Parenting And Children'S Negative Emotionality, Self-Regulation, And Academic Skills: The Moderating Role Of Fathers' Residency

We examined whether fathers' residency modified the associations among mothers' supportiveness, father involvement, children's negative emotionality during toddlerhood and children's academic skills in pre-kindergarten via children's self-regulation. Participants were 2,291 mothers (M-age = 23.24 years) and children (M-age = 14.99 months at Wave 1; 50.7% girls) in the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project. Results revealed distinctive associations by fathers' residency: self-regulation mediated the association between mothers' supportiveness and academic skills only in resident-father-families. Self-regulation mediated the association between negative emotionality and academic skills only in nonresident-father-families. The findings highlight the family processes of mothers, fathers, and children in low-income family contexts that contribute to children's academic skills, and how those family processes may vary by fathers' residency status.