What is it about?
It is based on interviews with nascent fathers during pregnancy and afterwards when the child was one and half years old. Many of them described their transition to fatherhood as a hazy and misty process, with relatively minor impact on their life. Their experiences contrasted sharply with experiences of their partners and mothers of their child. Different cultural roles of mothers and fathers provide different framing of transition to parenthood, and therefore different experiences were described. I suggest that the hazy transition to fatherhood involves patriarchy, the breadwinner role and the central worker identity, while the distinct transition to fatherhood entails equality, involved fatherhood and the central father identity.
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Why is it important?
Experiences of first time fathers on their way to fatherhood have been overlooked.
Perspectives
This article brings findings from the research focused on parenthood generally. We studied parental couples, not only the fathers or the mothers. I consider this important. Concept of hazy transition to fatherhood have been developed due to a sharp distinction between descriptions about transition to parenthood by the fathers when compared with descriptions provided by the mothers.
Olga Nesporova
Research Institute for Labour and Social Affairs
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Hazy Transition to Fatherhood: The Experiences of Czech Fathers, Journal of Family Issues, October 2018, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/0192513x18806028.
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