Predictors of Involvement and Warmth of CustodialFathers in Israel: Comparison with Married andNoncustodial Divorced Fathers

RICKY FINZI-DOTTAN*,†

ORNA COHEN‡

This study compared the levels and predictors of paternal warmth and involvement of218 custodial fathers to 222 married fathers and 105 noncustodial (NC) divorced fathers inIsrael. The examined predictors were fathers’ perceptions of their own fathers; their owncaregiving behaviors and parental self-efficacy; and child characteristics and coparentalcoordination. Results indicated that being a custodial father was associated with moreinvolvement than being a married or NC divorced father. Regression analyses revealed thatexperience of care with own father predicted fathers’ involvement, whereas own father con-trol was related to lower paternal warmth. Lower avoidant caregiving and high paternalself-efficacy predicted both paternal involvement and warmth, whereas perceiving the childas more difficult predicted lower paternal warmth. Higher levels of coparental coordinationwere associated with more paternal involvement, whereas low coparental coordination wasassociated with less involvement, primarily among NC divorced fathers. These interactionshighlight the distinct paternal behavior of custodial fathers. Unlike married and NCdivorced fathers, they showed more warmth, regardless of their avoidant caregiving.Results are discussed in light of the different roles played by fathers in the three groups.

Keywords: Father Involvement; Fatherly Warmth; Caregiving; Paternal Self-efficacy;Child Characteristics

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The last 30 years have seen a surge in research on fathering and fatherhood. The aug-mented interest stems from increasing understanding of the formative role played by

fathers in children’s development (Rohner & Veneziano, 2001) and from the changes infamily structure and roles resulting from recent cultural, economic, and social changes(Wood & Repetti, 2004). As the cultural definition of fatherhood shifts from provider tonurturer, fathers have become active parents, increasingly more involved in childrearing(Coltrane, 2004).

The interest in fathers has manifested itself mainly in research on married men raisingtheir children alongside their mothers and on divorced noncustodial fathers. The studieson married men generally focus on fathers in dual earner families, analyzing their paren-tal behavior and comparing it to the mothers’ (e.g., Lamb & Lewis, 2010); the studies ondivorced noncustodial fathers tend to focus on their involvement in their children’s lives

*School of Social Work, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.†Geha Mental Health Center, Child and Adolescence Outpatient Clinic, Petah Tiqva, Israel.‡School of Social Work, Tel Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel.Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Ricky Finzi-Dottan, Bar Ilan University,

School of Social Work, Ramat Gan, 529002, Israel. E-mail: rikifnz@biu.013.net.il.This research was supported by The Israel Science Foundation (grant No. 656/10).

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doi: 10.1111/famp.12124

(Bronte-Tinkew, Scott, & Lilja, 2010), their relations with their children’s mothers (Cohen& Finzi-Dottan, 2012), and their financial and emotional statuses (Dufur, Howell,Downey, Ainsworth, & Lapray, 2010).

In contrast, divorced custodial fathers have received little research attention. Brown(2000) examined their socioeconomic status, Hacker (2005) how they obtained custody.Only two qualitative studies examined their emotional status and parenting behaviors:Coles (2009) interviewed Black custodial fathers, emphasizing their stress and copingstrategies; Cohen, Finzi-Dottan, and Tangir-Dotan (2014) interviewed Israeli custodialfathers and reported that they found it difficult to play both parental roles. Two otherstudies, both quantitative, compared custodial fathers and mothers. Bronte-Tinkew et al.(2010) examined their parenting styles as perceived by their adolescent children,and reported that they exhibited less authoritarian and authoritative parenting than two-parent families, and were less involved than parents in single-mother, two-parent, andother types of families. Hilton, Desrochers, and Devall (2001) found that single fathershad better resources than single mothers, more positive parenting behaviors than marriedfathers, and relied more on friends than married parents. As informative as these studiesare, all but one were conducted in the United States, and none examines paternal warmthor involvement with their children.

The present study, conducted in Israel, assesses the impact of fathers’ relational statuson two aspects of their parenting: warmth and involvement with the children. It comparesdivorced custodial fathers with both married fathers and divorced noncustodial fathers onthese parenting behaviors, and identifies some predictors of them.

Paternal Behaviors

Parental warmth, according to Rohner (2004), is a manifestation of parental accep-tance, along with affection, care, comfort, concern, nurturance, support, and love. Father’sinvolvement is a multidimensional concept, which includes a wide range of behavioral,cognitive, and affective practices (Day & Lamb, 2004), with different fathers engagingmore in some and less in others (e.g., Lamb & Lewis, 2010).

These two variables complement one another: Involvement represents a key instrumentalcomponent of child care, warmth a major emotional component. They were selected for studyin light of extensive research evidence showing the positive impacts of paternal warmth andaffection on children’s development (e.g., Webster, Low, Siller, & Hackett, 2013; Khaleque &Rohner, 2012). These impacts include: improved social outcomes (e.g., Webster et al., 2013)and school adjustment and achievement (e.g., Sterling Honig, 2008); reduced behavior prob-lems in adolescence (Veneziano, 2003); and better coping with the tasks of this age (e.g.,Leidy, 2011). Conversely, studies show that paternal absence may be a crucial predictor ofadolescent delinquency (Rohner & Veneziano, 2001) and substance abuse (Campo & Rohner,1992), and difficulties in psychological adjustment in adulthood (Khaleque & Rohner, 2012).

