Stage 2: Survey

Understanding the characteristics and consequences of fathers’ recurrence through the father survey and secondary data linkage

To bridge the gap between the aggregate patterns ‘on the top’ and individual experiences ‘on the ground’, we propose to establish a new nationally representative survey by accessing fathers attending formal pre-proceedings meetings with the local authority. This survey will help establish a more fine-grained understanding of fathers in first and recurrent care proceedings and enable us to examine the socio-economic, emotional and wellbeing consequences of recurrence for the fathers, when analysed in comparison with secondary data (i.e. Understanding Society) on the general population. Furthermore, we will request consent from fathers for future data linkage, as part of a feasibility exercise incidental to this survey.

In this stage, we will address the following research questions:

  • What are the characteristics of fathers within first and repeat appearances in care proceedings?
  • How do fathers in care proceedings compare to the general demographic, using the Understanding Society survey data as the benchmark? (social, cultural and economic characteristics, mental wellbeing, life aspiration, etc.)

Sampling strategy

Our objective is to generate a current, representative sample of fathers in both first and recurrent care proceedings in England. Although our over-arching focus is on recurrent fathers, it is important to also sample fathers in first proceedings as a reference group to understand which fathers are ‘recycled’ in family courts, and whether and how first occurrence and recurrence may influence fathers in similar or different ways. We aim to achieve a final sample size of 424 fathers. Fathers will be sampled from 22 local authorities across England over a 7-month period from November 2017 to May 2018.

Questionnaire

The design of the father survey questionnaire will draw on three sources. First, results from Stage 1 of this project and the Nuffield funded project on recurrent mothers led by Broadhurst will be used to identify crucial informational gaps in the Cafcass Case Management System that may be relevant to the study of fathers’ recurrence. Second, our instruments will be adopted and adapted from the largest nationally representative social survey in the UK, the UK Household Longitudinal Survey (aka. Understanding Society), which contains a rich battery of measures on family relations, parenthood, care provision, child and youth development. The inclusion of identical instruments from Understanding Society in our survey will enable us to conduct comparative analyses of fathers in first and recurrent care proceedings against the general population in Understanding Society (as a control group). Third, we will draw on theoretical insights from previous research, and particularly Lancaster University’s research on recurrent mothers  and the University of East Anglia’s team’s ongoing project on fathers in child protection.