Research That Matters (January 17 - 20, 2008)

Purpose: As many young fathers have not successfully transitioned to adulthood, they need assistance to become better parents. However, adolescent fathers have remained an understudied and underserved population in comparison with adolescent mothers. Most national programs serving low-income families focus on mothers rather than fathers. Recently, attempts to include young fathers in services have increased, but relatively few programs for young fathers exist. Moreover, these programs focus narrowly on a few areas and are often developed on the basis of assumptions that services will meet participants' needs. Therefore, researchers suggest that in order for young fatherhood programs to be successful, they need to be attentive to the fathers' perspectives. In line with this recommendation, the purpose of this study was to examine African-American young fathers' expectations from a fatherhood program, as well as how they perceived program gains by using qualitative methods. This study explored young fathers' expectations from a fatherhood program at entry to the program, and their perceived benefits from the program at subsequent follow-up.

Methods: Fifty-four young fathers residing in a Southwestern United States inner-city were included in the study. They were participants in a teen health clinic fatherhood program at a major medical center. The young fathers responded to open-ended questions asking them about their expectations and personal gains from the program. Qualitative thematic analysis was utilized to identify main themes at both intake and follow-up.

Results: Two main themes emerged from the analysis: self-improvement and family-improvement. The theme of self-improvement reflected young fathers' desire to improve their personal situation, rather than expressing service needs or goals directly related to family or parenting. The focus of this theme reflected “me” statements. Family may be mentioned, tangentially, but was not the main focus of his goals. The second theme, family-improvement, was defined as the young fathers' request for services that were oriented mainly toward improving their family and children. They viewed securing employment as a necessity to family improvement. Their requests indicated that they equate employment with family improvement. The analysis revealed a change in focus from family-improvement at entry to the program to self-improvement at follow-up.

Implications: The shift from a focus on family-improvement at intake to a focus on self-improvement at follow-up raises the question whether it reflects a negative outcome, as one would expect that more fathers would adopt a stronger family orientation as a result of participating in a fatherhood program. This change may reflect the difficulty young fathers often have with balancing various roles in their lives and their struggle between taking care of their own needs and providing for their families. The results of this study suggest that many young fathers have not worked through the developmental tasks of adolescence. As such, many are still struggling with issues of identity, individuation, and role formation. Therefore, fatherhood programs need to assess the social milieu in which young fathers live and offer interventions that assist them in developing a healthy balance between mastering adolescence and family responsibility.