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Evidence-based Practice

The Supporting Father Involvement program entails a 16 week group (either for fathers only or for couples), case management, and organizational change efforts located in Family Resource Centers (FRC) serving primarily low-income families in small towns or rural areas in four California counties (San Luis Obispo, Santa Cruz, Tulare, and Yuba) and one urban setting in Contra Costa.

The First
The Supporting Father Involvement study is the first systematically evaluated father involvement intervention program using a randomized clinical trial design, created specifically for low-income families from various cultural backgrounds. The intervention study was based on five family dimensions known to affect family health, mental health, and child abuse outcomes: 
1) individual characteristics of the parents
2) parent-child relationship quality
3) couple or co-parenting relationship quality
4) the intergenerational transmission of parent-child involvement and relationships
5) external influences such as employment, environmental stressors, and social supports.

We assessed these aspects of life before and two times after parents participated in the groups to look for any effects of the interventions.

A Positive Preventitive Effect
Our assumption was that if we could reduce symptoms of distress in the participants, affect the quality of their relationship as a couple, improve each of their relationships with the child and with their families of origin, and help them to use social supports more effectively to cope with life stress, then we would have a positive preventive effect on child abuse and neglect and, more generally, healthy family development.

Phase I: The Statistics Show Positive Impact
Results from the first 289 families participating in Phase I of the SFI project show clearly that both men and women participating in the couples and fathers groups are receiving significant benefits. The families were predominantly Hispanic, with a small percentage of Caucasian and Asian descent. The youngest child in each family ranged in age from 0-7 with the average age being 2.3 yrs. The one-session information-only condition (the control condition) produced no significant positive changes over 18 months: the couples showed increased levels of stress, and they described their children as showing more aggressive behavior and symptoms of depression over time. 

• Men and their partners in the fathers groups were significantly more involved in the day to day care of their children (bathing, feeding, taking to the doctor, etc.)  The men and their partners did not show the same increase in stress and anxiety over time that the control couples did, and their children did not show increases in problem behaviors in the same way that the control couples’ children did.

• Clearest gains were made by parents in the couples groups, who showed (1) significantly increased father involvement, (2) couple satisfaction maintained over time (when it typically declines), (3) lower parenting stress, (4) lower personal distress, and (5) no increases in their children’s problem behavior (aggression or hyperactivity) compared to children of parents in the control condition, who were described by their parents as exhibiting more problem behavior over the same period.

• The intervention effects reported above held across ethnic group membership, income level, and marital status.

• These results have been published:
   Cowan, P. A., Cowan, C. P., Pruett, M. K., Pruett, K. D., & Wong, J. (2009). Promoting fathers' engagement
      with children: Preventive interventions for low-income families. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 71,
      663-679.

• During the first year, the agencies housing the SFI project showed a significant improvement in their reputation for serving fathers, father-inclusive policies and procedures, the staff’s preparation to provide services to fathers, and programs for fathers. These positive changes were maintained over the next six years.

Phase II: A replication
A new group of 285 families were enrolled in fathers groups and couples groups. We did not have a control condition because we knew that without the groups, parents were having more difficulty over time. The results for the fathers groups and couples groups were even more positive than those for Phase I. The findings now include a sample of African American families.

Phase III: A second replication with families referred to the Child Welfare System
In 2009, the Office of Child Abuse Prevention asked us to determine whether the Supporting Father Involvement approach could be applied to families who had been referred to the Child Welfare System because of child abuse or neglect. (In earlier phases, these families were referred elsewhere if they attempted to enroll in the project).

We have enrolled almost 300 new families, half of whom had been in the Child Welfare System during the year before they entered the project. Preliminary results on the first 200 families suggest that participation in Supporting Father Involvement groups results in significant decreases in couple violence and harsh parenting by fathers and mothers. The data gathering for this phase will be completed in June, 2012.

The SFI team is now ready for determining cost effectiveness of findings, and for making our knowledge base about the methods, strategies, and success of the program in engaging and supporting fathers and their families more readily available for providers both inside and outside California.

Listed as an evidence-based practice by the California Evidence-based Clearinghouse
 

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