Father involvement has similarly been found to affect the child’s cognitive, emotional, andsocial development. Cognitively, children of involved fathers show better problem solving,higher school achievement, and greater career success than children of uninvolved fathers(e.g., Sterling Honig, 2008); emotionally, they show greater self-confidence and less fear,frustration, and depression (Khaleque & Rohner, 2012); socially, they evidence fewerbehavior problems and greater patience and empathy (Veneziano, 2003; Webster et al.,2013).

Antecedents of Paternal Warmth and Involvement

Substantial scholarship has been devoted to identifying correlates and predictors offathering behaviors (e.g., Lamb & Lewis, 2010). However, theory and practical investiga-

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tion of the determinants of father engagement predominantly focus either on fathers inintact families (e.g., Beaton & Doherty, 2007), especially new fathers (e.g., Knoester,Petts, & Eggebeen, 2007), or on divorced noncustodial fathers (e.g., Amato & Dorius,2010). Very few studies examine predictors of fathering among divorced custodial fathers,and most of them, like most of the studies on fathering practices, examine only a smallnumber of variables (e.g., Bokker, Farely, & Bailey, 2006).

The present study’s examination of predictors is based on Belsky’s multidimen-sional, multigenerational, ecological model of parenting determinants (Belsky, 1984).This model posits that parents’ behavior in the family is the product of three factors:(a) the parents’ personal psychological resources and functioning, which may be tracedback to experiences they had with their own parents; (b) contextual sources of stress,among them marital relations, work, and social network; and (c) child’s characteristicsand behavior styles that make parenting more or less difficult (Belsky, 1984). Belsky(1984) maintains that the parents’ psychological resources and functioning are themost influential of these factors, but may be affected by the context and child’s tem-perament. In the present study, the fathers’ psychological resources are represented bytheir experiences with their own fathers, their self-efficacy, and their caregiving. Wehypothesize that each of these variables will contribute to the fathers’ warmth and/orinvolvement.

Experience with own father

Psychoanalytic literature posits that men’s experience with their fathers may affecttheir parenting either through assimilation and reproduction of the father’s parentingstyle or through identification with and internalization of his superego. Empirical studiesshow that both harsh and rejecting parenting (Weiss, Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 1992), andaffectionate and supportive parenting (Olson, Martin, & Halverson, 1999) are linkedacross generations. Findings show that the experience of childhood acceptance andwarmth from their own fathers predict fathers’ responsive behaviors toward their ownchildren (Hofferth, Pleck, & Vesely, 2012). They also show both that highly involvedfathers are likely to have had highly involved fathers themselves (Hofferth et al., 2012),and that fathers who were dissatisfied with the quality of fathering they received oftenbecome more involved with their children (e.g., Coles, 2009).

Parental self-efficacy

Parental self-efficacy in this study refers to parents’ belief or self-referent estimationregarding their ability to perform competently and effectively as parents (Coleman &Karraker, 2000). Research evidence consistently links self-efficacy to parents’ involvementpractices (Coleman & Karraker, 2000). Findings show that parents with high parentingself-efficacy encourage their children, spend time with them, set boundaries, fosterresponsibility, and support them emotionally and instrumentally (e.g., Shumow & Lomax,2002). They perform parenting tasks efficiently, meet their children’s needs with sensitiv-ity, and employ positive parenting behaviors such as protection and risk prevention fortheir children (e.g., Leerkes & Burney, 2007).

Caregiving

Caregiving in the family refers to the parent’s sensitivity and responsiveness to thechild’s needs, aimed at keeping the dependent offspring close and safe (Bowlby, 1988;Shaver, Mikulincer, & Shemesh-Iron, 2010). The quality of caregiving is believed to beanchored in the individual’s caregiving system, based on representations of caregivingdeveloped in childhood. Its dysfunction can trigger either hyperactivation or deactivationof the caregiving system, resulting respectively in anxious or avoidant caregiving.

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Research shows that avoidant caregiving is associated with denying interdependence andpersonal responsibility for others’ welfare, not valuing the protection of other people, cyni-cal attitudes toward others, and beliefs that others do not deserve help; and that anxiouscaregiving is associated with a compulsion to help others even when they do not seekassistance and a lack of perceived self-efficacy in helping others (George & Solomon,2008). Proper functioning of the caregiving system should foster quality caregiving, char-acterized by sensitivity and responsiveness to the child and commitment to meeting his orher needs (Shaver et al., 2010).

Little, if any, research has been conducted on the association between caregiving andeither parental warmth or parental involvement. However, two studies suggest that theyare associated. Reizer and Mikulincer (2007) found that the personal tendency to caregiv-ing contributed to fathers’ and mothers’ motivation to actualize their parenthood and theirwillingness to put effort into parenting. Shaver et al. (2010) found that mothers whoscored high on anxious and/or avoidant caregiving were less helpful than others in interac-tions with their children: anxious mothers because they were distressed, and avoidantmothers because they were cold and distant.

The present study also examines two moderator variables: one contextual, namely therelationship with the children’s mother (whether wife or ex-wife); the other a child charac-teristic, namely being difficult. Both are potential stressors in parenting.

Coordination with children’s mother

Ample empirical support exists for the view that the quality of coparenting coordinationplays an important role in shaping father involvement. For example, findings among mar-ried couples show that supportive coparenting and refraining from undermining behaviorwere associated both with fathers’ increased involvement in playing with their childrenand reduced involvement in caregiving (Jia & Schoppe-Sullivan, 2011). Studies of divorcedand separated couples show that parental conflict reduces father involvement (Coley &Hernandez, 2006), while maternal support for or encouragement of father’s involvementtends to increase it (e.g., Cannon, Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, Brown, & Sokolowski,2008).

