No abstract

This 49-family study is the first to explore the father-child relationship in a clinical population of preschoolers (at a tertiary care child psychiatry clinic) and to examine its relation to child anxiety and attachment to the mother. A moderation model of the father-child activation relationship on the relation between attachment to the mother and child anxiety was tested and discussed. Analyses confirmed the expected independence between mother-child attachment and father-child activation as well as the association between mother-child attachment and anxiety. The highest levels of anxiety were found in insecure children, and more specifically, in insecure-ambivalent children and insecure disorganized-controlling children of the caregiving subtype. Hypotheses regarding the relation between anxiety and activation were only partially confirmed. Finally, the activation relationship with the father was shown to have a moderating effect on the relation between attachment to the mother and child anxiety; activation by the father may be considered either a protective or a risk factor. Results for this clinical population of young children are discussed in the light of attachment theory and activation relationship theory. The study's findings have the potential to contribute to the development of preventative, diagnostic, and intervention programs that take both parental figures into account.

The activation relationship refers to the emotional bond a child develops with a parent that helps ensure the regulation of risk-taking during child exploration of the surrounding environment. As a complement to Bowlby’s attachment theory, activation relationship theory provides a greater understanding of the impact of fathering on child development, focusing primarily on parental stimulation of risk-taking and control during child exploration. The overarching objective of this article is to better understand the association between children’s relationship quality with both parents, via the activation to father and the attachment to mother relationships, and child externalizing behaviors in a clinical sample. Fifty two-parent families (40 boys and 10 girls) were recruited at random from a population of children receiving treatment at the perinatal and early childhood psychiatry clinic. Results with 44 children (with complete cases) showed that overactivated preschoolers displayed more externalizing behaviors than did children with either an activated or an under-activated relationship with their father. Results also showed that children with a disorganized-controlling caregiving attachment to their mother marginally presented with higher levels of externalizing behavior.