There is no question among
researchers that fathers who spend time with their children instill
self-control and social skills in their offspring. Exactly how dads do that, however, is largely a mystery.
Thousands
of studies have sliced and diced the benefits for children of a close,
nurturing bond with Mom. Researchers have a harder time analyzing the
ways fathers interact with children, such as rough-and-tumble play.
Some scientists are inventing new
scales and laboratory procedures to try to measure the father factor.
One researcher watched fathers and children playing games like "Get Up,"
in which fathers try to get up from the floor while the children try to
hold them down, and "Sock Wrestle," in which father and child try to
snatch each other's socks. Other researchers had toddlers climb down
stairs in fathers' presence, in a process dubbed "Risky Situation."
"Most
people have a pretty well-defined sense of what it means to be a good
mom, but for dads, that role is much less scripted," says University of
Georgia researcher Geoffrey Brown, lead author of a 2012 study in the
Journal of Family Psychology on fundamental questions about how fathers
bond with children.
Greg Kessler likes to roughhouse with
his 7-year-old son Ezra or his 4-year-old daughter Zoe. He loves
wrestling, pillow-fighting and a game they call "Big Chair, Little
Chair," when he lies down, balances a child on the soles of his feet and
raises and lowers the child in midair, says Mr. Kessler, a New York
City photographer.
His wife, Paula
Trotto, believes her husband's play style will help Ezra learn to stand
up for himself, but "it does baffle me" that her husband enjoys getting
the children so excited, she says. At times, she adds, "I have to leave
the room. It's such an intuitive thing, to not want to tolerate the
sounds of your kids screaming."
The
primary test of attachment—a key concept in child-development
research—was developed to analyze babies' bonds with mothers. This
procedure, known as the "Strange Situation," has mothers briefly
separate from their infants twice. Babies who are upset but readily
comforted by the mother when she returns are seen as having a secure
bond.
Positive scores tend to sync with
other measures of mothers' sensitivity and to predict better cognitive
and emotional skills in children later. But when researchers put dads
through the Strange Situation, the scores don't consistently predict
much, and often fail to match other measures' results.
Many
researchers believe dad's bond is expressed a little later, when the
father serves as a secure base allowing the child to explore and take
risks. This is hard to study in a lab. Animal studies, however, show
that baby rats deprived of rough-and-tumble are more aggressive and lack
social skills as adults.
The Father Factor
Researchers studying fathers' role often look at how they act during rough-and-tumble play. Here are some positive signs:
- Father is immersed in the game emotionally, smiling and laughing
- Father shows spontaneity, creativity or silliness
- Father is good-natured about losing, with no signs of ego
- Father helps the child control his or her emotions and calms him or her when overexcited
- Father adjusts his effort and his technique based on the child's cues
- Father motivates the child to stay engaged and keep going, or rejoin the game
- Father is dominant but shares the upper hand, allowing the child to win sometimes
--Richard Fletcher, University of Newcastle in Australia
In an early study at the University
of Regensburg in Germany, researchers created a scale to evaluate
parents' play, based on whether they challenged kids to stretch
themselves, were sensitive to their emotions and encouraged them to
solve problems. Mothers and fathers were observed playing with blocks or
play dough with their 2-year-olds. Fathers' scores were a unique
predictor of children's healthy attitudes toward relationships with
others at age 16, according to the 2002 study of 49 subjects led by
Karin Grossmann, a senior scientist at the university.
Christopher
VanDijk tunes in closely to signals from his 4-year-old son Liam that
he wants to play. "He gets this mischievous look on his face, and you
just kind of know," says Mr. VanDijk of Denver, an at-home dad. "We have
pillow fights. And I pretend like I'm going to eat his ears. There's
lots of squealing."
Liam sometimes
takes the lead, saying, 'I'm going to scare you, and when I say, "Boo!"
you have to say, "Ahhh!" ' Mr. VanDijk also watches for signals that
Liam is out-of-control or frightened. "There are times when you put on
the brakes," he says. Rough-and-tumble
play isn't confined to fathers. "If a mom does it, the child will learn
the same thing," says Catherine Tamis-LeMonda, a professor of
developmental psychology at New York University.
Mr.
VanDijk's wife Angie, a college administrator, often plays active
superhero games with Liam. "Sometimes he needs quiet time, sometimes he
needs scuffle time," she says.
Fathers
engage in more scuffle time on average, however. Using an adjustable
carpeted ramp, researchers at New York University asked 34 parents to
show how steep a slope they'd allow their babies to attempt. Some 62% of
fathers said they would let their babies try a slope beyond their
ability, compared with 56% of mothers, says the 2007 study co-authored
by Dr. Tamis-LeMonda.
Many fathers walk a
fine line during play between safety and risk, allowing children to get
minor injuries without endangering them, says a 2011 study of 32
subjects in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics.
Researchers say this can instill emotional intelligence under fire, and
an ability to take prudent risks and set limits with peers.
Navdeep
Singh Dhillon likes play-fighting with his 4-year-old daughter Kavya,
pretending to throw a kick, teaching her how to block it, then saying,
"OK, it's your turn to kick me," he says. He sometimes traps Kavya and
his 4-month-old son Shaiyar in a leg lock and has Kavya "tap out,"
tapping him three times as a signal to release them. Mr. Dhillon of
Jersey City, N.J., a college professor, says such play teaches children
to set boundaries. "When they have relationships of their own, or with
other kids, they'll know what is OK and what's not OK."
Richard
Fletcher, an Australian researcher who has studied fathers in free-form
games with preschoolers, says fathers need to follow children's lead
sometimes, while encouraging them to stretch themselves, and to let them
win often enough to have fun—but not so often that they lose interest.
Dr. Fletcher, a senior lecturer on the health and medicine faculty at
the University of Newcastle, invented a scale to measure quality of
play. In a study published last year in Early Child Development and
Care, researchers video-recorded 26 fathers in their homes playing the
games "Get Up" and "Sock Wrestle" with their 3- and 4-year-olds.
Children of fathers who scored high on play quality had fewer social and
behavior problems.
The "Risky
Situation" is a 20-minute test that assesses children's confidence to
explore. Toddlers are placed in a room with their father and a stranger
and allowed to play with the stranger, then to climb down a set of
stairs. Toddlers who explored with confidence, while heeding limits set
by their fathers, had better social and emotional skills 12 to 18 months
later, according to a 2013 study co-authored by the test's creator,
Daniel Paquette, an associate professor of psychoeducation at the
University of Montreal in Canada.
Dr.
Tamis-LeMonda is video-recording daily routines of 100 New York City
families. In a past study, she discovered "hall ball"— a game where "Dad
throws the ball down the hallway," and the toddler brings it back, she
says. "That's a natural, everyday routine we wouldn't have known about
if we just brought families into the lab and said, 'Here are some toys.'
" Such insights, she says, "might guide future research."
