Session: Engaging Fathers in Child and Family Services to Improve Parenting and Reduce Child Maltreatment (Society for Social Work and Research 15th Annual Conference: Emerging Horizons for Social Work Research)

A mounting body of research reaffirms the contribution of fathers to child and family well-being. Unfortunately, fathers are often neglected in child and family interventions and research. The theme of this symposium is organized around research that informs efforts to engage fathers in services to improve their parenting and reduce child maltreatment. In particular we highlight efforts to better understand how fathers are currently engaged in child and family services, the barriers that prevent their engagement, and potential strategies that might be used to increase fathers' engagement in these interventions.

The five papers included in this symposium use a variety of data sources to address key questions related to moving this nascent area of research forward, including data from two large child welfare datasets, a randomized clinical trial, and qualitative data collected directly from fathers themselves. Oftentimes researchers rely on reports from mothers, other caregivers, and others to provide information about fathers. The strengths of this symposium include the presentation of data collected directly from fathers, the examination of a variety of child and family service strategies, and a variety of methodological approaches including analyses of administrative, survey, clinical field trial, and focus group data.

The failure to engage fathers in the child welfare system is particularly concerning given that men are over-represented as perpetrators of some of the most injurious and lethal forms of child maltreatment. Two of the papers that will be presented in this symposium will focus on the child welfare service system. First, data from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being are used to illustrate some of the challenges related to determining which fathers should be included in parenting interventions in child welfare. Second, the inclusion of fathers in assessments in a large child welfare system is examined, including factors related to fathers' inclusion in assessment and the impact of their inclusion on key child welfare outcomes. Next, findings from a randomized clinical trial of a home-based preventive service program indicate a key moderating role played by the degree to which fathers are engaged in services and involved with their children. Finally, two qualitative focus group studies are used to explore fathers' perspectives on their own engagement in parenting programs aimed at improving parenting and addressing child maltreatment.

Taken together these studies provide a multifaceted view of father engagement in services from the system, family, and individual levels. The results of the studies offer guidance for future research and have implications for child and family service providers who are seeking to improve the inclusion of fathers in these types of services. Continued barriers to services including serving a variety of fathers in complex family structures, limited parenting resources for fathers in child welfare, and fathers' perceptions of child and family services are examined as well as innovative services strategies including repackaging parenting programs, using an Integrated Assessment model, and the use of cell phone technology are described.