Fathers are very important! Learn the top ten scientific reasons why.
The National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) was founded in 1994, by former White House advisor and civil society scholar Don Eberly and child psychologist Wade Horn. The mission of the organization is to improve the well-being of children by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathersNFI’s Father Facts (4th edition) is a comprehensive review of research on fatherhood and family trends. Here are NFI’s “top ten father facts” showing that children suffer greatly from the absence of their biological fathers.¹

1. 24 million children (34 percent) live absent their biological father.

2. Nearly 20 million children (27 percent) live in single-parent homes.

3. 1.35 million births (33 percent of all births) in 2000 occurred out of wedlock.

4. 43 percent of first marriages dissolve within fifteen years; about 60 percent of divorcing couples have children; and approximately one million children each year experience the divorce of their parents.

5. Over 3.3 million children live with an unmarried parent and the parent’s cohabiting partner. The number of cohabiting couples with children has nearly doubled since 1990, from 891,000 to 1.7 million today [c. 2000].

6. Fathers who live with their children are more likely to have a close, enduring relationship with their children than those who do not. The best predictor of father presence is marital status. Compared to children born within marriage, children born to cohabiting parents are three times as likely to experience father absence, and children born to unmarried, non-cohabiting parents are four times as likely to live in a father-absent home.

7. About 40 percent of children in father-absent homes have not seen their father at all during the past year; 26 percent of absent fathers live in a different state than their children; and 50 percent of children living absent their father have never set foot in their father’s home.

8. Children who live absent their biological fathers are, on average, at least two to three times more likely to be poor, to use drugs, to experience educational, health, emotional and behavioral problems, to be victims of child abuse, and to engage in criminal behavior than their peers who live with their married, biological (or adoptive) parents.

9. From 1960 to 1995, the proportion of children living in single-parent homes tripled, from 9 percent to 27 percent, and the proportion of children living with married parents declined. However, from 1995 to 2000, the proportion of children living in single-parent homes slightly declined, while the proportion of children living with two married parents remained stable.

10. Children with involved, loving fathers are significantly more likely to do well in school, have healthy self-esteem, exhibit empathy and pro-social behavior, and avoid high-risk behaviors such as drug use, truancy, and criminal activity compared to children who have uninvolved fathers.²

^Footnotes:

¹ See also Kairos Journal article, “Timothy and the Single-Parent Home.”

² Wade F. Horn, “Top Ten Father Facts,” National Fatherhood Initiative Website (2002), http://www.fatherhood.org/fatherfacts_t10.asp (accessed February 7, 2006).

Top Ten Father Facts—National Fatherhood Initiative

From Kairos Journal