Father involvement in Latino families: The influence of acculturation, gender attitudes, and parenting style
Year: 2012
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Latinos are a sizeable and growing population within the United States.Despite this, the majority of empirical research on parenting and father involvement has been conducted with White, middle-class, European American families, the results of which cannot be generalized to Latinos.The primary aim of the current study was to examine how acculturation, gender attitudes, and parenting style influence father involvement in Latino families.Although fathers may have a choice in their level of involvement in the everyday lives of their children, mothers also exert influence on father involvement by conscious or unconscious encouragement or discouragement.Data were collected and independently analyzed from both Latino fathers (n = 90) and Latina mothers (n = 112) in the Midwest.Participants were asked to independently selfreport on acculturation, gender attitudes, parenting style, and father involvement.It was hypothesized that acculturation to the U.S. majority culture, egalitarian gender attitudes and an authoritarian parenting style would predict increased father involvement for fathers.This hypothesis was partially supported with parenting style predicting father involvement.Acculturation to the U.S. majority culture, egalitarian gender attitudes, and a permissive parenting style by mothers was hypothesized to predict increased father involvement.This hypothesis was not supported.However, results suggest that both fathers' and mothers' acculturation to the dominant U.S. majority culture may be indirectly related to father involvement.Additional research is needed to explore this potential indirect relationship.A secondary aim of this study was an exploratory examination of the relationship between gender attitudes and parenting style within this population.For both fathers and mothers, an authoritative parenting style predicted gender attitudes.Implications and applications of the results of this study are discussed for practitioners working directly with Latino parents, including utility for cultural adaptation of parenting education programs.
Author: Angela D. Ledgerwood
Institution: Miami University
Language: English
Subfield: Demography
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Reduced inequalities
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W434349560