Report out today reviews critical role a Father plays

 in a child’s development from toddler to adulthood
New review of evidence- based literature

A recent review of evidence around the impact of fathers in a child’s life by The Fathering Project has highlighted the vast importance of fathers in children’s lives from toddler to teenager and beyond. Not only because children ‘need and love their dads’, but also because of the significant impact that fathers have on the social, cognitive, emotional and physical well-being of children from infancy to adolescence and with lasting influences into their adult life

A summary of evidence published this week by The Fathering Project is based on a review of literature and research primarily covering the last 10 years. As there is a vast volume of research relating to parenting and children more generally, the review focused on evidence relating specifically to the influence of fathers and father figures.

Commenting on this review, Kati Gapaillard CEO of The Fathering Project says, “Research has shown unequivocally that fathers have a profound impact on their children’s lives, and in our programs for Fathers across the country, we work with dads to help them understand and achieve their critical role.’’

This summary of the research and literature includes statements taken from major international reports on fathering published primarily in the last ten years to describe the impacts of fathers on child development and wellbeing. It also presents Australian evidence to align with or further expand in these international claims.

Included in this summary is the Fathering Project report reviewing Australian data. This report explored the fathering variables included in Australia’s first longitudinal study of Australian Children (LSAC). This dataset contains measures of key fathering characteristics measured over regular time intervals within a cohort of 10,000 families.

Commenting on this summary of evidence, Senior Researcher Erin Erceg expands on two key areas of the report around ‘education and ‘mental health’, which are fundamentals in early childhood development and looks at the impacts engaged fathers have on their child’s development in these areas.

‘When we examine the evidence from this summary of reports, we find that a child with an engaged father during primary school had: fewer school adjustment problems , better academic progress  and enhanced occupational achievements in adulthood.  Children’s positive and negative school outcomes have been linked to father beliefs (eg. about teachers), perceptions, school involvement (eg. motivation for involvement, father-teacher relationship quality), efficacy and child attachment.


 ‘Additionally, fathers who are absent during this period have children linked to higher incidence of negative outcomes such as school suspension and expulsion. Children do better in school when their fathers are involved in their school, regardless of whether their fathers live with them or live apart’.

Around  Mental Health,  much of the research on fathering has focused on its implications for child and adolescent mental health, with compelling evidence that fathering has significant protective and positive effects on the mental health of children across various ages and stages of development. Being warm and supportive_, involved, and engaged with their child are among fathering traits that have been shown to positively impact a child’s mental health. Conversely, the summary of evidence shows that  ‘poor father-child relationships can negatively impact on a child’s mental health, both in childhood and later during adolescence and in adulthood’.

Key findings of this report point to the critical role fathers play in a child’s life. 

Fathers who display engagement and warmth in parenting are the most powerful predictors of children’s improved health, academic, social and emotional outcomes.   Children who have a father or father figure who live with them throughout their life, have better learning outcomes, general health, emotional wellbeing, and fewer problem behaviours. A father’s influence on the child’s outcomes is most obvious when the child reaches school age.  The child performers better academically, socially, emotionally and enjoys better health and development with an engaged father, or father figure.

About The Fathering Project

The Fathering Project recognises that fathers and father-figures play a vital role in children’s lives. The evidence is now robust, indisputable, and compelling.

In conjunction with this evidence, the role of father’s has changed and is now perceived as unique, and complementary compared with previously held ideas of fatherhood. These ideas were often aligned with stereotypes relating to being disciplinarian or the ‘breadwinner’ of the family, whereas fathers are now acknowledged as caregivers and role models to their children.

Current research shows that targeted and universal interventions aimed at promoting positive parenting behaviours and fathers’ engagement have been found to increase fathers’ involvement with infants, preschool and primary school-aged children.  The Fathering Project is is Australia's leading not-for-profit working to inspire and equip fathers and father-figures - for the benefit of children.  It is also the first intervention to be implemented anywhere in the world, which focuses on the fathers of all children in the population of an entire country.

Link to the Report:

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