Longitudinal Relations between Maternal Gatekeeping and Father Responsibility

The current study examined relations between child characteristics and father responsibility and maternal gatekeeping (mothers attempts to either limit or encourage fathers parenting) and father responsibility across the infants first year using self-report and observational data from 64 two-parent families. Results showed that child gender and temperament interacted in relation to father responsibility, such that fathers were more involved with difficult boys and less involved with difficult girls. Furthermore, positive and negative dimensions of maternal gatekeeping were related to different types of later father responsibility. Implications of these findings are discussed