Child characteristic

The child characteristic examined is the perceived difficulty of the child. Difficult chil-dren are highly reactive, prone to mood changes, and find it hard to adapt (McBride, Scho-ppe, & Rane, 2002). In some cases, the difficulty may reflect a psychological disorder, suchas conduct disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, mood disorder, or attention-deficithyperactivity disorder (Shoval, Manor, & Tyano, 2005). Comparisons of parents’ behaviortoward siblings indicate that children with different personalities and behaviors elicitdifferent parenting behaviors (see Karraker & Coleman, 2005). More compliant childrentend to elicit milder, more positive parenting than their less compliant siblings (Wong,Mangelsdorf, Brown, Neff, & Schoppe-Sullivan, 2009). Research on children with“difficult” temperaments indicates that their parents tend to be more disapproving,hostile, and directive than parents of children with “easy” temperaments, and that theyreceive less care from their fathers (McBride et al., 2002). There are also indications thatfathers are less involved with children with a difficult or less sociable temperament(Ganiban, Ulbricht, Saudino, Reiss, & Neiderhiser, 2011).

The Present Study

The present study develops and assesses a multidimensional measurement model ofpaternal warmth and involvement. It has three main objectives. The first is to compare

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the warmth and involvement of divorced custodial fathers with that of divorced noncusto-dial fathers and married fathers. The second is to determine whether experience of pater-nal care in childhood, self-efficacy, and caregiving predict fathers’ involvement andwarmth. The third is to determine whether the contextual variable of relations with thechild’s mother and child difficulty moderate the impact of the personal variables.

This study is important because divorced custodial fathers with sole rights and respon-sibility for raising their children constitute a rapidly growing group of single parents. In2006, approximately 2% of divorced fathers in the United States had sole custody of theirchildren (Bokker et al., 2006), in Israel of 2011, 3.3% do (National Insurance Institute,2011). Despite this, few studies have examined fathering practices or their predictors inthis situation. Our belief is that better understanding the fathering practices of custodialfathers is crucial to improving knowledge of this relatively new and increasingly commonfamily structure, and to developing interventions to help fathers and children alike.

The Israeli Context

The study was conducted in Israel. Israel is a familistic society, which places substan-tial value on marriage, family, and children. Having children is considered so importantthat the last two decades have seen increasing numbers of unmarried women having chil-dren by choice, with little if any social stigma. With this, Israel is also an individualisticsociety. Among nonreligious middle and upper middle class Jews, self-actualization is awidely held goal. Many women in this sector of society consider work not only a source ofincome, but also a means of self-fulfillment. Two-earner families are not uncommon,resulting in a certain tension between the Western individualism and the family ethosthat both characterize Israeli society.

Although women in Israel continue to bear the chief responsibility for housework andchildcare, the phenomenon of the “newman” is increasingly common. While fathers usuallyremain the chief breadwinners, decisions regarding the children in the secular middle andupper middle classes are usually made mutually by both parents, and fathers are expectedto participate in childcare and to be actively involved with their children (Cohen, 2003).

The divorce rate in Israel is between a quarter and a third of those who marry; joint cus-tody is rare. In 92% of divorces sole custody is awarded to the mother, while divorcedfathers are usually granted visitation rights, whereby the children can stay overnight onceor twice a week and every other weekend. The country’s small size permits close geo-graphic proximity, which facilitates visitation (Cohen, 2003).

Custodial fathers account for 3.3% of divorced couples in Israel (National InsuranceInstitute, 2011). In most cases, they are only awarded custody when the mother is deemedincompetent, due to incapacitating illness, severe psychological problems, or substanceabuse (Hacker, 2005). Like divorced custodial mothers, they are entitled to welfare assis-tance if they earn less than a set amount; however, to the best of the authors’ knowledge,most custodial fathers are of either middle or upper middle class (see Hacker, 2005) andtherefore not eligible for assistance. Unlike divorced custodial mothers, they rarely receivechild support from their former spouse.

METHOD

Participants

Three groups of fathers were recruited for the study: married fathers, divorced custo-dial fathers, and noncustodial divorced fathers. Fathers eligible to participate had to haveat least one child under the age of 18. If the father was married or custodial, the child hadto be living with him. All fathers had to speak Hebrew and live in Israel.

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As there is no official list of divorced custodial fathers in Israel, both the custodial andnoncustodial divorced fathers were recruited via some 150 social workers in the social wel-fare departments of Israel’s municipalities. These workers have access to the records ofdivorced parents because, by law, family social workers are the ones who provide thecourts with a written opinion before the courts award custody, and access and visitationrights. We identified the social workers through a list obtained from the Israel Associationof Social Workers. After receiving authorization for the study from Israel’s Ministry ofSocial Welfare, we sent a letter to each social worker explaining the study’s aims and ask-ing for cooperation in recruiting divorced fathers. The social workers subsequently con-tacted the fathers, informing them of the study and its purpose, assuring them that theirresponses would be anonymous and used only for research, and asking their permission togive us their contact information. This process enabled the fathers who preferred not toparticipate to decline. Although we did not have the resources to track recruitment dataacross the 150 social workers contacted throughout Israel, our impression, based on theworkers’ informal statements, is that almost all the custodial fathers approached agreedto participate. Those who agreed signed an informed consent form.

