Psychology - Life With (or Without) Father Essay -- essays research pa

What was the purpose of this study? This study had three purposes. The first purpose of this study was to better understand the effects of fathers’ antisocial behaviors have on their children while differentiating between those fathers who have very antisocial behavior with those that have very little. The second purpose was the find out if the effects of a father’s being in his child’s life was the same in every family. The third purpose in this study was to find out whether the children of antisocial fathers were going to develop behavioral problems from both genetic and environmental risks. What hypothesis or hypotheses did the authors test in this study? The author’s felt the father’s antisocial behavior would affect the results in whether the father was present or not. For example, if a father is only a little antisocial and he spends very little time living with his children his children could have a lot of behavior problems. However, if the father is very antisocial and he lives with his children his children can also develop a lot of behavior problems. Even though logically it seems that having a father living with the child would be beneficial for the child if the child observes that his father has antisocial behaviors it can create unwanted problems. Those conducting this study hypothesized that the most extreme cases of behavior problems would be found could they pass on traits that would cause antisocial behaviors genetically but the constant observing of their father’s misbehaving could create environmental factors as well. What was the prior research that motivated these hypotheses? Briefly describe the studies that have been done in the past that cause the authors to propose these hypotheses. There has been research done that children who have been raised with both parents living with them behave better than those children who live with only one parent. A theory stemming from evolutionary psychology indicated that men’s promiscuous sexual behavior lessoned their drive to stick with their family and hence the reason why there are a lot more single mothers than fathers. This caused some lawmakers and researchers to realize that perhaps the absence of a father in his child’s life could create problems with the child both academically and behaviorally. There are several reasons why a father’s absence can be detrimental to the child su... ... the effects that antisocial behavior of fathers have on their children’s own behavior and this can help them better understand the family unit and allows the lawmakers to make adjustments to the law regarding encouraging those on welfare to marry. By understanding the entire picture, the lawmakers are able to convince single parents to abide to laws that are made. What implications do these findings have for parenting practices? The findings can help better parents understand the reasons why their child is misbehaving and how to limit their chances of becoming severe cases. Also the results of this study questions the benefits and disadvantages to the institution of marriage. Marriage can benefit a child if the father has low or average degrees of antisocial behavior and the higher he has and the more time he lives with the child the more damaging it could be for the child. Basically, this study gives us more insight on the effects of not only the presence of the father or lack of, but the degrees of antisocial behavior expressed by him and the interplay of the two. Genetics and environment work together to determine the development of behavioral problems within a child’s life.