The Father Factor

Education

71 percent of high school dropouts are fatherless.  Fatherless children have more trouble academically, scoring poorly on tests of reading, mathematics, and thinking skills. Children from father absent homes are more likely to play truant from school, more likely to be excluded from school, more likely to leave school at age 16.

Source: Kruk, Edward. "Co-Parenting after Divorce." Psychology Today. 23 May 2012: n. page. Web. 25 Mar. 2014. 
 

Poverty

Children in father-absent homes are almost four times more likely to be poor. In 2011, 12 percent of children in married-couple families were living in poverty, compared to 44 percent of children in mother-only families.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Children’s Living Arrangements and Characteristics: March 2011, Table C8. Washington D.C.: 2011.

Crime and Incarceration

85% of youth in prison have an absent father. Fatherless children are more likely to offend and go to jail as adults. Youths in father-absent households have significantly higher odds of incarceration than those in mother-father families.

Source: Harper, Cynthia C. and Sara S. McLanahan. “Father Absence and Youth Incarceration.” Journal of Research on Adolescence 14 (September 2004): 369-397. 

Source: Kruk, Edward. "Co-Parenting after Divorce." Psychology Today. 23 May 2012: n. page. Web. 25 Mar. 2014. 

Drug and Alcohol Abuse

Even after controlling for community context, there is significantly more drug use among children who do not live with their mother and father. Fatherless children are more likely to smoke, drink alcohol, and abuse drugs in childhood and adulthood.

Source: Hoffmann, John P. “The Community Context of Family Structure and Adolescent Drug Use.” Journal of Marriage and Family 64 (May 2002): 314-330.

Source:  Kruk, Edward. "Co-Parenting after Divorce." Psychology Today. 23 May 2012: n. page. Web. 25 Mar. 2014.

Pregnancy & Sexual Activity

Being raised by a single mother raises the risk of teen pregnancy, marrying with less than a high school degree, and forming a marriage where both partners have less than a high school degree.

Source: Teachman, Jay D. “The Childhood Living Arrangements of Children and the Characteristics of Their Marriages.” Journal of Family Issues 25 (January 2004): 86-111.

Self-Concept and Security

Children consistently report feeling abandoned when their fathers are not involved in their lives, struggling with their emotions and episodic bouts of self-loathing.

Source: Kruk, Edward. "Co-Parenting after Divorce." Psychology Today. 23 May 2012: n. page. Web. 25 Mar. 2014. 

Emotional & Behavioral Problems

Data from three waves of the Fragile Families Study was used to examine the prevalence and effects of mothers’ relationship changes between birth and age 3 on their children’s well-being. Children born to single mothers show higher levels of aggressive behavior than children born to married mothers. Living in a single-mother household is equivalent to experiencing 5.25 partnership transitions.

Source: Osborne, C., & McLanahan, S. (2007). Partnership instability and child well-being. Journal of Marriage and Family, 69, 1065-1083. 

Fatherless children have more difficulties with social adjustment and are more likely to report problems with friendships and manifest behavior problems. Many develop a swaggering, intimidating persona in an attempt to disguise their underlying fears, resentments, anxieties and unhappiness.

Source: Kruk, Edward. "Co-Parenting after Divorce." Psychology Today. 23 May 2012: n. page. Web. 25 Mar. 2014. 

The Positive Impact of Father Involvement

In a study examining father involvement with 134 children of adolescent mothers over the first 10 years of life, researchers found that father-child contact was associated with better socio-emotional and academic functioning. The results indicated that children with more involved fathers experienced fewer behavioral problems and scored higher on reading achievement. This study showed the significance of the role of fathers in the lives of at-risk children, even in case of nonresident fathers.

Source: Howard, K. S., Burke Lefever, J. E., Borkowski, J.G., & Whitman , T. L. (2006). Fathers’ influence in the lives of children with adolescent mothers. Journal of Family Psychology, 20, 468- 476.