The research provides some of the most conclusive evidence to date of fathers' importance to children's outcomes and reinforces the idea that early childhood programs such as Head Start should focus on the whole family, including mother and father alike. The findings are published online in two academic journals, Early Childhood Research Quarterly and Infant and Child Development.
"There's this whole idea that grew out of past research that dads really don't have direct effects on their kids, that they just kind of create the tone for the household and that moms are the ones who affect their children's development," said Claire Vallotton, associate professor and primary investigator on the research project. "But here we show that fathers really do have a direct effect on kids, both in the short term and long term."
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