Difference Between Black And White Fathers

Submitted By Tom-HornBlow
Words: 467
Pages: 2

Fatherly involvement decreases dramatically among both black and white fathers when they are no longer living with their children. Many fathers have limited relationships with their non-custodial children, as Pew Foundation and CDC surveys have confirmed. More than one half of men reported that they had not shared a meal with their non-custodial children in the last four weeks, while nearly two-thirds had not read to their children four years old and younger, and three quarters had not done homework with their children five to 18 years old. But there is a problem: The same data show a dramatic difference in the share of black and white fathers who did not live with their children. Among white children five to 18 years old, 21.6 percent live in a fatherless household; the figure for black children is 42 percent. Among children up to four years of age, the figures are 9.2 percent for whites but 31.4 percent for blacks. These racial differences reflect the much larger share of black than white women who have children with more than one partner. Sociologist Cassandra Dorius has estimated that, over their lifetimes, 59 percent of African-American mothers, 35 percent of Hispanic mothers, and 22 percent of white mothers will have given birth to children by more than one father. Many studies document how a child’s abandonment by his father leads to serious education and behavioral problems. Maltreatment of children in a household with a single mother is three times more likely when she lives with a man other than the child’s father than when no man is present. In single-mother households without a man, child-maltreatment rates are actually lower among blacks than among whites. Where a partner is present, however, the rates on all three measures of child maltreatment — emotional, physical, and endangerment — in black