Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Randomized Controlled Trial
. 2023 Jan;24(1):137-149.
doi: 10.1007/s11121-022-01451-8. Epub 2022 Nov 4.

The Effect of Dads Matter-HV on Father Engagement in Home Visiting Services

Jennifer L Bellamy  1 , Aaron Banman  2 , Justin S Harty  3 , Sandra Mirque-Morales  4 , James Jaccard  5 , Neil B Guterman  4
Affiliations
Randomized Controlled Trial

The Effect of Dads Matter-HV on Father Engagement in Home Visiting Services

Jennifer L Bellamy et al. Prev Sci. 2023 Jan.

Abstract

Engaging fathers early in child and family services has the potential to promote positive father contributions towards positive child development, improve family well-being, and enhance service outcomes over time. However, low father engagement in child and family services remains a persistent problem, and few interventions designed to improve father engagement in these services have been rigorously tested. The current study assesses the effect of a service enhancement intervention called Dads Matter-Home Visiting (Dads Matter-HV) on biological father engagement in home visiting services when compared to home visiting services delivered as usual. To assess the efficacy of the Dads Matter-HV intervention, the research team used a stratified cluster randomized clinical trial design with five agencies delivering early home visiting service programs. Seventeen teams across the five agencies were randomly assigned to either the control group condition (i.e., standard home visiting services as usual) or the intervention condition (i.e., Dads Matter-HV). Data were collected from a total of 204 families at baseline, 4 months postbaseline (92% retention rate), and 12 months postbaseline (84% retention rate). The results suggest that Dads Matter-HV increases biological father engagement for fathers who begin services in the postnatal period, but reduces engagement when services are initiated prenatally. Findings suggest some pathways through which the intervention effects engagement.

Keywords: Engagement; Fathers; Home visiting; Intervention; Randomized clinical trial.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Allison, P. D. (2012). Handling missing data by maximum likelihood. Paper 312–2012, SAS Global Forum: Statistics and Data Analysis. Statistical Horizons. https://statisticalhorizons.com/wp-content/uploads/MissingDataByML.pdf
    1. Amato, P. R., & Gilbreth, J. G. (1999). Nonresident fathers and children’s well-being: A meta-analysis. Journal of Marriage and Family, 61, 557–573. https://doi.org/10.2307/353560 - DOI
    1. Asparouhov, T., & Muthén, B. (2005). Multivariate statistical modeling with survey data. In Proceedings of the FCMS 2005 research conference. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.159.4286&re...
    1. Bellamy, J. L., Banman, A., & Guterman, N. B. (2021a). Dads Matter-HV: Manual for Home Visitors. Denver, CO: Dads Matter-HV.
    1. Bellamy, J. L., Harty, J. S., Banman, A. & Guterman, N. B. (2021b). Engaging fathers in perinatal home visiting: Early lessons from a randomized control study of Dads Matter-HV. In J. J. Fagan, J. Pearson (Eds.), New research on parenting programs for low-income fathers. Routledge.

Publication types