Fathers' Frames for Childrearing: Evidence Toward a “Masculine Concept of Caregiving”

Abstract

In this study, employed fathers of preschool-age children were interviewed, both individually and with their spouses, to identify their communicative strategies for constructing their own performances of childrearing. Bateson's “frame” construct provided the meta-analytic basis for an interpretive analysis of the interview accounts. The analysis identified 13 frames, clustered under 3 metaframes (“childrearing as work – expression of agency,” “childrearing as work – experience of constraint,” and “childrearing as expression of pure relationship”). The content of the frames and their interrelationships in the fathers' accounts are used to advance a “masculine concept of caregiving.” The significance of articulating a “masculine concept of caregiving” for overcoming obstacles to involved fathering is examined.