Influence of father support on parenting stress and behavior among adolescent mothers

Data from the Fragile Families Year 1 and 3 Core Study and In-Home Survey (N = 223\ud mother-father dyads with complete data) were used to examine the relations among\ud father support, maternal parenting stress and behavior, and behavior problems of\ud children born to adolescent mothers. It was hypothesized that (a) father support will\ud predict maternal parenting stress, (b) maternal parenting stress will predict spanking, (c)\ud spanking will predict child behavior problems, and (d) father support will predict child\ud behavior problems. Regression analyses indicated that (a) interactions between Year 1\ud father support and parenting stress predicted Year 3 parenting stress; (b) Year 1\ud parenting stress did not predict Year 3 spanking; (c) Year 2 spanking did not predict\ud Year 3 behavior problems; (d) interactions between Year 1 father support and parenting\ud stress predicted Year 3 child behavior problems. The implications for adolescent parent\ud research and prevention are discussed