Stay-at-home dads on the up
Stay-at-home dads on the up - an award from the National Children’s Research Centre will help Dr Abigail Locke to continue her work on the phenomenon of the stay-at-home dad.
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 14:15:00 GMT
New research into the UK’s stay-at-home dads now underway
THE stay-at-home dad is here to stay. But how much have attitudes truly changed? Is there still prejudice against fathers who quit work to care for children while mothers become the main breadwinners? A University of Huddersfield expert has won funding for her research into what is seen as a major shift in the conventions of parenting.
An award from the National Children’s Research Centre will help Dr Abigail Locke (pictured right) to continue her work on the phenomenon of the stay-at-home dad.
“I am really interested in societal discourses on fatherhood. We have dads who aren’t providing in terms of money, but they are providing in terms of nurture, care and time, which can be seen as going against the traditional norms of fatherhood,” said Dr Locke, who is a Reader in Applied Social Psychology at the University of Huddersfield.
She has already conducted a substantial investigation into media attitudes, by combing the last six years of national press reports and comment on the subject. Negative stereotypes can still be found.
“There is still some stigma attached to stay-at-home dads, but the scope of parenting is changing,” said Dr Locke, who gives a wide-ranging overview of the subject at a public lecture taking place on Wednesday 19 February entitled From ‘Feckless Fathers’ to ‘Dynamic Dads’: Fatherhood in Contemporary British Culture.
The picture is a complex one, admits Dr Locke, with figures for the number of stay-at-home dads in modern Britain hard to establish – although one estimate places it at one-in-seven. There are also difficulties of definition. For example, is a father who works from home a stay-at-home dad?
Also, social class may play a role. Working class fathers may have more traditional ideas of masculinity, but have also contributed a lot to childcare. For example, shift work has often enabled them to care for children or take part in the school-run.
“In the middle class, it tends to be more of a deliberate decision that a father is going to stop working while his partner pursues her career, so that the stay-at-home father role is seen as more of a job,” said Dr Locke.
Also, the financial crisis and the recession played a role, although Dr Locke disputes the idea that it was a “mancession” that afflicted fathers disproportionately.
She believes that the trends towards stay-at-home fathers will continue to evolve.
“Ideas about the so-called crisis of masculinity are debatable, because men are actually doing very well in jobs. But women are getting more equality in the workplace and as a result, this is moving to more equality at home, where men are doing more.”
Dr Locke’s National Children’s Research Centre grant will enable her to build on the findings from the media analysis to looking at how men undertaking a large role in their children’s care, reflect on their experiences.
- The free lecture From ‘Feckless Fathers’ to ‘Dynamic Dads’: Fatherhood in Contemporary British Culture takes place in the University’s Sir George Buckley Lecture Theatre on Wednesday 19 February at 6.30pm. More details from b.golding@hud.ac.uk.
