Dr Helen Norman provides expert commentary on BBC Radio 4
Dr Helen Norman provides expert commentary on the impact of fathers being involved with their children in the first year of life.
During the episode of BBC Radio 4’s Analysis programme released on 14 November 2022, Professor Tina Miller (Sociology, Oxford Brookes University) asks to what extent women are still trapped by society and its structures. But as she finds out, the roles can be reversed in much later life. She asks what needs to change for men to take on more caring responsibility earlier.
Dr Helen Norman shares her findings from the analysis of family data collected in the millennium cohort study:
If fathers are involved in the first year of a child’s life, they are more likely to be involved as the child gets older, say up to age 3. This suggests that providing the opportunity for fathers to take time off work to engage with their children in that first year sets up a pattern of involved caregiving that persists, as the child gets older.
