Fatherhood as a Social Context for Reducing Men’s Health Disparities

Abstract

This chapter reviews the literature examining fatherhood as a critical social context for promoting men’s health across generations. It describes theoretical model and incorporate findings from research with nonresident African American fathers and sons to show connections between fatherhood and health from a community-based intergenerational health intervention. The chapter highlights how enhancing parenting and quality of relationships with sons can improve fathers’ health behaviors and mental health and shows how the benefits of father involvement can reduce sons’ health risk behavior. It discusses clinical service and policy issues with the potential to improve fathers’ involvement in the lives of their children. The chapter suggests the significance of community-based health programs centered around father engagement that are designed to achieve reciprocal benefits for men and boys as a promising new strategy for reducing men’s health disparities from an intergenerational perspective. It provides examples of findings that are based on tests of theoretical model that incorporates fathers’ health and mental health outcomes.

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