I was racing through the Washington Post this morning, trying to finish the A section before it was time to go into border collie mode and start nipping heels (who wants to go to school in June, anyway?), and came across a brief item [1] about a new government survey.
The National Center for Health Statistics surveyed about 4,900 men between the ages of 15 and 44. Based on the results, the researchers estimate about 28 million men have children under the age of 19, and that 75 percent live with at least some of those children.
They also found a clear connection between a father's level of education and his level of involvement with his children. More educated dads were more likely to read to their kids, bathe and change them, eat meals with them, and play with them. They were also much less likely to father a child outside of marriage...about 6 percent of college graduates had done so, compared to almost half of those who hadn't finished high school.
All very interesting, if somewhat basic, information.
A bit more interesting to me was the fact that this was the first time that this major survey, " target="_blank">the National Survey of Family Growth [2], actually bothered to include men. (It's been carried out since 1973.)
Remember when we all woke up to the fact, some years back, that all the medical research we'd been counting on to keep us safe from dangerous side effects of drugs or the cancer-causing properties of various chemicals had been carried out exclusively on men, as though men were the template for everyone else when it came to biology?
Women, I guess, have been the template for family life.
I hope the NCHS will keep on checking with men about their experiences of family life and fatherhood. Findings like these have clear and compelling policy implications -- such as providing more support for the idea that closing the education gap between men and women is important for the well-being of children.