Department of Human Development and Family Science.
Department of Preventive Medicine.
Dev Psychol. 2020 Aug;56(8):1496-1508. doi: 10.1037/dev0000929.
Father involvement contributes uniquely to children's developmental outcomes. The antecedents of father involvement among unmarried, African American fathers from rural areas, however, have been largely overlooked. The present study tested a conceptual model linking retrospective reports of childhood trauma and early adulthood social instability to father involvement among unmarried, African American men living in resource-poor, rural communities in the southeastern United States. We hypothesized these factors would influence father involvement indirectly, via DNA methylation of the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR). A sample of 192 fathers participated in 3 waves of data collection in early adulthood. Fathers reported on social instability at Wave 1; OXTR methylation was assessed via saliva samples at Wave 2; and measures of father involvement, retrospective childhood trauma, and quality of the fathers' relationships with their children's mothers were collected at Wave 3. Structural equation modeling indicated that childhood trauma was related directly to reduced levels of father involvement and to increased social instability. Social instability was associated with elevated levels of OXTR methylation, which in turn predicted decreased father involvement. The indirect effect from social instability to father involvement via OXTR methylation was significant. These associations did not operate through fathers' relationship with the child's mother and remained significant even accounting for associations between interparental relationship quality and father involvement. Findings suggest that OXTR methylation might be a biological mechanism linking social instability to father involvement among unmarried, African American fathers in vulnerable contexts and underscore the detrimental influence of childhood trauma on father involvement. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).
父亲的参与对孩子的发展结果有独特的贡献。然而，在来自农村地区的未婚非裔美国父亲中，父亲参与的先前因素在很大程度上被忽视了。本研究测试了一个概念模型，该模型将儿童时期创伤和成年早期社会不稳定的回顾性报告与生活在美国东南部资源匮乏的农村社区的未婚非裔美国男性的父亲参与联系起来。我们假设这些因素会通过催产素受体基因 (OXTR) 的 DNA 甲基化间接影响父亲的参与。192 名父亲参加了成年早期的 3 波数据收集。父亲们在第 1 波报告社会不稳定；在第 2 波通过唾液样本评估 OXTR 甲基化；在第 3 波收集父亲参与度、儿童时期创伤的回顾性以及父亲与孩子母亲关系的质量的测量。结构方程模型表明，儿童时期创伤与父亲参与度的降低以及社会不稳定的增加直接相关。社会不稳定与 OXTR 甲基化水平升高有关，而 OXTR 甲基化水平升高又与父亲参与度降低有关。社会不稳定通过 OXTR 甲基化对父亲参与度的间接影响是显著的。这些关联不是通过父亲与孩子母亲的关系运作的，即使考虑到父母关系质量与父亲参与度之间的关联，这些关联仍然是显著的。研究结果表明，OXTR 甲基化可能是将社会不稳定与脆弱环境中未婚非裔美国父亲的父亲参与联系起来的生物学机制，并强调了儿童时期创伤对父亲参与的不利影响。（PsycInfo 数据库记录（c）2020 APA，保留所有权利）。