To obtain the two control groups, we asked the divorced custodial fathers who agreed toparticipate in the study to provide names and contact information of three married fathersand three noncustodial fathers with children of similar ages in their area of residence.Those fathers were contacted by our research assistant.

Response rates were good. Questionnaires were completed by 218 (86%) of the 251custodial fathers contacted, 105 (56%) of the 188 noncustodial fathers contacted, and 222(77%) of the 287 married fathers contacted.

Study Fathers

The study participants were 218 custodial fathers, 222 married fathers, and 105 non-custodial (NC) divorced fathers. All fathers had at least one child below the age of 18 intheir sole custody, and all were Jewish. The three groups were matched by the age of theiryoungest child (M = 13.61; SD = 6.0).

The mean years of divorce were 5.51 (SD = 3.7) for the custodial fathers, and 5.17(SD = 4.3) for the NC divorced fathers, with no significant difference. The NC divorcedfathers were almost twice as likely to have reported being remarried as the custodialfathers: 22.4% and 12% respectively. No difference was found in warmth or involvement ofdivorced fathers who did and did not have a partner.

Most of the fathers (90%) in all three groups were born in Israel; their average age wasmid-forties.

Group differences were found in the number of children, education, and socioeconomicstatus. The married fathers had more children (M = 3.13; SD = 1.25) than the custodial(M = 2.56; SD = 1.08) and NC divorced fathers (M = 1.95; SD = 0.85). The custodialfathers had approximately 2 years less schooling (13.71; SD = 3.1) than the married andNC divorced fathers (15.44 and 15.79, respectively). More custodial and noncustodialdivorced fathers (15.1% and 15.9% respectively) reported low socioeconomic status (orbeing poor) than married fathers (0.5%).

Most of the custodial fathers (79.72%) had custody of all their children. Among the other20.28%, one or more children were in the mother’s custody. Of these, 63.8% were girls.Most of the custodial fathers had one (40.5%) or two children (37.6%) in their custody;21.9% had three children in their custody.

Subsequent independent sample t-tests showed no difference in the paternal involve-ment [t(216) = .16, p = .87] or warmth t(216) = �1.12, p = .22] between the fathers whoremarried (N = 27; 12%) and those who did not (N = 191).

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Instruments

The fathers completed eight questionnaires, in the following order:Father involvement was assessed by the Instrument of Father Involvement (Bradford,

Hawkins, Palkovitz, Christiansen, & Day, 2002). This is a 35-item questionnaire, rate on a7-point scale that measures father involvement in nine domains: discipline and teachingresponsibility; school encouragement; reading to children and homework support; supportof the mother; providing; spending time talking together; giving praise and affection;developing talents and future concerns; and being attentive to the children and involvedin their daily lives. The developers of this instrument reported its good construct validity.In the present study, the overall Cronbach’s alpha was 0.93, and ranged from 0.69 to 0.89for each subscale.

Paternal self-efficacy was examined using a self-report questionnaire designed byGibaud-Wallston and Wandersman (1978, as cited in Johnston & Mash, 1989) entitledParenting Sense of Competence scale. Respondents rate the extent to which they agreewith each of 17 statements describing their parenting satisfaction and sense of parentingcompetence on a 6-point scale. This scale has two subscales: (a) Knowledge/Skill, address-ing parents’ self-perceptions regarding the skills and understanding required to be a goodparent; and (b) Valuing/Comfort, that is, the degree to which respondents feel comfortableand capable in their role as parents and the value they assign to the parental role. In thepresent study, Cronbach’s alpha for the Knowledge/Skill subscale was 0.75, for the Valu-ing/Comfort subscale 0.76, and for the overall score 0.81.

Parental warmth was assessed using Rohner, Khaleque, and Cournoyer’s PARQ-Shortform (2005). This questionnaire contains 24 items and four subscales: warmth/affection;hostility/aggression; indifference/neglect; undifferentiated rejection. Respondents indi-cate, on a 4-point scale, the extent to which each of the sentences described their behav-ior. The total score was the sum of the scales with the ratings on the negative aspects ofparenting reversed. In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha for the overall score was0.87.

Characteristics of the child were examined using a scale developed from Shoval et al.’s(2005) characterization of the “difficult child.” The scale consists of nine dichotomouslyphrased questions regarding the child’s behavior (e.g., oppositional behaviors, noncompli-ance with parental authority, irritability, etc.). Respondents answered each question forthe child they described as most challenging, and then noted if any of their other childrenbehaved similarly to the “challenging child.” The higher the score, the more difficult thechild was deemed. In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha was 0.77.

Coparental coordination (with the children’s mother) was measured using a subscalederived from Goldsmith’s (1980) Relationship between Former Spouses Scale. Respon-dents were asked to rate the extent to which each of eight statements of this scale appliedto them, on a 5-point scale. In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha was 0.71.

Caregiving was assessed using the Caregiving System Function scale (Shaver et al.,2010). The scale is designed to examine the caregiving strategies in parent–child rela-tionships (or other social contexts, such as couple relationships). This scale consists of20 statements describing caregiving activities and attitudes along two dimensions ofthe caregiving system: anxious hyper activation and avoidant deactivation. Fathersrate the degree to which each statement applies to them on a 7-point scale. In thepresent study, Cronbach’s alpha was 0.78 for avoidant caregiving and 0.77 for anxiouscaregiving.

Experiences with own father were measured using Parker, Tupling, and Brown’s (1979)Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI). This is a 25-item measure designed to assess people’sperceptions of their parents’ bonding behavior during the first 16 years of their life.

