Fathers as Intervention Agents for Their Children with Developmental Disabilities

ABSTRACT

Parent training aimed at aiding children to overcome social and behavioral problems is an area that has continued to gain attention and support. Very little of the current research has been with developmentally disabled children, the focus of this study. Additionally, for most parent training programs, “parents” actually refers to mothers. In this study three fathers and their developmentally disabled children, who ranged in age from 2 years 10 months to 4 years 5 months, were studied. A multiple baseline across fathers' behaviors was utilized for participants to evaluate effects of parent training on fathers' target behaviors. Child compliance and inappropriate behaviors were also addressed. Parent training resulted in desirable changes on a range of target behaviors. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Deviant Heroes: Nonconformists as Agents of Justice and Social Change

Sociologists usually define deviance as a fluid construct, relative to given social circumstances, and something that is neither negative nor positive in and of itself. Despite the rejection of absolutist approaches, the vast majority of texts and studies concerning deviant behavior implicitly or explicitly present deviance as either a morally bad or morally neutral behavior. Such literatures wrongly conflate deviant behavior with villainous actions. We argue that some of the most important deviants have been at the leading forefront of positive social change and the creation of a more just, fair, and humane society. Deviant heroes are those individuals who violate unjust norms and laws, facing the repercussions of social control, while simultaneously effecting positive social change. This article considers the theoretical role of the deviant hero within classical and contemporary sociological traditions and identifies new directions for social research.     

Fathers and fetuses

Harris postulates that in certain instances it would be morally impermissible for a woman to have an abortion because it would be a wrongful harm to the father and a violation of his autonomy. He constructs and analyzes five cases chosen to elucidate the moral issues involved and concludes that, for a man to lay claim to the fetus being his in a sense that the mother is obligated to respect, the fetus must be the result of his having pursued a legitimate interest in procreation in a morally legitimate way. When a man has satisfied the requirements of autonomy both for himself and for his sexual partner in regard to the interest in procreation, the woman has a prima facie obligation to him not to harm the fetus. Therefore, unless there is some contravening moral consideration that overrides this obligation, the abortion of the fetus is morally impermissible.     

Fathers: The invisible parent

Viewing the family as a system of interdependent roles has frequently led to the assumption that fathers, in comparison with mothers, play highly restricted roles vis-à-vis their children. Much of the literature on fathers, in point of fact, stresses their absence, their disinterest, and lack of competence in child care. Reported here are findings from a sample of 231 families which suggest that this conception of fatherhood does an injustice to the empirical case. The evidence indicates that when the amount of time available to spend with children is considered, the father's involvement with his children is equal to that of the mother's. Under certain conditions, in fact, father-child involvement exceeds the child-related activities performed by mothers.     

Teenage Fathers: A Profile

In this century both the literature and social programs devoted to adolescent pregnancy have focused almost exclusively on the female. This article presents a profile of teenage fathers by reviewing the scant literature that is available. The authors make specific recommendations for counselors on the basis of this review.     

Knowledge About Parenting as a Predictor of Behavioral Discipline Practices between Mothers and Fathers

Psychological Studies - Knowledge of child-rearing and child development is of the utmost importance to optimal parenting and child well-being. Most of what is known about parenting knowledge is...     

Heroes and heroines among American adolescents

Based upon the analysis of questionnaire responses of 1092 high school students, an attempt was made to assess the type of heroes and heroines most often chosen. The major findings are that high school students have more heroes than heroines, that they have an approximately equal number of personal heroes and heroines, and that the preference for heroes is not altered when the sex or race of the respondents is considered. The findings are explained both by the greater numbers of males than females in public professional roles and by the greater salience of male than female professional role models. Implications of the possible effects of hero and heroine choices for sex-role identification are discussed.     

The Psychology of Fathers and Daughters

No abstract available for this article.     

Single Fathers and Noncustodial Mothers:

Private practitioners will increasingly be called upon to meet the needs of single fathers raising children alone. One articular challenne will be to und&stand the relatGnship these fathers have with their &- wives, the mothers of the children they are raising. Information from a sample of 1,136 single fathers provides needed baseline data about visitation'patterns and the dynamics-of the continuing relationship between the father. the children. and the noncustodial mother. The benefits to the father of having the mother stay involved with the family are highlighted.     

The Role of Mothers and Fathers

The development of personality characteristics appears to differ by sex of child and role of parent, with interpersonal concerns tending to characterize mothers and instrumental concerns describing fathers. Using a semi-structured interview protocol and paper-and-pencil questionnaires, we examined the effects of parenting, as reported by middle-class high school senior boys and girls, on the development of two aspects of personality. Ego development and self-esteem both have demonstrated sex differences, with girls displaying more advanced ego development and boys displaying higher self-esteem. We expected that mothers, because of their greater interpersonal orientation, would influence the development of ego development more than would fathers, and that, based on past findings, the opposite-sex parent would exert the primary influence on self-esteem. While ego development was found to relate to more encouraging, warmer mothering in boys, it related weakly to mothering in girls. Boys and girls who perceived their cross-sex parent to be warm and supportive were found to have higher self-esteem.     

Getting Fathers Involved in Child-Related Therapy

Fathers are involved in treatment for child and family problems to a far lesser extent than are mothers. This article reviews the level of fathers’ inclusion in therapy, delineates possible barriers to fathers’ participation in child-related treatment, and discusses factors associated with fathers’ involvement in therapy. Empirically and clinically informed strategies to engage fathers in treatment are offered to help therapists increase fathers’ participation in the therapeutic process. Finally, future directions for clinically informed research in this area are discussed.     

Adolescent Boys' Talk about Absent Fathers

The objective of this study was to explore how adolescent boys talk about absent fathers in Alexandra Township, a historically working-class and black community in Gauteng, South Africa. Individual and group interviews were conducted with 30 adolescent boys between the age of 14 and 18 years in two high schools in Alexandra Township. The results reveal that many of the adolescent boys in the study did not know their fathers or their fathers had separated with their mothers. Despite this, some of the boys were able to construct positive male identities that were not risk-taking. This process involved certain psychical and defensive manoeuvres such as fantasy and an idealized self representation of wanting to become ‘different’ fathers as compared to their own biological fathers. Young adolescent boys' positive voices about future fathering and fatherhood could be supported.