Self‐perceived Coparenting of Nonresident Fathers: Scale Development and Validation

• Author: Jessica Pearson,Natasha Cabrera,Jay Fagan,W. Justin Dyer,Rebecca Kaufman
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12331
• Date: 01 December 2018
• Published date: 01 December 2018

Self-perceived Coparenting of Nonresident Fathers:

Scale Development and Validation

W. JUSTIN DYER*

JAY FAGAN

†

REBECCA KAUFMAN

†

JESSICA PEARSON

‡

NATASHA CABRERA

§

This study reports on the development and validation of the Fatherhood Research and

Practice Network coparenting perceptions scale for nonresident fathers. Although other

measures of coparenting have been developed, this is the first measure developed specifi-

cally for low-income, nonresident fathers. Focus groups were conducted to determine vari-

ous aspects of coparenting. Based on this, a scale was created and administered to 542

nonresident fathers. Participants also responded to items used to examine convergent and

predictive validity (i.e., parental responsibility, contact with the mother, father self-efficacy

and satisfaction, child behavior problems, and contact and engagement with the child).

Factor analyses and reliability tests revealed three distinct and reliable perceived coparent -

ing factors: undermining, alliance, and gatekeeping. Validity tests suggest substantial

overlap between the undermining and alliance factors, though undermining was uniquely

related to child behavior problems. The alliance and gatekeeping factors show ed strong

convergent validity and evidence for predictive validity. Taken together, results suggest

this relatively short measure (11 items) taps into three coparenting dimensions signifi-

cantly predictive of aspects of individual and family life.

Keywords: Coparenting; Measurement; Validation; Nonresident Fathers; Low-income

Fathers

Fam Proc 57:927–946, 2017

The rising rates of nonmarital childbearing among low-income individuals over the past

few decades (Cherlin, 2010) have been associated with large numbers of fathers not

residing in the same household as their children and the mothers of their children (Amato,

2005). Despite not living together, many of these fathers share parenting responsibilities

(i.e., coparent) with the mother (Cabrera, Ryan, Mitchell, Shannon, & Tamis-LeMonda,

2008). Still, coparenting relationships in nonresident father families are often complex

with a substantial number of fathers struggling to be involved in the family system,

including the coparenting relationship.

Coparenting is typically defined as “shared activity undertaken by those adults respon-

sible for the care and upbringing of children” (McHale & Irace, 2011, p. 16) involving tri-

adic exchanges in that they are at the nexus of the mother–father–child system (McHale &

*Brigham Young University, Provo, UT.

†

Temple University, Philadelphia, PA.

‡

Center for Policy Research, Denver, CO.

§

University of Maryland, College Park, MD.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to W. Justin Dyer, Brigham Young Univer-

sity, Provo, UT 84602. E-mail: wjd@byu.edu.

927

Family Process, Vol. 57, No. 4, 2018 ©2017 Family Process Institute

doi: 10.1111/famp.12331

Coates, 2014). Researchers, practitioners, and policymakers have become increasingly

interested in the coparenting of low-income nonresident parents, largely because copar-

enting relationships tend to deteriorate over time. This is unfortunate given the impor-

tance of healthy coparenting for the children and overall family system (see Mangelsdorf,

Laxman, & Jessee, 2011).

Indeed, studies have shown that nonresident fathers are less likely to be involved with

their children when the coparenting relationship is weak (Carlson, McLanahan, &

Brooks-Gunn, 2008; Futris & Schoppe-Sullivan, 2007). From a clinical perspective, Ahrons

(2007) notes that, for divorced parents: “It is sobering ... to hear how their behavior—not

the divorce per se, but the quality of their coparenting—continues to echo throughout the

family system” (p. 63).

One significant hindrance to research in this area is the lack of quantitative coparent-

ing measures developed and validated for low-income, nonresident parents. With the

exception of one measure focused on divorced families (e.g., Ahrons, 1981), most available

coparenting measures have been developed for co-residing parents (Feinberg, Brown, &

Kan, 2012; Hock & Mooradian, 2012; McHale & Fivaz-Depeursinge, 2010). Further, recent

research has stressed the need to examine multiple dimensions of coparenting for nonresi-

dent fathers (Fagan & Kaufman, 2015). Indeed, a monolithic approach to coparenting

likely misses crucial aspects of the coparenting relationship, each with unique family ante-

cedents and outcomes.

This paper describes the development and validation of a new, multidimensional mea-

sure of low-income, nonresident fathers’ perceptions of their coparenting with their child’s

biological mother. This will enable researchers and practitioners to extend primary

research on these fathers as well as to better assess program impacts (though still with

the caveats of self-reported data; e.g., Dyer, Day, & Harper, 2014).

THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS

McHale (2007) notes that although children are almost ubiquitously raised in “multi-

person relationship systems” (p. 370), the parent–child dyad has remained the foci of

research. However, family systems theory has long acknowledged that development is best

understood in the context of a whole family system which is made up of interdependent

subsystems (Cox, Paley, & Harter, 2001; Minuchin, 1988). Coparenting is a key subsys tem

and, when functioning well (e.g., high support, coordination, and low conflict), has positive

impacts on other subsystems and the individuals within those systems (see above).

A number of early coparenting studies focused on parenting coordination of those

divorced/separated (Maccoby, Depner, & Mnookin, 1991). This focus was justified given

that a poorer functioning marital/partner subsystem is negatively related to the copar ent-

ing subsystem (Stroud, Durbin, Wilson, & Mendelsohn, 2011). With a deterioration of

coparenting, many nonresident fathers experience a negative spillover to the father–child

relationship as their parenting role diminishes (Carlson et al., 2008; Formoso, Gonzales,

Barrera, & Dumka, 2007; Martin, Sturge-Apple, Davies, Romero, & Buckholz, 2017;

Stroud et al., 2011). In other words, a deteriorating marital/partner system may strain

the coparenting system, which, in turn, may strain parent–child systems. Bronfenbren-

ner’s (1999) ecological systems theory can also be used to conceptualize the role of the

coparenting subsystem for nonresident parents. This theory proposes that development

transpires during proximal processes which occur within the child’s immediate environ-

ment (i.e., a “microsystem”). The interaction between the child’s various microsystems is

referred to as the “mesosystem.” The better those who are in the child’s various microsys-

tems coordinate (i.e., the more efficient the mesosystem), the better the proxim al process

of each microsystem can be tailored toward positive development. For nonresident

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