Religious Heterogamy, Marital Quality, and Paternal Engagement

Young-Il Kim,Isaak Swan

doi:10.3390/rel10020102

Abstract

Using data from a nationally representative sample of married fathers of school-aged children, we examined the association between religious heterogamy of parents and fathers’ involvement in children’s lives. We further examined whether that association is mediated by marital quality and father–child religious discord. Results showed that greater religious heterogamy is associated with less interaction and more relational distance between fathers and children. Results also suggested that fathers’ reports of marital happiness play an important role in mediating the association between religious heterogamy and paternal engagement. We concluded that religious fathers are more involved in their children’s lives insofar as their wives are equally religious and they are in happy marriages.

Highlights

The last half-century has seen a substantial increase in the percentage of Americans taking an egalitarian view of the role that fathers should play in the lives of their children (Ishizuka 2018).the shift in cultural norms of paternal parenting is not consistently reflected in the actual behavior of fathers (LaRossa 1988), and some fathers appear to meet these cultural expectations better than others
We took into account the religiosity of mothers as well as fathers and addressed the following question: Does religious heterogamy of parents discourage fathers’ involvement in children’s lives? If so, why? Using data from a representative sample of heterosexual married men of school-aged children in the US, this study examined the association between religious heterogamy and paternal engagement
To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to focus on the effects of religious heterogamy on paternal engagement

Summary

Introduction

The last half-century has seen a substantial increase in the percentage of Americans taking an egalitarian view of the role that fathers should play in the lives of their children (Ishizuka 2018).the shift in cultural norms of paternal parenting is not consistently reflected in the actual behavior of fathers (LaRossa 1988), and some fathers appear to meet these cultural expectations better than others. Despite a large amount of evidence supporting the positive relationship between religion and paternal engagement, research is often conducted without due consideration to the mothers’ religiosity or the role that they play in fathers’ parenting. This oversight is surprising in light of the fact that fathers’ parenting is correlated with mothers’ parenting, and vice versa. We took into account the religiosity of mothers as well as fathers and addressed the following question: Does religious heterogamy of parents discourage fathers’ involvement in children’s lives? To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to focus on the effects of religious heterogamy on paternal engagement

Methods

Results

Conclusion