j of genetic psychology

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Mothers as Gatekeepers: A

Model of Maternal Mediators of

Father InvolvementMary F. De Luccie

a

aSchool of Family Studies and Human Services,

Kansas State University, USA

Version of record first published: 06 Jul 2010.

To cite this article: Mary F. De Luccie (1995): Mothers as Gatekeepers: A Model

of Maternal Mediators of Father Involvement, The Journal of Genetic Psychology:

Research and Theory on Human Development, 156:1, 115-131

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00221325.1995.9914811

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Th e Journal of Genet i c Psychology, 156( ) , 115-1 3 1

Mothers as Gatekeepers: A Model ofMaternal Mediators of Father InvolvementMARY F. DE LUCCIESchool of Family Studies and Human ServicesKansas State Universi ty

~ ~~

ABSTRACT. A model of maternal characteristics posited to mediate frequency of fatherinvolvement with children in intact families was evaluated. A structured, standardizedquestionnaire that assessed several exogenous variables (satisfaction with marriage,employment status, and social support; personal attributes of mothers and ch ildren) as w ellas two maternal mediators (importance of and satisfaction with father involvement) wasadministered to 144 mothers. Multiple regression analyses indicate that 79% of the varia-tion in the mothers reports of frequency of father involvement was explained directly bythe maternal mediators, marital satisfaction, and age of child. Maternal ratings of theimportance of father involvement and satisfaction with father involvement reliably medi-ated the effects of age of child, satisfaction with social support, satisfaction with employ-ment status, and satisfaction with marriage. The results support the value of an ecologicalperspective for understanding the myriad factors affecting father-child relations. Implica-tions for future research are discussed.

DURING TH E PAST 15YEAR S, developmentalists have exhibited a k een inter-es t in understanding fathers-the forgotten contributors to child developm ent(Lamb, 1975). Fathers are salient and powerful contributors to their childrensdevelopment (Lamb, 1981), but less is known of the specific contextual factorsthat may mediate or regulate father-child interaction (Pedersen, 1981).Although research demonstrates that father-child relations are undoubtedlyaffected by husband-wife (Belsky, Robins, & Gamble, 1984) and m other-childrelations (Clarke-Stewart, 1978), few studies have examined the ways in whichmothers personal and role characteristics may affect father-child relations. AsBronfenbrenner and Crouter (1983) noted, an adequate understanding of the ecol-ogy of family functioning requires assessment of the impacts of second-ordereffects, that is, the ways interactions of two mem bers m ay be influenced by otherdyadic events and processes in the family system. In this specific case, how m ayAddress correspondence to Mary E De Luccie, School o Family Studies and Human Ser-vices, Kansas State University, Justin Hall, Manhattan, KS 66506.

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1I6 Th e Journr i l o C m r t i c Psychology

the mothers behaviors, expectations, and attitudes influence father-child rela-tions?Belsky, Rovine, and Fish (1 989 ) reminded u s that the family m ust be thoughtof in terms of multiple levels of analysis, consisting of elements that togetherconstitute subsystems, and that like the elements are reciprocally interrelated,com pris ing an entity that is not reducible to the sum of its parts (p. 121). Hen ce,an ecological perspective requires that attention be paid to mothers as influenc-ing agen ts in father-child relations.According to Pruett ( 1 987), a mother may define fathering in terms of herown needs and perceptions, delineating her mate as so meon e to father her or bethe security force, master repairman, or financial center. In add ition , fathers may

be less likely to exhibit higher levels of involvement with their children whentheir spouse fails to support suc h involvement (P edersen , Zaslow, Cain, S uwal-sky, & Rabinovich, 1987). Similarly, fathers may interact with children in waysthat are rarely part of their repertoire simply because mothers encourage suchbehaviors (Pedersen, 1985).Researchers have speculated that women serve as gatekeepers, overtly orcovertly, excluding fathers fro m participating in child care because of fear of lossof power (Pleck, 1983) or threat to personal identity (Pruett, 1987). For exam ple,although some studies show that a majority of men want to be more involved inchild care and dom estic activities, Plec k (198 3) found that only 42 % of workingmothers wanted m ore help with child care from their husband. Pleck sugge stedthat mothers discou rage paternal involvement in do mestic and child-ca re activi-ties because of their traditionally based notions that men a re unaccustomed to andcareless about performing such tasks. When mothers do allow participation ithas to be done on their terms. In this way, they actively manage their husbandsparticipation (Pleck, 1983).In attempts to account for maternal effects on fathering, social learning andexch ange theorists (Simons, Whitb eck, Conger, &Melby, 1990) have suggestedthat factors both intrinsic and extrinsic to the father-child relationship should beconsidered. For example, mothers may encourage certain levels of father-childinvolvement based on cultural values or on the relationship they had with theirown father. In this view, a wife whose husband meets these expectations wouldbe m ore satisfied with his involvement as a father.Several maternal role-related dimensions may influence aspects offather-child interaction. One of the key determinants of parenting style is spous alsupport (Belsky, 1984).A positive marital re lationship provides impo rtant emo-tional support needed for sensitive parenting (Goldberg & Easterbrooks, 1984).For example, Pedersen (1981) demonstrated that mothers benefit from a hus-bands emotional support. Moreover, fathers who receive social support andencouragement from their wives report feeling a higher sense of parental com-petenc e, regardless of the temperamental difficulty of the infant (Gibraud-Wall-ston &Wandersman, 1978). According to Hoffman and Nye (1975 ), fathers are

