Objective To investigate the effectiveness of fatherhood programs targeting unmarried, low‐income, nonresident fathers. Background Programs for unmarried, nonresident, and low‐income fathers increased in number and scope over the past decade. Programs for fathers have typically targeted five broad areas: positive father involvement, parenting, co‐parenting, employment, and child support payment. Method We conducted a systematic search for published and unpublished evaluations of fathering programs targeting unmarried, never married, and low‐income fathers. We identified 25 reports with 30 independent studies. Of these, 21 employed a control–treatment design, and nine employed a one‐group/pre–post design. Results These programs produce small but statistically significant effects (d = .099, p < .01). We found that only father involvement (d = .114, p < .05), parenting (d = .110, p < .01), and co‐parenting (d = .167, p < .05) were significantly affected; the strongest effect size was in co‐parenting. Unfortunately, these programs did not significantly influence father employment and economic well‐being, nor did they significantly impact father payment of child support. Conclusion Although programs for low‐income, unmarried, nonresident fathers have a small statistically significant effect, evaluation work may increase the impact of these programs. Implications. There is a continued need for evaluation focused on unmarried, nonresident, low‐income fathers. There is also need for improved statistical reporting, reports of attrition, assessment of child outcomes, observational measures of outcomes, and better assessment of moderators, such as father age, program location, child developmental stage, multipartner fertility, and other barriers to father involvement.

Though many fathers want to be warmer, more nurturing, and more actively involved than prior generations (i.e., the new fatherhood ideal), they also embrace a father's traditional role as financial earner. Thus, we hypothesized that fathers' attitudes about their roles would likely interact with workplace characteristics to produce variations in father warmth and engagement. Using a national sample of 1,020 employed U.S. fathers with children ages 2-8 years old, results suggest that adherence to the new fatherhood ideal was associated with more frequent father engagement and warmth, while endorsing traditional gender norms was associated with less father warmth. Also consistent with prior research showing that family friendly work cultures may enable fathers to be more engaged parents, we find that a family supportive workplace and greater flexibility in when and where fathers work, were associated with more frequent father engagement and warmth. Moreover, interaction results suggest that the associations between job flexibility and engagement are stronger for fathers who do not fully endorse the new fatherhood ideal; associations between workplace support and warmth are also stronger for fathers who do not fully endorse the new fatherhood ideal. Thus, flexibility and a family supportive workplace may particularly enable father involvement for fathers whose attitudes might otherwise be a barrier to their involvement.

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Objective: Using a survey sample comprised of predominantly low-income fathers of color, we examine whether child support debt (arrears) is associated with fathers' poor physical health, depression, and material hardship 9 years after their child's birth. Background: About 70% of the $113.5 billion in outstanding arrears is held by men earning $10,000 or less, and an emerging body of research suggests arrears can negatively impact economically disadvantaged fathers of color and their families. Method: Drawing on fathers' data from the first five waves of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS; N = 1614), we use multivariate regressions to assess the relationship between child support arrears and fathers' physical health, depression, and material hardship. We examine three different measures of arrears and assess the robustness of our results to model specifications that account for selection into arrears. Results: Fathers with arrears and with higher arrears are more likely to experience poor physical health, depression, and material hardship, and these associations are more pronounced for fathers with high arrears burdens relative to their incomes. Results are robust to different measurements of arrears, who reports them (father or mother), and across model specifications (lagged dependent variables and inverse probability weighted analyses). Conclusion: Disadvantaged fathers with arrears fare far worse physically, psychologically, and economically than those with no arrears. Findings from our study add to growing research documenting harmful consequences of child support debt and point to an important avenue through which ostensibly race neutral family policies may disadvantage low-income men of color.

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