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Fathers are asked to indicate the degree to which each item describes their own fathers ona 4-point scale. The PBI consists of two subscales: care and overprotection. Ideal parentingis represented by a low score on the latter and a high score on the former. Low scores onthe care scale reflect parental neglect and rejection; high scores on the overprotection scaleindicate excessive control and intrusive parenting. In the present study, Cronbach’s alphawas 0.90 for care and 0.77 for overprotection.

Procedure

The study was conducted between October 2010 and December 2011. Of participants,80% completed the questionnaires electronically, the remaining 20% in hard copy whichthey received and returned by mail. The questionnaires filled out electronically were allcomplete, as the computer did not permit proceeding to the next question unless the previ-ous one was answered.

Data Analysis

Group differences in the parenthood dimensions were examined via multivariateanalyses of variance (MANOVA) and univariate analyses of variance (ANOVA). A seriesof four-step hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted to examine the con-tribution of the independent variables to paternal involvement and warmth. The inter-actions found enabled the examination of the moderating role of child characteristicsand coparental coordination, as well as the differential moderation among the threeresearch groups. Overall, of the participants, 97.46% had complete data; among thosewith missing data, 0.54% were missing. Little’s MCAR test indicated that the data werenot Missing Completely At Random, v2(43) = 75.10, p = .002. To handle missing data, weused the Multiple Imputation procedure (Rubin, 2009) using SPSS v.21 (IBM Corp.,2012).

RESULTS

Comparison of the Predictor and Outcome Variables among the Study Groups

A series of one-way ANOVA was conducted to examine the group differences in both theoutcome (paternal involvement and paternal warmth) and predictor (experience of care orcontrol with own father, anxious and avoidant caregiving, paternal self-efficacy, childcharacteristics, coparental coordination) variables. As Levene’s tests revealed that theassumption of homogeneity of variance was not held for several measures (experience ofcare with own father, child characteristics, paternal involvement, and paternal warmth),we adjusted the tests using the Brown–Forsythe method. Post hoc analyses were con-ducted using Bonferroni (for homogenous variance) or Tamhane (for heterogeneous vari-ance) adjustments. Means, standard deviations, test statistics, and their significance levelare presented in Table 1.

The analyses revealed that the groups differ in experience of care and control from ownfather, paternal self-efficacy, child characteristics, coparental coordination, paternalinvolvement, and paternal warmth. Specifically, NC divorced fathers reported havingexperienced less care from their own fathers than married fathers, and less control fromtheir own fathers than custodial fathers. In addition, both NC divorced and custodialfathers reported higher paternal self-efficacy and lower coparental coordination thanmarried fathers. Custodial fathers characterized their child as more “difficult” thanmarried fathers. Finally, custodial fathers reported more involvement than both marriedand NC divorced fathers. All other effects were nonsignificant.

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Examination of the Model: Prediction of Fathers’ Warmth and Involvement by thePredictor and Moderator Variables

This section reports on our examination of the proposed model, whereby child charac-teristics and coparental coordination moderate the links between fathers’ experience ofcare or control with own father, anxious and avoidant caregiving, and paternal self-effi-cacy on one hand (the predictors), and paternal involvement and warmth on the other (theoutcome measures). It also reports our examination of whether these processes weredifferent among custodial, NC divorced fathers, and married fathers.

The intercorrelations among the variables are presented in Table 2. As can be seen,significant positive correlations were found between anxious caregiving and experiencesof care and control of own fathers, and between perception of the child as difficult andcontrol by own fathers. The greater the perceived control by own father, the more anxiousthe caregiving and the more difficult the child seemed. The greater the care by own father,the more anxious the fathers’ own caregiving. Significant negative associations werefound between parental self-efficacy and control by own fathers, avoidant and anxiouscaregiving, and perception of child as difficult, and between coparental cooperation andcontrol by own father and perception of child as difficult. Paternal involvement correlatedpositively with care by own father and paternal self-efficacy, and negatively with avoidantcaregiving and perception of child as difficult. The more care the father had experiencedfrom his own father and the greater his paternal self-efficacy, the more involved he tendedto be; the more anxious and avoidant his caregiving and the more difficult he perceived hischild to be, the less involved he reported being. Paternal warmth correlated positively withpaternal involvement and self-efficacy, and negatively with avoidant and anxious caregiv-ing and perception of child as difficult. The greater the father’s involvement and self-effi-cacy, the less anxious and avoidant his caregiving; and the less he perceived his child asdifficult, the greater his warmth.

TABLE 1

Means (SD), Statistics, and their Significance Level for Examining the Differences between the Study Groups

in the Main Study Measures

Variable

Custodial fathers(N = 218)

NC divorcedfathers (N = 105)

Married fathers(N = 222)

F g2M (SD) M (SD) M (SD)

Experience of carewith own father†

30.35 (7.99) 28.58a (6.90) 30.56b (6.31) 3.03* .01

Experience of controlwith own father

22.91a (5.45) 21.07b (5.99) 22.36 (6.01) 3.61* .01

Avoidant caregiving 2.52 (.70) 2.60 (.84) 2.62 (.84) .86 .00Anxious caregiving 2.71 (.93) 2.68 (.96) 2.64 (.85) .30 .00Paternal self-efficacy 4.70a (.64) 4.61a (.67) 4.42b (.65) 10.99*** .04Child characteristics† 17.04a (4.81) 15.72 (5.15) 15.91b (4.26) 4.00* .02Coparental coordination 36.56a (15.35) 36.36a (13.64) 57.00b (17.03) 110.58*** .29Paternal involvement† 4.85 (.63) 4.69 (.85) 4.78 (.55) 2.18* .00Paternal warmth† 86.87 (16.67) 90.11a (9.76) 83.97b (11.98) 8.65*** .03

Note. †Adjusted for heterogeneity of variance using the Brown–Forsythe method.*p < .05.**p < .01.***p < .001.g2 = effect size (amount of explained variance). Means with different superscript letters are significantly

different.

