Why do fathers matter? Recent conceptual and theoretical advances regarding father–child relationships have demonstrated that fathers affect children's outcomes both directly and indirectly. To attain a complete developmental account of the ecologically rich contexts of child development, in this article, we recommend best practices regarding the conceptualization and assessment of father–child relationships that reflect contemporary family life. We also discuss conceptual and measurement issues pertaining to father–child relationships in different family configurations, including those with resident and nonresident fathers. We conclude with recommendations that can help developmental researchers advance our understanding of fathering, parenting, and children's development.

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Mother-and father-reported reactions to children's negative emotions were examined as correlates of emotional understanding (Study 1, N = 55, 5-to 6-year-olds) and friendship quality (Study 2, N = 49, 3-to 5-year-olds). Mothers' and fathers' supportive reactions together contributed to greater child-friend coordinated play during a sharing task. Further, when one parent reported low support, greater support by the other parent was related to better understanding of emotions and less intense conflict with friends (for boys only). When one parent reported high support, however, greater support by the other parent was associated with less optimal functioning on these outcomes. Results partially support the notion that children benefit when parents differ in their reactions to children's emotions.How parents respond to their children's emotional displays, especially those involving negative affect, has important implications for children's socioemotional functioning (Dunsmore & Halberstadt, 1997;Eisenberg, Cumberland, & Spinrad, 1998;Gottman, Katz & Hooven, 1996;Parke, 1994). Parental reactions that are punitive or dismissing may impede children's ability to regulate physiological arousal (Gottman et al., 1996;Eisenberg, Fabes, & Murphy, 1996) and process information about emotional events (Gottman et al., 1996;Hoffman, 1983), and may also lead children to view emotions as threatening, avoid emotionally challenging situations, and ultimately miss opportunities to learn about and cope with negative emotions (Eisenberg et al., 1998). In contrast, parental responses to children's negative emotions that provide instrumental (e.g., problem-solving) or emotional (e.g., comforting) support are hypothesized to foster social and emotional competence through the child's openness to explore emotional events and meanings, the ability to regulate arousal, and focus and shift attention to emotional stimuli in appropriate ways (Eisenberg et al., 1998;Gottman et al., 1996).Studies of parental reactions to children's emotions have typically been conducted with mothers only, despite calls for greater attention to the larger family system (Cowan, 1996;Parke & McDowell, 1998) and suggestions in the literature that fathers may play a unique role in children's socioemotional development (Parke, 1994;Roberts & Strayer, 1987;Rohner & Correspondence concerning this manuscript may be addressed to the first author at the Department of Human and Community Development, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 904 W. Nevada Street, Urbana, IL 61801. E-mail: mcelwn@uiuc.edu. NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptChild Dev. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2008 October 7. Published in final edited form as:Child Dev. 2007 ; 78(5): 1407-1425. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01074.x. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript Veneziano, 2001;Volling, McElwain, Notaro, & Herrera, 2002). When studies have included fathers, associations between parental reactions and child outcomes have been examined separately for...

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For almost three decades, the association between paternal sensitivity and infant-father attachment security has been studied. The first wave of studies on the correlates of infant-father attachment showed a weak association between paternal sensitivity and infant-father attachment security (r = .13, p < .001, k = 8, N = 546). In the current paper, a meta-analysis of the association between paternal sensitivity and infant-father attachment based on all studies currently available is presented, and the change over time of the association between paternal sensitivity and infant-father attachment is investigated. Studies using an observational measure of paternal interactive behavior with the infant, and the Strange Situation Procedure to observe the attachment relationship were included. Paternal sensitivity is differentiated from paternal sensitivity combined with stimulation in the interaction with the infant. Higher levels of paternal sensitivity were associated with more infant-father attachment security (r = .12, p < .001, k = 16, N = 1,355). Fathers' sensitive play combined with stimulation was not more strongly associated with attachment security than sensitive interactions without stimulation of play. Despite possible changes in paternal role patterns, we did not find stronger associations between paternal sensitivity and infant attachment in more recent years.