R. Feldman, Parents' convergence on sharing and marital satisfaction, father involvement, and parent-child relationship at the transition to parenthood, INF MEN H J, 21(3), 2000, pp. 176-191
This study examines determinants of father involvement, the parents' conver
gence on marital satisfaction, and mothers' and fathers' interactive behavi
or in dual-earner families at the transition to parenthood. Sixty dual-earn
er Israeli couples and their five-month-old firstborn child were interviewe
d and videotaped in infant-mother and infant-father interactions. Interacti
ons were coded globally for 21 interactive behaviors and composited into me
asures of parent sensitivity and infant readiness to interact. Five determi
nants of each parent's involvement in house and childcare were assessed as
predictors of parent-infant interactions: the sharing of household and chil
dcare responsibilities, the amount of time each parent spends with the infa
nt during the week and on weekends, and the range of childcare activities t
he parent typically performs. Marital convergence was indexed by the absolu
te difference score between mothers' and fathers' marital satisfaction. Fat
her sensitivity was related to the sharing of household and childcare respo
nsibilities, to the amount of time the father spends with the: child on wee
kends (but not during the week), to the range of childcare activities fathe
r performs, and to marital convergence. Mother sensitivity was related only
to the sharing of responsibilities between spouses. The range of the fathe
r's childcare activities predicted maternal interactive sensitivity. Infant
readiness to interact with the father, but not with the mother, was relate
d to the sharing of childcare responsibilities, to the range of father's ch
ildcare activities, and to marital convergence. Results further specify the
differential associations between the marital and the parent-child relatio
nship for mothers and fathers and point to the importance of the father's i
nstrumental involvement in childcare to the development of fathering.