Life Also Fathers example essay topic

"Fathers should be seen nor heard. That's the only proper basis for family life". (Popenoe 1) That was the view on how things should be years ago. Fathering a child is not just the woman's job anymore. Now what society expects of fathers has changed enormously. Fathers are now expected to be more involved in their children's lives and more involved with housework.

The role of the father is bigger than past generations of fathers would have thought possible. Many people once thought that fathers are unimportant to their child's development. Many studies prove that one, fathers have a specific impact on their child that a women doesn't have, and two, there are many negative impacts that an absent or not involved father can have on his children. Fathers are now trying to be more apart of their children's lives. With all the divorce's there are that may be hard though. Sometimes the father can't see his children because he may live too far away or he may have problems with the mother.

Now, "of children born in the past decade, the chances that by age seventeen they will not be living with both biological parents stand at over 50 percent". (Popenoe 19) Many of these fathers don't even see their children on a regular basis. On the other hand, the number of fathers solely taking care of their children is growing. 1/5th of single parents today are single fathers, which equals to two million. This number has grown since 1970 when 90 percent of single parents were single mothers.

There is currently a new law that makes sure there is shared custody by both parents, but this law is only the law in about forty states. Without this law there would be many fathers that would not ever see their children. In a New York Times-CBS poll in 1989 found that both working men and women felt about the same about the fact that they feel conflict between their work and family responsibilities. Men now feel that family is just as important as their careers, which was not the case many years ago. For a lot of fathers an "ambition for old age (is) to follow... (their) children for as long as (they) could". (Franzen 91) Work does not come first anymore in most families.

Having two adults in the family can counteract each others weakness and support the strengths. They can bring different skills and perspectives to a child and provide more economic resources. Studies have shown that fathers have unique traits that they bring to the children. Men think more aggressively, take more risks, and have different ways of doing things. Fathers provide important experiences that are essential for competence and maturity.

Boys without fathers lack instruction on how to be a man because they have no one to watch and learn from. Watching their father is usually how children develop masculine traits. Also, fathers are essential for disciplining boys. Girls learn how to relate to men from their fathers. Girls also learn about trust, intimacy, and difference. Girls learn how to cope in a world that can be still male-dominated sometimes.

Girls with supportive fathers are usually more successful in their careers. For both genders, fathers have different styles of playing than mothers. Fathers play tends to be rougher and more exciting. "In one study of 21/2 year olds who were given a choice of play partners, more than two-thirds chose to play with their fathers". (Popenoe 144) Kids who play with their fathers learn self-control better. Studies show that certain forms of play in childhood are crucial to controlling later aggression.

"The findings of a study of convicted murders in Texas are probably not based on coincidence -- 90 percent of the murders either did not play as children or played abnormally". (Popenoe 144) Fathers also stress competition, challenge, risk taking, and independence. Fathers also differ in the way they talk to children. Father's conversations are briefer and more likely to be about things directly related to life Also fathers are more concerned for the child's longer term development. In short, the role of the father in a child's life is unique and irreplaceable. The father makes a large contribution to the development of a child and so does the mother.

Mothers focus more on the child's immediate well being. Mothers play tends to take place more "at the child's level". (Popenoe 144) Mothers usually let the child direct the play and be more in charge. Mothers stress emotional security and personal safety more. Mothers are also more worried about danger and stop their child from taking risks.

When mothers talk to their children they talk more about feelings, safety, and emotions. This fact can be contracted because fathers are known for saying things like, .".. right now... you need to keep your eyes open. You know, use common sense". (Price 272) Mothers also have many other qualities that were not mentioned. Fathers affect their children as soon as they are born. Studies show that infants with involved fathers were found to be more cognitively developed at one year of age than infants with less involved fathers.

Children who were disliked by their peers reported that they had poor relationships with their fathers. Children achieve more when there is a father active in their life. "For daughter's, several studies have found that the presence of the father is one of the determinants of proficiency in mathematics". (Popenoe 148) When a father is involved, boys learn how to have sympathy. Boys don't think it's ok to be emotional but they can learn from their dads that it is ok by watching. It would be hard for boys to get this from their mothers.

Involved fathers are important for the psychological well being of their children, including happiness, life satisfaction, and the absence of psychological distress. "Many interview studies of happy and successful adults have discovered that a central fact of their lives was having had such father as children". (Popenoe 149) However, many children do not have such a father for two reasons: divorce and the father neglecting them. 50 percent of marriages end in divorce. So this means that half of all families are missing a biological parent.

Divorce does not just involve the parents; it involves the children also and usually in a negative way. At the moment, about 40 percent of children don't live with their biological father. There have been studies that have shown that the typical father that doesn't live with the children doesn't support or see the child either Fathers are very important, especially for the son. When the son does something good and the father doesn't care, the child will "ache to have him slap me on the back, want (ing) to hear his unstinting praise and in it the honeyed pronouncement: son". (Cooper 22-23) Not having a father around can also cause problems for some children who are at greater risk for negative consequences. For example, children without fathers are more likely to drop out of school and become involved in drug and alcohol abuse.

Girls are more likely to become pregnant as teens. Boys are more likely to become involved in crime and violence. Both sexes of children might feel like they have been betrayed and rejected by their father. Studies show that fatherless children score lower on tests and have lower grade point averages. Adolescents in mother-only families are more likely to be sexually active also. Throughout the child's whole life there will be extra anger and hostility in single parent families.

Another thing is "children in father-absent families are five times more likely to be poor and more likely to be extremely poor". (Popenoe 155) Poverty caused by the lack of father can also contribute to the negative behaviors of children. Having an absent father doesn't just have to be because of a divorce. A father can still have this same effect even if the father is around but not active in his child's life. This is when the father is around but he just doesn't take part in the raising of the child, he just leaves it up to the mother. He pretends that the child just doesn't exist.

The statistics and facts that have been listed do not apply to all families. Sometimes, a child that doesn't have a father in their life can turn out just like a regular child who does well in school and has no hostility because of a absent father. Sometimes children from families with two parents can have troubled kids. It's just that most children living in two parent families usually have better life skills and are better-off socially, economically, and emotionally. Cooper, Bernard. "Winner Take Nothing".

The Best American Essays 2002. Ed. Stephen Jay Gould. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.22-35.

Franzen, Jonathan. "My Father's Brain". Ed. Stephen Jay Gold. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.88-110. Gould, Stephen Jay.

Ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002 Popenoe, David. Life Without Father. New York: The Free Press, 1996. Price, Richard and Anne Hudson-Price.

"Word On The Street". Ed. Stephen Jay Gould. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002.267-275.