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A series of four-step hierarchical linear regression analyses was conducted. In the firststep, we introduced the fathers’ education, economic status, number of children, and timeelapsed since divorce, to control for their effect. In the second step, we introduced thefathers’ experience of care or control with own father, anxious and avoidant caregiving,and paternal self-efficacy as predictors. In the third step, we introduced the moderators:child characteristics and coparental coordination, and study status. Study group waseffect-coded to compare custodial fathers (�1) with NC divorced fathers (1), and custodialfathers (�1) with married fathers (1). This step allowed us to examine the unique effectsof the main study measures on fathers’ involvement and warmth. In the fourth step, weadded the two-way interactions between the moderators (child characteristics, andcoparental coordination) and the predictors (experience of care or control with own father,anxious and avoidant caregiving, and paternal self-efficacy), between study group andpredictors, and between the moderators and study group. This step enabled us to explorewhether the links between the predictors and the outcome measures were qualified byeither the moderators or study group. Probing of significant interactions was performedaccording to Preacher, Curran, and Bauer (2006). To facilitate understanding of theresults and to avoid multi-colinearity, we centered all measures, except study group,around their grand mean. Regression coefficients are presented in Table 2 (only the inter-actions that were found significant by p < .05 are presented).

As can be seen in Table 3, the analyses revealed that a higher education level wasrelated to greater paternal involvement, but not to paternal warmth. Conversely, fathers’economic status, number of children, and time elapsed since divorce were not related toeither involvement or warmth.

In addition, the analyses revealed that greater paternal self-efficacy and lower avoidantcaregiving were associated with both paternal involvement and warmth. Greater experi-ence of care with own father was related to greater paternal involvement, whereas greaterexperience of control with own father was related to less paternal warmth.

In the third step, perceiving the child as more difficult was associated with less warmth,but not with less involvement. Greater coparental coordination was associated with moreinvolvement, but not more warmth. Custodial fathers reported more warmth than NCdivorced fathers.

The addition of the interactions in the fourth step significantly increased the variance.Study group (Custodial vs. NC Divorced) moderated the association between fathers’ expe-rience of control from their own father and paternal involvement: Among custodial

TABLE 2

Intercorrelations among the Main Study Variables (N = 545)

Variable 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

1. Experience of carewith own father

1

2. Experience of controlwith own father

�.06 1

3. Avoidant caregiving �.04 .03 14. Anxious caregiving .10* .13** .07 15. Paternal self-efficacy .06 �.13** �.25*** �.21*** 16. Child characteristics �.06 .12** .05 .11* �.28*** 17. Coparental coordination .07 �.09* .04 �.06 �.13 �.13** 18. Paternal involvement .16** �.01 �.34*** �.02 .50*** �.13** .08 19. Paternal warmth .03 �.15** �.34*** �.12** .36*** �.21*** �.02 .30***

*p < .05.**p < .01.***p < .001.

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fathers, we found no association between experience of control and paternal involvement(b = �.04, p = .10), whereas among NC divorced fathers, the greater the experience of con-trol, the greater their involvement (b = .14, p = .049). Study group (Custodial vs.Divorced) also moderated the link between coparental coordination and paternal involve-ment. High coparental coordination was associated with greater parental involvement;the association was significantly stronger among NC divorced fathers (b = .42, p < .001)than among custodial fathers (b = .23, p < .001).

The association between avoidant caregiving and paternal warmth was moderated bychild characteristics. When the child was perceived as difficult, the higher the caregivingavoidance, the lower the warmth (+1 SD; b = �4.37, p < .001). No association betweenavoidant caregiving and paternal warmth was found when the child was perceived as rela-tively easy (�1 SD; b = �1.32, p = .15).

The association between avoidant caregiving and paternal warmth was further moder-ated by study group (Custodial vs. NC Divorced, and Custodial vs. Married). Among custo-dial fathers, we found no association between avoidant caregiving and paternal warmth(b = �1.48, p = .28). In contrast, among NC divorced or married fathers, the higher theavoidant caregiving, the lower the warmth (b = �5.27, p < .001 for NC divorced fathers,and b = �3.89, p < .01 for married fathers). All other results were nonsignificant.

DISCUSSION

The study findings reflect the fathers’ recollections of the care and control they hadreceived from their own fathers, their subjective reports of their own behaviors, and their

TABLE 3

Standardized (b) Regression Coefficients Predicting Paternal Involvement and Warmth

Paternal involvement Paternal warmth

Education level .11* .05Economic status .08 .02Number of children �.01 �.01Time since divorce �.09 �.03

[R2 = 2.5%**] [R2 = 0.4%]Experience of care from own father .11** .02Experience of control from own father .05 �.08*Avoidant caregiving �.21*** �.27***Anxious caregiving .08 �.03Paternal self-efficacy .46*** .23***

[R2 = 27.6%***] [R2 = 21.9%***]Perceived child difficulty .01 �.12**Coparental coordination .14* .03Custodial versus NC divorced fathers �.04 �.10*Custodial versus married fathers .07 �.05

[R2 = 2.1%**] [R2 = 1.1%**]Custodial versus NC divorced 9 Experienceof control with own father

.16* .01

Custodial versus NC divorced 9 Coparental coordination .17* .05Avoidant caregiving 9 Child characteristics .03 �.10*Custodial versus married 9 Avoidant caregiving .03 .18***Custodial versus NC divorced 9 Avoidant caregiving .06 .16**

[DR2 = 6.9%***] [DR2 = 4.4%*]

*p < .05.**p < .01.***p < .001.

