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January
Fathers and Daughyters: Eye Opening Facts
We strengthen father-daughter relationships by
making ourselves aware of the facts and freeing
ourselves from the demeaning myths about men as
parents. Recent national statistics and research
from the most well respected experts in psychology
and sociology, show
that……….
Fathers generally have as much or more impact as
mothers in the following areas of their
daughters’ lives: (1) achieving academic and
career success—especially in math and science
(2) creating a loving, trusting relationship with a
man (3) dealing well with people in
authority—especially men (4) Being
self-confident and self-reliant (5) Being willing
to try new things and to accept challenges (6)
Maintaining good mental health (no clinical
depression, eating disorders, or chronic anxiety)
(7) Expressing anger comfortably and
appropriately—especially with men
Because our society emphasizes the importance of
mother-daughter relationships more than
father-daughter relationships, most fathers and
daughters do not ever get to know one another as
well or spend as much time together throughout
their lives as most mothers and daughters.
Most children’s books, TV programs, and
movies send the message that fathers and daughters
are not supposed to know each other as well or
spend as much time together as mothers and
daughters.
Daughters who are raised by single fathers are
just as well adjusted and as happy as daughters
raised by single mothers.
Fathers and daughters are usually closer when
the mother works full time outside the home while
the children are growing up.
Most fathers want to spend more time with their
children, but can’t because of their jobs.
Realities: (1) Eighty percent of the fathers in
our country earn most of the money for their
families. (2) Counting the time spent commuting,
working, doing house and yard work, and being with
the kids, the average father has 5 hours less free
time each week than the average employed mother.
(3) On average, employed fathers work 10 more hours
a week than employed mothers.
A father usually has a closer relationship with
his daughter when the mother lets everyone in the
family know how much she appreciates his ways of
parenting—especially if his way of parenting
isn’t exactly like hers.
A daughter has a better relationship with her
father when her mother does not rely on her for
advice or comfort on adult issues—especially
issues involving the parents’ relationship
with each other.
When parents are unhappily married or divorced,
the daughter is more likely to side with her mother
and against her father.
Some mothers feel uncomfortable or jealous with
the idea that their daughter might share as much
time or as much personal information with her
father as she does with her mother.
The mother who had a distant or unloving
relationship with her own father is usually more
jealous and more unsupportive of her
daughter’s having a close relationship with
her father.
©2008 Dr. Linda
Nielsen
See Books,
Issues,
Resources
* * *
It is easier for a father to have children than
for children to have a real father. Pope John
XXIII
Dr. Nielsen
has been teaching, counseling, conducting research
and writing about adolescents and father-daughter
relationships since 1970. A member of Phi Beta
Kappa and the recipient of the outstanding
graduate's award in teacher education from the
University of Tennessee in 1969, she taught and
counseled high school students for several years.
After earning a Master's Degree in Counseling and a
Doctorate in Educational and Adolescent Psychology,
she joined the faculty of Wake Forest University in
1974. Her grants and awards include the Outstanding
Article Award in 1980 from the U.S. Center for
Women Scholars and a postdoctoral fellowship from
the American Association of University Women. For
the past fifteen years she has focused primarily on
father-daughter relationships with a special
emphasis on divorced fathers and their daughters.
Her work has been cited in the "Wall Street
Journal" as well as in popular magzines such as
"Cosmopolitan", and shared through television and
radio interviews..
In 1991 she created her "Fathers
& Daughters" course - the only college course
in the country that focuses exclusively on
father-daughter relationships. In addition to
having written several dozen articles for journals
such as the "Harvard Educational Review" and the
"Journal of Divorce & Remarriage", Dr. Nielsen
has written three books: How to Motivate
Adolescents (Prentice Hall) and Adolescence: A
Contemporary View (Harcourt Brace) which sold more
than 60,000 copies and was adopted by hundreds of
universities throughout the country and abroad
between 1986-1996. Her third book, Embracing
Your Father: Creating the Relationship You Want
with Your Dad was
published in April, 2004. www.wfu.edu/~nielsen
or E-Mail
* * *
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