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De Luccie 117

especially in need of em otional support to maintain their parenting role. Resea rchhas shown that frequency of m arital co mm unication (Belsky, 19 84) and m aritalquality (Feldman, Nash, & Aschenbrenner, 1982) are related to positive father-ing behaviors, and that the marital relationship is affected negatively when mater-nal expectations of child-care assistance from the father are not m et (R uble, Flem-ing, Hackel, & Strangor, 1988). Other researchers have found a positivecorrelation betw een m arital qua lity and levels of paternal involvement (Harris &Morgan, 1991; McBride & Mills, 1993). In contrast, Cow an and Cowan (1987)found that perceptions of marital quality were not a determinant of father involve-ment during the transition to parenthood. Crouter, Perry-Jenkins, Huston, andMcHale (1987) reported that marital negativity was associated with higher levelsof father involvement with school-aged children.Mothers satisfaction with their em ploym ent status also influenc es fathering.Stuckey, McG hee, and Bell (19 82) found that negative affect was exhibited mo refrequently by parents with attitudes toward dual career roles for women thatdidnt match the em ploym ent status of the mother in the family. Although someresearchers have found that time spent with children by both mothers and fathersis affected by the mothers work status (Nock & Kingston, 1988 ), others havereported that maternal employment is a poor predictor of father involvement(Marsiglio, 1991). Other research (Douvan, 1963; McCord, M cCord, &Thurber,1963;Propper, 1972) has dem onstrated that maternal em ploym ent creates strainin the father-son relationship. M ore recent research indicates that it is the con -gruenc e between emp loym ent preference and em ploym ent status that influen ceswomens emotional well-being and psychological health, which may, in turn,influence parenting (Hock & DeMeis, 1990).In addition to marital and employment satisfaction, satisfaction with socialsupport a lso influences parenting (Belsky, 1984). Co bb (19 76) defined s ocial sup-port as information that leads the individual to believe that he o r s he is apprec i-ated and is a memb er of a network of com mu nication. Perceived support (anappraisal that ones environment is helpful), social embed dedn ess (the quantityand identity of individuals in ones network), and enacted support (actual sup-portive behaviors performed by network m emb ers, such as material aid, esteemsupport, and advice) have been identified as three aspects of this construct (Bar-rera, 1986). Coh en and Wills (1985) speculated that esteem s uppo rt indicates tothe individual that she is valued by others, perhaps leading to enhanced self-esteem and a feeling of mastery over stressors. Informational support may assistthe individual to understand and cope more effectively with stressors.Numerous studies have indicated that behavior is influenced by perceptionsof self-effcacy (Bandura, 1982). Individuals may expend little energy in situa-tions where they sense that their behavior has little influence on the outcomes.Mothers who believe that father involvement is important may be more likely toenco urage paternal involvement than other mothers. Conversely, mothers wh o d onot think such involvement is valuable may not actively encourage such partici-

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pation. For example, Simons et al. (1990) reported that mothers values andbeliefs about parenting influenced fathering behav iors. They fo und that a fathersdegree of involvement in parenting was a function of the mothers beliefs aboutwhat is important and necessary.

