“Don’t wait for it to rain to buy an umbrella:” The transmission of values from African American fathers to sons.

Abstract

African American fathers are increasingly documented as being involved with their children and engaging in roles that include child socialization. Yet, we have limited knowledge about the values African American fathers seek to instill in their children or the mechanism through which they transmit these values. Therefore, our objective was to explore, from African American fathers' perspectives, the values they seek to instill within their sons. Participants included 30 self-identified, African American, biological fathers of preadolescent sons at broad risk for developing aggressive behaviors, depressive symptoms, or both. The fathers participated in semistructured, qualitative interviews based on a topic guide that was developed a priori. Informed by grounded theory analysis methods, emergent themes were systematically identified by the research team. Five themes and 4 subthemes emerged from the data. The first 4 themes reflected values fathers aimed to instill in their sons: cultural messages (subthemes: cultural pride, managing racism), education (subthemes: educational attainment, social intelligence, and exposure), respect, and responsibility. The fifth theme, modeling, represented a mechanism through which fathers taught these important values. The findings provide invaluable insight, from the perspectives of fathers, into the cultural and gendered contexts that shape the values African American fathers seek to instill in their sons. An increased understanding of what is most important to fathers may be instrumental in the engagement and retention of African American fathers in prevention programs. Implications for prevention programs and future research are discussed.

The Associations Among Teacher Discrimination, Parents’ and Peer Emotional Supports, and African American Youth’s School Bonding

“…The current study examined the unique influence of fathers’ emotional support to youth in relation to school bonding. Consistent with the emerging body of works (Doyle et al, 2016; Yogman, Garfield, & Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, 2016), results suggest that African American fathers have unique and direct effect on the emotional well-being of youth to affect school bonding. Thus, more social work research and practice focusing on the unique role of fathers in supporting African American youth is needed to leverage the resources and support that fathers provide to facilitate increased school bonding among African American youth.…”

“…In the context of perceived teacher discrimination, African American mothers have been found to demonstrate positive emotional warmth and supportiveness in helping youth process and develop effective coping mechanisms for adjustment in school (Smith-Bynum et al, 2016). Similarly, African American fathers are noted to transmit values related to cultural messages, education, respect, and responsibility to their sons given their racialized experiences to ensure youth achieve healthy developmental outcomes (Doyle et al, 2016).…”

“…This feeling of mattering as perceived by youth provides a strong sense of emotional security that supports psychosocial adjustment (Suh et al, 2016). Although African American fathers, both residential and nonresidential, are involved in the parenting of their children and uniquely contribute to children’s positive development (Doyle et al, 2016; McHale et al, 2006), the vast majority of the parenting literature has focused on mothers (Cooper et al, 2015; Doyle et al, 2016). The limited attention on fathers may send the message that children’s relationship with fathers is less important (Suh et al, 2016).…”

‘That is why we raise children’: African American fathers' race‐related concerns for their adolescents and parenting strategies

“…Coupled with existing studies (e.g., Caldwell et al, 2010;Doyle et al, 2016;Fagan & Stevenson, 2002), this investigation has implications for the development of both father-adolescent and father-specific program development. For example, the study findings highlight the potential utility of the father-adolescent dyad as a context for prevention.…”

“Faça o que eu digo, não o que eu faço?” Um Estudo sobre a Transmissão Valorativa entre Pais e Filhos

“…Após a análise das publicações, identifica-se que há um predomínio de pesquisas com amostras de adolescentes, provavelmente em virtude das mudanças vivenciadas no processo de socialização e no próprio fato de o desenvolvimento cognitivo ser refletido de forma mais notória e impactante nesse grupo (Calderón-Tena, Knight, & Carlo, 2011). Ao considerar alguns critérios de inclusão, tais como exclusão de pesquisas que tratem do processo com outros agentes (e.g., escola, pares, irmãos) e em outras faixas etárias (e.g., adolescentes), destacaram-se alguns estudos tanto no contexto brasileiro (Gomes, 2015;Schneider, 2001;Soares, 2013;Meneses, 2017) quanto no internacional (Schönpflug & Yan, 2012;Doyle, Magan, Cryer--Coupet, Goldston, & Estroff, 2016).…”