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perceptions of their cooperation with their children’s mothers and perceived difficulty oftheir child. Taking into account the self-report design of the study, the findings providepartial support for the study hypotheses by showing intergroup differences both in theoutcome variables (fathers’ warmth and involvement) and in most of the predictor vari-ables, as well as the moderation of those predictor or contributing variables by cooperationwith the mother and the perceived difficulty of the child.

The Custodial Fathers

In many respects, the custodial fathers differ from the fathers in the other two groups.They report being more involved with their children and coordinating less with their chil-dren’s mothers, and also report higher paternal self-efficacy and viewing their children asmore difficult than other fathers. These differences may potentially be explained by thesole responsibility that the custodial fathers bear for meeting their children’s needs.Unlike both married fathers and noncustodial divorced fathers, they cannot rely on themother to see to their children’s needs or share the task of childrearing with her. This isespecially so in Israel, where paternal custody is usually awarded only when the mother isdeemed incompetent as a parent (Hacker, 2005).

The custodial fathers’ perceived inability to rely on their children’s mother may alsoaccount for two differences between them and married fathers. One is that the tendencytoward avoidant caregiving reduced custodial fathers’ involvement with their children lessthan it did the involvement of the married fathers. The other is that whereas the involve-ment of married fathers was associated with their experience of care from their ownfathers that of custodial fathers was not. These findings suggest that as sole caregivers,even fathers who tend to display avoidant caregiving and lack a model of involved father-ing themselves (whether manifested as caring or control) cannot allow themselves not tobe involved with their children.

The findings also show that the custodial fathers reported more warmth than the mar-ried fathers but less than the noncustodial fathers. This finding may stem from the needof custodial fathers to serve as both parents (Cohen, Finzi-Dottan, & Tangir-Dotan, 2014).The finding that noncustodial fathers report more warmth than the other two groups domay be explained by their longing for their children, with whom they do not live, coupledwith their freedom from the daily tasks of childrearing (Amato & Dorius, 2010).

The custodial fathers’ relatively high levels of warmth and involvement should beparticularly noted in view of the fact that they were awarded custody due to the mothers’inability to take care of their children, and not because of their own competence orstrengths. The findings suggest that they certainly rose to the challenges of single parent-ing.

Contributions to Fathers’ Warmth and Involvement

Of the variables examined, the fathers’ personal features contributed most to both theirwarmth and involvement. Two of these features, paternal self-efficacy and avoidant care-giving, contributed to both. Fathers who reported greater paternal self-efficacy reportedgreater warmth and involvement; those who reported more avoidant caregiving reportedless warmth and involvement. Both these findings make intuitive sense and are consistentwith previous findings. As noted in the introduction, findings show that parental self-effi-cacy is associated with greater parental involvement with and encouraging, acceptingbehavior toward one’s children (Coleman & Karraker, 2000). Avoidant caregiving entailslimited warmth and involvement by definition (Shaver et al., 2010). The study findingsare consistent with findings of distancing strategies used by avoidant mothers to deal withparenting tasks (Berant, Mikulincer, & Florian, 2001).

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Perceived care from own father predicted greater paternal involvement. This finding isalso consistent with the findings reported in the introduction. It may be explained bysocial learning theory, which suggests that men learn fathering from the model of father-ing provided by their own fathers (Shears, Summers, Boller, & Barclay-McLaughlin,2006). It may also be that care from own fathers served as an emotional resource that gavethem the emotional capacity enabling their involvement.

However, avoidant caregiving predicted a much greater reduction in paternal involve-ment among married fathers than among custodial fathers. The reason is suggested byfindings showing that avoidant mothers of premature babies and babies with congenitalheart disease did not behave with avoidance in these situations (Berant et al., 2001; Spiel-man & Taubman-Ben-Ari, 2009). Like our findings, these too suggest that the child’s needand parent’s responsibility for the child may temper the manifestation of avoidant tenden-cies. The reduced warmth associated with anxious caregiving may be explained by thedistress of anxious parents (Shaver et al., 2010) and the preoccupation of anxious fatherswith their own worries and guilt feelings (George & Solomon, 2008).

Moderators of Fathers’ Warmth and Involvement

Consistent with the study hypotheses, both coordination with the child’s mother andperceived difficulty of the child moderated the relationship between fathers’ personal fea-tures and their paternal behavior in all three groups. Coordination with the child’smother, which predicted paternal involvement in general, predicted even more enhancedinvolvement of noncustodial fathers. As measured in this study, coordination was amutual process, involving both parents’ ease of coordinating with respect to the children;the mothers’ willingness to help raise the children; the fathers’ readiness to take care ofthe children when the mother had difficulties doing so, and his asking her for help whenneeded. The finding that coparenting coordination predicted enhanced involvementamong all three groups of fathers is consistent with repeated findings showing the closeassociation between coparental cooperation and father involvement (Cannon et al., 2008).The special importance of coordination in the involvement of noncustodial fathers reflectsthe fact that it is in this group that coordination is most needed. More than that of fathersin the other two groups, the relationship between noncustodial fathers and their childrendepends on the mothers’ willingness to allow and facilitate it.

