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Articles

Shift work, father engagement, and the cognitive development of young children

Pages 133-150 | Received 10 Oct 2016, Accepted 07 Nov 2017, Published online: 01 Mar 2018
 

ABSTRACT

The present study investigates whether the effect of fathers’ positive engagement on young children’s cognitive development is accentuated when one or both dual-earner parents is employed during nonstandard hours. Longitudinal regression models are fitted to three waves of nationally representative data from the Early Child Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort. Father engagement when children are nine months old has an especially positive effect on children’s cognitive ability at age two when the father works during the day and the mother has a fixed evening or night shift. There are no interactions between shift work and engagement at age two in the whole sample, but subgroup analyses show that engagement has an especially strong effect on children who have a non-parent caregiver if both parents are shift workers. The results highlight the important role fathers play in couples with a shift worker, and provide a rationale for efforts to encourage and support their involvement.

RESUMEN

El presente estudio investiga si el efecto de la involucración positiva de los padres en el desarrollo cognitivo de los niños pequeños se acentúa cuando uno o ambos padres de doble ingreso se emplean durante horas no estándar. Los modelos de regresión longitudinal se ajustan a tres ondas de datos representativos a nivel nacional del Estudio Longitudinal del Niño y la Cohorte de Nacimiento. La involucración del padre cuando los niños tienen nueve meses tiene un efecto especialmente positivo en la capacidad cognitiva de los niños a los dos años cuando el padre trabaja durante el día y la madre tiene un turno de tarde o de noche fijo. No hay interacciones entre el trabajo por turnos y la involucración a los dos años en toda la muestra, pero los análisis de subgrupos muestran que la involucración tiene un efecto especialmente fuerte en los niños que tienen un cuidador que no es un padre si ambos padres son trabajadores por turnos. Los resultados ponen de relieve el importante papel que juegan los padres en las parejas con un trabajador por turnos, y proporcionan un fundamento para los esfuerzos para alentar y apoyar su participación.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Matthew Weinshenker is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Fordham University in Bronx, NY. His research focuses on fatherhood and on work–family issues in the contemporary United States.

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