A positive relationship between amount of encouragement and satisfactionwith father involvement is to be expected. More specifically, a mother whoenc ourages father-child interaction, and whose husband mee ts maternal stan-dards, should be expected to report higher levels of satisfaction with fatherinvolvement than should a mother whose husband does not interact more fre-quently with their children despite her encouragement to do so.To date, no oth er researcher has systematically investigated th e extent an d

manner to which these selected maternal characteristics interact in affectingfather-child relations. Thus, in the present study I explored the extent to whichselected characteristics of mothers may mediate father-child relationships. Agatekeeper model of maternal mediators of frequency of father involvementwas postulated to identify the imp act of selected personal, dem ograph ic, and fam-ily characteristics on fathering and father-child relations (see Figure 1) . Th e vari-ables in the model were selected on conceptual and empirical grounds. Specifi-cally, I predicted that two contextual sources of stress and support (Belsky,1984)-satisfaction with em ploym ent status and satisfaction with social sup-port-would have indirect effects on frequency of father involvement. A third fac-tor, marital satisfaction, was expected to play both a direct and an indirect role inaffecting father involvement. M aternal occup ation, age of child, and number ofchildren in the family were also expected to directly and indirectly affect fatherinvolvement. The effect of maternal education was hypothesized to indirectlyaffect father involvement, with its effect mediated by tw o endo gen ous variables-mothers views of how important father involvement is and how satisfied themother is with her husbands involvement. These endogenous variables wereexpected to directly predict level of father involvement and to mediate the rela-tionship between frequency of involvement and other variables in the model.

SumplrA volunteer sample of 144 mothers from intact families residing in a mid-western university town participated in this study. Their oldest (target) children

(73 daughters, 7 1 sons) ranged in ag e from 2 to 19 years. Approximately 20% ofthe children were within each of five age categories: 20 to 28 months, 5 to 7years, 9 to 1 1 years, 13 to 15 years, and 17 to 19 years. A com parable number ofboys and girls were in each of the five age groups. Th e mothers were predomi-nantly White (97%), Protestant (65%), well educated (67% had some college),and they ranged in age from 2 5 to 50 years (M=36 years, SD =5.7 years). Mo st

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De Luccie 119

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(5 1% ) were employed full time; 3 1% were not employe d outside the home. Mostof the fathers were college educated (73% had gradu ated from college), and theyranged in age from 26 to 6 0 years (M=38 years, S D =5.9 years). Nearly all(96% ) worked full time. On average, the parents had 2 children (range = l-9),were married 13 years (S D =5.9), and owned their homes (82%). Total familyincome for 8 1D/O of the parents was $25,0 00 or mo re per year.Instrutnents und Dependent Variables

As part of an ongo ing study of the ecology of fath erho od, I asked each moth-er to complete survey questionnaires assessing (a ) frequency of their husbandsinvolvement with their oldest child; (b) attitudes about the importance of fatherinvolvement and satisfaction with father involvement; ( c) satisfaction with mar-riage, with employment status, and with social support; and (d) demographicinformation. Socially desirable responding was assessed via the Crowne-Marlowe Social Desirability Scale.Frequency of involvement. Paternal involvement was assessed with a modifiedversion of Kleins ( I 983) Frequency of Participation S cale. This sca le consists of22 items measuring five areas of paternal involvement, including basic caregiv-ing (e.g., disciplining the child); recreational involvement (e.g., playing activegames with the child, such as running, playing ball, and exercising); emotionalsupport (e.g., comforting the child when she or he is upset); religious-ethicalinvolvement (e.g., providing religious training for the child); and school-relatedinvolvement (e.g ., helping the child learn a new skill or com plete a school assign-ment). The 22 original items were retained, but the 4-point qualitative responsecategories (e.g., very often) were replaced with a more con crete 6-point formatranging from not ut all ( I ) to daily (6). Responses to the 22 items were sum medto yield a total score, and higher scores indicated greater frequency of involve-ment with children. Internal consistency of the scale (Cronbachs a lpha) was .90.(To explore the verticality of the measure, I also asked the fathers to completethis scale. Their scores were highly correlated with maternal reports, r =.69.)Importance of und sutisjaction with fath er involvement. Maternal ratings of theimportance of father involvement and satisfaction with father involvement wereassessed with modified versions of Kleins Frequency of Participation Scale.First, the mothers were asked, How important do you think it is for your hus-band to be involved with your oldes t child in each of these childca re tasks? Theyresponded to the 22 items on a 5-point scale ranging from no t at all important( 1 ) to v e y important (5).Score s were summ ed to yield an estim ate of the degreeof importance the mothers placed on the fathers involvement with the oldestchild; higher scores indicated stronger belief in the importance of paternalinvolvement.