Perceived child difficulty contributed to a more negative relationship between avoidantcaregiving and warmth. Among fathers whose caregiving was avoidant, the more difficultthey considered the child, the more avoidance and less warmth they reported. This findingconcurs with other studies indicating that fathers are more likely to “back off” from chil-dren who are difficult and get into trouble (Ganiban et al., 2011). With this, the cross-sectional design of the study makes the direction of the associations impossible todetermine with certainty. As pointed out in the introduction, children with variousdevelopmental disorders may have difficult temperaments. However, it may also be thatchildren who do not receive adequate parental warmth become difficult. As the literaturepoints out, lack of parental warmth may result in anger, fear, frustration, depression, andconduct disorders (Rohner & Veneziano, 2001). Moreover, our correlational findingssuggest that perceived child difficulty is anchored, at least in part, in the fathers’ ownpersonality features and parental competence. Fathers who viewed their own fathers asmore controlling and who reported more anxious caregiving tended to perceive theirchildren as more difficult, while fathers who reported greater parental self-efficacy tendedto perceive their children as less difficult.

The fact that the study was carried out in Israel raises questions about the impact ofIsrael’s family norms on the findings. The family is considered important in Israel (Cohen,

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2003), and although childcare is primarily viewed as the mothers’ responsibility fathersare by no means distant, uninvolved. They are expected to participate in childcare, andtend to spend a good deal of their leisure time with their children (Shamgar-Hendelm &Bar-Yosef, 1991). However, these features of Israeli society would affect the behavior of allthree groups of fathers; they do not explain the differences between the custodial andother fathers. Moreover, as paternal custody is assigned when the mother is deemed unfit,the legal basis of paternal custody does not explain the findings either.

The study findings are consistent with Belsky’s (1984) model of parenting determinants(Belsky, 1984). Its findings on the role of the perceived care and control of the participants’own fathers are consistent with Belsky’s intergenerational perspective, which claims thatthe parenting one received helps to shape the parenting one practices. Its findings on self-perceived paternal caregiving and self-efficacy support the theoretical claim that parents’personal psychological resources and functioning are the major factors in shaping parent-ing. The indication that coordination with the child’s mother contributes to paternalinvolvement is also consistent with the model’s claim that parenting is responsive tocontextual stresses. The finding that the perceived difficulty of the child is associated withreduced involvement among avoidant fathers is consistent with the idea that parenting isaffected by the child’s temperament.

Limitations, Contributions, and Recommendations for Further Study

The study contains some methodological limitations. Two pertain to the samplingmethod: The lack of organized data on divorced fathers in Israel compelled us to rely on aconvenience sample; moreover, as we did not have the resources to track recruitment dataacross the 150 social workers who enlisted the fathers for the study, we could not provideprecise rates of participation. Four further limitations pertain to the instruments used inthe study: (1) All the instruments are self-report questionnaires, which are subject toresponse bias; (2) The parental bonding instrument is retrospective, which means that thefathers’ recollections of the parenting they received may be influenced by their currentstate of mind; (3) The fathers reported their involvement and warmth toward their chil-dren in general; it cannot be ruled out that their behaviors and emotions differ from childto child, varying with the child’s gender, age, and other qualities, as well as the father’sstage in life; and (4) The coparental coordination questionnaire was designed to assesscooperation between divorced spouses and was adopted for the married fathers’ group aswell.

Yet, another limitation has to do with the order in which the questionnaires were com-pleted. All the questionnaires were completed in the same order; to determine whetherearlier questionnaires influenced the respondents’ answers to later ones, some question-naires should have been given to participants in a different order.

These limitations notwithstanding, the study provides information about a littlestudied but ever-growing group of fathers. Its findings suggest that custodial fathersare a distinct group that differs from both married and nonresidential divorced fathers.The findings also provide support for Belsky’s ecological model of parenting, whichmaintains that parenting is influenced by the parent’s personal features, contextual fea-tures, and characteristics of the child. Finally, the conceptual model of parenting devel-oped in the study can be applied to and tested among fathers in diverse populations andsituations.

Further study outside of Israel is recommended to determine the generalizability of thefindings to other countries. Such studies should add the perspectives of the children andmothers to that of the fathers, and also consider the contribution of socioeconomic factors.It is also recommended to examine a larger number of variables in each category.

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Clinical and Policy Implications

The findings point to the distinctiveness of custodial fathers, at least in this sample. Asstated above, they are more involved with their children, coordinate less with their chil-dren’s mothers, and view their children as more difficult than other fathers do. Thesedifferences suggest that their parenting task is heavier than that of other fathers, andthat they receive less help and cooperation carrying it out. We recommend that ways befound to alleviate some of the burden. One way might be to encourage Internet supportgroups in which custodial fathers can discuss the challenges they face with others insimilar situation. Such groups may be of particular use to those who, like custodialfathers, are strapped for time and reluctant to leave their children at home alone or with ababysitter (Cohen et al., 2014). Another way might be to raise awareness in schools of thepossibility that children of custodial fathers face difficulties that their peers from intactfamilies or maternal custody do not. The findings on the positive associations of paternalself-efficacy with paternal involvement also have practical significance: They suggest thatthis quality might be given special consideration in custody decisions (Emery, Rowen, &Dinescu, 2014), and also that any intervention with custodial fathers should attempt tofoster their paternal self-efficacy.

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