Spending Quality Time With Dads Deters Daughters From Engaging in Risky Sexual Activity, Study Shows
Spending quality time with their fathers lessens the propensity of young women to engage in risky sexual activity, according to a study released last month.
The research, published in the journal Developmental Psychology and reported in the University of Utah website, adds to previous studies that highlight the importance of fathering for daughters, according to Christian Headlines.
Previous studies linking a father's involvement and his daughters' sexual behavior attributed the influence to shared genes.
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But a new study led by a University of Utah researcher suggests that even though genes may play a part, there are other factors involved.
The researchers used as subjects two kinds of families—intact and with divorced parents—each of them with two biological sisters, at least four years apart. In the case of the divorced or separated parents, the split happened before the younger sister turned 14.
The results suggest a link between the behavior of a father and his daughters' experiences. They show that different amounts of exposure to their fathers change the social environments of the young women that impact on their sexual behavior.
The researchers concluded that a quality relationship with a father significantly influences the behavior of his daughter when it comes to risky sex.
"It's not enough for a dad to just be in the home," said Danielle J. DelPriore, a post-doctoral fellow in the University of Utah's department of psychology and lead author of the study.
"The prolonged presence of a warm and engaged father can buffer girls against early, high-risk sex," said DelPriore, according to the The Wall Street Journal.
The researchers noted that it was the quality time that a father spent at home with his daughters that made the biggest impact. When the influence and presence of the father was positive, his older daughter—who spent more time with her father—delayed sexual activity and spent less time with sexually risk-prone peers.
However, a distant and cold father seemed to have a negative impact on his daughter even though he spent a similar amount of time with her.
"It's all about dosage of exposure to dads; the bigger the dose, the more fathering matters—for better and for worse," Bruce Ellis of the University of Utah, another researcher involved in the study, said.