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Second, the mothers were asked, How satisfied are you with your husbandsinvolvement with your oldest child in each of these childcare tasks? Theyresponded to the 22 items on a 5-point scale ranging from not at all satisfied (1 )to very satisfied (5). Scores were summed to yield an estimate of how satisfiedthe mothers were with father involvement; higher scores indicated greater levelsof satisfaction. Cronbach alpha coefficients for these two scales were 3 6 and 3 9 ,respectively.Satisfaction w ith marriage, social s uppo rt, and emplo yme nt status. Marital satis-faction was assessed with the Kansas Marital Satisfaction Scale (Schum m et al.,1986). The mothers w ere asked, on a scale of 1 to 5 (ve ry dissatisfied to very sat-isfied), how satisfied they were with (a) their marriage , (b) their relationship withtheir spouse, and (c) their husband as a spouse. The scores on the three items weresummed to yield an estimate of marital satisfaction; higher scores representedgreater levels of satisfaction with m arriage. The alpha coefficient was .92.Satisfaction with social support was assessed with a three-item measure. Ona scale that ranged from very dissatisfied (1 ) to very satisjied (3 , he motherswere asked how satisfied they were du ring the past month with (a) the amount ofhelp (time, energy, money) they received from other people, (b) the number ofopportunities they had to talk to or receive advice from others about personal orprivate matters, and (c) the num ber of opportunities they had to get together withpeople for fun and relaxation. The scores for the three items were summed toyield an estimate of satisfaction with social support; high scores represented high-er levels of satisfac tion with social support. Cronbachs alpha was .67.Three items were also used to assess satisfaction with m aternal employmentstatus. Each mother was asked to rate, on the same 5-point scale, how satisfiedshe was with her present role as an employed or nonemployed mother, how sat-isfied she thought her husband was with her decision to work or not to work out-side the home, and how satisfied she thought her oldest child was with her deci-sion to work or not to work outside the home. The sco res on the three items w eresummed to yield an estimate of satisfaction with employment status; higherscores represented higher levels of satisfaction. Cronbachs alpha for these itemswas .53.Social desirability. To assess the possibility that the validity of these data wasaffected by socially desirable responding, I had the mothers complete the six-itemCrowne-Marlowe Social Desirability Scale (Campbell, Converse, & Rodgers,1976). The range of possible scores is 0 to 6, and higher scores indicate higherlevels of socially desirable responding. The m ean score for this sam ple of moth-ers was 2.2 ( S D=1.5). Correlations were run between each of the maternal vari-ables and social desirability; all coefficients were nonsignificant, ranging from,008 (satisfaction with father involvem ent) to -. 14 (maternal education).

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I2 2 The Journul .f'Crneric Psychology

ProcedureParents of 2-year-old children were located via birth announcements pub-lished 20 to 28 months earlier in the local newspaper. They were contacted bymail. A total of 28 parents met the sam pling criteria (first-born child was 2 yearsold, family was intact, and the child was free of serious health problems) andagreed to participate in the research. Parents of the older children (n=116) hadparticipated 2 years earlier in a study of father-ch ild relations and agreed to con-tinue their involvement by taking part in this study. (Two thirds of the originalsample participated in the fo llow-up study.)The questionnaires were bound in a single booklet and sent by mail to the

mothers. They were asked to respond to each question as it pertained to the rear-ing of their oldest child only; they were instructed not to discuss the question-naires or their responses with their husbands until the end of the project. Com-pleted booklets were returned in stamped, pre-addressed envelopes.Results

Pearson product-mom ent correlations between all variables in the predictedpath m odel are displayed in Table 1 (along with m eans and standard deviationsof each measure).Figure 1 displays the path model of maternal mediators of father involve-ment. Values on the paths are partial standardized regression (beta) coefficientsderived using ordinary least squares regression procedures. These coefficientsindicate the relative importance of each variable for this sample in term s of stan-dard deviations, and they represen t the direct effect of a g iven independent vari-able on a given dependent variable, while holding constant the effects of all othervariables in the model (Markides & Martin, 1979). The zero-order correlationcoefficient between an exogenous predictor and an endogenous variable can bedecomposed into a direct effect, an indirect effect, and an indeterminate (resid-ual) association resulting from the unanalyzed correlation with other predictorvariables (Aiwin & Hauser, 1975). The decomposition of all direct and indirecteffects predicted in the m odel is presented in Table 2.The six direct predictors together accounted for 79% of the variation in themothers' repor ts of frequency of father involvement. Four of these relations werestatistically reliable (p< 05):maternal satisfaction with father involvem ent, childage, maternal ratings of the importance of father involvement, and m arital satis-faction. However, as indicated by their lower beta weights, two of these directpredictors-importance of father involvement and marital satisfaction-were rel-atively weaker predictors of the variation in frequency of father involvement.Number of children and mother's occupational level did not reliably predict fre-quency of father involvement. More specifically, those mothers who were m orehappily m arried, had younger aged children, believed that father involvement was

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