Science is the process of querying nature to find the truth.
Apparently, what we all know is the truth: fatherlessness has a pretty strong tendency to make boys into criminals.
From the study:
The study, undertaken by the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research at the Faculty of Business and Economics, found that the presence of a father figure during adolescence was most likely to have a preventive effect on whether male youths engage in risk-taking and deviant behaviour.
While active involvement and interaction between fathers and youths was found to be beneficial, it did not explain the positive benefits of children who grow up with fathers in the household.
“The sense of security generated by the presence of a male role model in a youth‟s life has protective effects for a child, regardless of the degree of interaction between the child and father,” Professor Deborah Cobb-Clark, Director of the Melbourne Institute said.
“Fathers provide children with male role models and can influence children‟s preferences, values and attitudes, while giving them a sense of security and boosting their self-esteem. They also increase the degree of adult supervision at home, which may lead to a direct reduction of delinquent behaviour.”
Using American data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, three factors were studied in the role of fathers influencing youth delinquency: parental involvement and interaction, contribution to household income and engagement with a father figure by simply being present at home.
Unlike previous studies in the field, “Fathers and Youths‟ Delinquent Behaviour‟ which was co-authored by Professor Erdal Tekin from Georgia State University, examines the full range of father figure roles and modern family structures, Professor Cobb-Clark said.
“Our study included residential and non-residential, biological fathers and residential stepfathers and their influence on adolescent behaviours,” Professor Cobb-Clark said.
“We find that adolescent boys engage in more delinquency without a father figure in their lives. Adolescent girls‟ behaviours are less closely linked to this, which may be attributed to the inherent levels of risk-taking that vary between males and females.”
Additionally, higher family incomes were found to have little effects on solving the problems associated with youth delinquency.
The full study ‘Fathers and Youths’ Delinquent Behaviour’ is available for download at http://melbournein … p2011n23.pdf
I have great skepticism of studies in general. But studies that confirm every single thing I saw in eight years of criminal defense work sure are believable to me.
This study is believable to me as well, considering that it comports with decades of fatherhood research which shows that father absence is linked to male delinquency (among other things).
That’s precisely the problem with the lesbian-parenting “research.” It supposedly overthrows not only the accumulated experiences of professionals like yourself, but decades of fatherhood research. Well, now we know why there’s a discrepancy between these two bodies of literature…because the lesbian parenting research is flawed!
Thanks for sharing.
The religious right continues trying to use research on the success of children from “broken homes” to prove the “dangers” of same-sex parenting. Of course, they would never want to see studies done that would ACTUALLY be relevant – i.e. studies on the success children ACTUALLY raised by same-sex couples compared to those raised by opposite-sex couples – because they know their claims about the dangerous and scary gay people will be completely discredited. So they keep on citing totally unrelated data in attempt to justify their bigotry. Nothing new here….