"Fathers Do Not Mother, They Father"

Dads are not just incompetent moms, despite what the sitcoms tell us.

They parent in a different way, one that is good for children to be exposed to, but they are often treated like second class citizens.

Mothers often unintentionally discourage fathers from becoming involved with the children. They correct his position holding the baby, they limit the activities he can do with the toddler, they chastise him for getting the kids riled up before bed. Yet they become frustrated when they are left with the bulk of the childcare.

“The walls in family resource centers are pink, there are women’s magazines in the waiting room, the mother’s name is on the files, and the home visitor asks for the mother if the father answers the door,” said Philip A. Cowan, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, who along with his wife, Carolyn Pape Cowan, has conducted decades of research on families. “It’s like fathers are not there.”

But a new study has shown that the closer the parents are, the closer the dad will be with his kids. Parental groups were held for 16 weeks to discuss the issues around childcare.

In both of those groups, the researchers found, the fathers not only spent more time with their children than the controls did but were also more active in the daily tasks of child-rearing. They became more emotionally involved with their children, and the children were much less aggressive, hyperactive, depressed or socially withdrawn than children of fathers in the control group.

The groups that involved both the mother and the father had the most involvement by the dads, suggesting to the researchers that the key to male involvement to good communication between both parents. It was important for them to accept the different ways both interact with their children.

“Fathers tend to do things differently,” said Dr. Kyle Pruett, “but not in ways that are worse for the children. Fathers do not mother, they father.”

And government agencies need to recognize this. The mother should not always be the first phone call that the school, doctor’s office, dentist’s office and library makes regarding the child. Dads should not be complimented for remembering their child’s birthday, as if they are mentally incompetent.

Study after study have proven the importance of dads in their children’s lives. It is time mothers backed off and let them get about the business of fathering.