Child-Rearing

A Comparison of Popular and Scientific Research Articles

According to Nicholson in 2008, a father’s role in child-rearing is largely dependent upon the support or discouragement that the mother/wife gives them through maternal gateway behaviors. In a study of 97 couples that took place from pregnancy to when the children were three months old, these couples were videotaped and asked to answer questionnaires in order to assess the level of involvement with their child-rearing practices. It was found that when the fathers were given positive support for interacting with the child from the mother, they were more likely to be involved on a day-to-day basis with childcare than those who were not supported. Nicholson reported that mothers are still seen as the primary caregivers in our society and that could be the reason that mothers have the influence to allow more or less interaction between the father and child.

Schoppe-Sullivan, Cannon, Brown, and Mangelsdorf (2008) did the original study which was then stripped down and published on a popular news site; the previous paragraph gives a summary to that article. The main questions of their study were to determine the amount of father involvement and competence based on the couple’s beliefs about maternal gatekeeping, the amount that these beliefs about maternal gatekeeping have on the parents’ relationship quality and fathering behavior, and how much the maternal gatekeeping behavior effects fathers’ beliefs about how involved they should be in child-rearing, as well as how much it effects the co-parenting relationship quality and how the father behaves in raising their child. They hypothesized that when the maternal gatekeeping behavior was positive (encouraging fathers to be involved, positive reactions, low criticism), then father involvement and competence in child-rearing would increase, the co-parenting relationship quality would be better, and the couple’s beliefs about the father’s role in raising a child...