factors, including social isolation, unemployment and trauma.
• Gay fathers face challenging issues related to “coming out” after having children, disclosure of sexual orientation to children and spouses, and entitlement to fatherhood.
• Separated and divorced fathers face legal, emotional and financial issues that affect their continued involvement, and want equal parenting responsibilities with support from courts and other institutions.
• New fathers face difficulties in transitioning into parenting and wish to support their partners and communicate with them about their life and relationship changes.
• Even though young fathers have little power in terms of having access to their children if the mother denies it, they make concrete efforts to be recognized as a valuable partner.
• Fathers of children with special needs have difficulty getting employer permission to attend clinics and have little downtime.