First-time dads have typically been a little short-changed when it comes to the resources available for improving their parenting skills. Moms have far more options and, where there are programs for dads, they’re often based on a model that works for women.
Now, a team of researchers from the University of Alberta and University of Calgary have evaluated a home-visitation program in which dads are videotaped interacting with their babies and then given instant feedback. It appears to be a hit.
“What works for mothers doesn’t always work as well for dads,” says Dr. Joyce Magill-Evans, a U of A researcher and the lead investigator on the study. “Fathers tend to prefer parenting education programs in which they can actively participate.”
Older models often tried to get fathers together in a room to share their experiences in child-rearing, but men were generally less than thrilled with that format, notes the U of C’s Dr. Karen Benzies. “Men are just uncomfortable opening up like that until their babies are a bit older,” she says.
In all, the study recruited 162 fathers of five-month old babies. They were videotaped on two separate occasions teaching their five-month old to play with a new toy. The home visitors, trained professionals in infant development, showed them what they were doing right and how to improve the quality of play with their baby.
“What the home visitors would find is that dads would sometimes fail to notice cues their child was giving him, or they would fail to talk to their babies,” Benzies says. Studies have shown that positive father-baby interactions promote cognitive development, such as language acquisition, as well as social-emotional development.
Compared to fathers in a control group, fathers who received the intervention maintained their sensitivity to cues from the baby and increased their cognitive growth fostering.
“These are very encouraging results but more evaluation is needed before we could recommend full-scale implementation of the program,” Magill-Evans says.
Researchers need to test the intervention within existing health and social service programming and with other populations, such as with preterm infants who are typically more irritable and difficult to soothe.
The research team, which also includes Margaret J. Harrison and Mark Gierl of the U of A and Cathy Kimak of the Capital Health region, report their findings in the latest issue of the academic journal Fathering. Laurie Blahitka and Maureen Best from the Calgary Health region assisted with recruitment of fathers in Calgary. Their paper is titled, Effects of Parenting Education on First-Time Fathers’ Skills in Interactions with their Infants.