Parenting in On/Off Relationships: The Link Between Relationship Churning and Father Involvement

Abstract

Family systems theory points to the interconnected nature of dyadic relationships within the family unit, arguing for attention to how the parental relationship shapes their ties to and interactions with their children. Grounded in family systems theory, we consider how relationship churning-defined as being in an on-again/off-again relationship with the same partner-is associated with father involvement. We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to examine how father involvement among relationship churners compares with father involvement among those in three other relationship types (measured during the first five years of the focal child's life): stably together relationships, stably broken-up relationships, and repartnered relationships. First, we find that churning fathers remain more involved with their 9-year-old children than do parents who stably break up or repartner, but they are less involved than those who are stably together. Second, lower relationship quality among churners-and, to a lesser extent, repartnering and childbearing with a new partner-explains some of the differences in father involvement between churners and the stably together. Third, these differences are most apparent among parents not living together when father involvement is measured. Taken together, the focus on relationship churning extends prior research on the association between relationship transitions and father involvement by separating relationship instability from partner change.

Two Methods for Studying the Developmental Significance of Family Structure Trajectories

“…This class is composed of almost 10% of the sample and represents children whose parents separate and repartner with each other for a number of reasons, often referred to as churning. Churning relationships have previously represented up to 16% of the sample, but most studies have only examined parental churning during the first 5 years of the focal child's life (Halpern‐Meekin & Turney, ; Turney & Halpern‐Meekin, ). Furthermore, this class includes children who experienced parental incarceration (2.4%) and likely includes other possibilities, such as parental deployment or redeployment and work separation (e.g., commercial fisherman and migrant farmers) not measured in the data.…”

Fathers’ Involvement with Their Children Before and After Separation

“…Paternal involvement in the early years may therefore contribute to enhancing fathers’ ongoing relationships with their daughters in particular, should the partnership founder. The fact that there was less evidence for a relationship between paternal involvement and any post-separation contact for fathers who had not been married to the child’s mother may relate to the ways in which maintaining some form of contact becomes more important in the less secure access available to unmarried fathers (Turney and Halpern-Meekin 2017 ). Thus, specific levels of prior involvement with the child are less salient.…”

“…An extensive literature has examined both the implications of paternal absence for child outcomes (Adamsons and Johnson 2013 ) and the contemporary factors associated with paternal involvement in non-intact families (e.g. Cooksey and Craig 1998 ; Turney and Halpern-Meekin 2017 ). Yet, despite the research and policy salience of this topic, we know little about how prior circumstances are implicated in different patterns of post-separation contact, and in particular, whether previously more (less) involved fathers maintain higher (lower) contact.…”

Parental Relationship Churning and Adolescent Well‐Being: Examining Instability Within Families

“…A small body of research examines the dynamics in churning families with children. Although levels of father involvement remain higher among churning families than among families in which parents have dissolved their union (Nepomnyaschy & Teitler, ; Turney & Halpern‐Meekin, ), both mothers and fathers in churning relationships are equally or more likely to report parenting stress than their counterparts in other family structures (Halpern‐Meekin & Turney, ). This offers contradictory indications for the present study.…”

“…In this way, their outcomes might be similar to adolescents who experience parental relationship dissolution without repartnering. Furthermore, fathers in churning relationships remain more involved with their children than do fathers in other families in which parents have dissolved their union (Turney & Halpern‐Meekin, ). Therefore, adolescents in churning families may receive the protective benefits of having a more involved father (Amato, ; Amato & Gilbreth, ; Carlson, ; Flouri & Buchanan, ; Jeynes, ; Williams & Kelly, ).…”