Involvement in Pregnancy can Make Men Failures in Parenting

A Brit researcher has said that men who involve themselves in their partner's pregnancy and are present at the time of childbirth can jeopardise the father-child relationship later in life. Dr Jonathan Ives of the Centre for Biomedical Ethics at the University of Birmingham rubbishes the "false, modern rhetoric of equal involvement that has sprung up around parenting."

Dr Ives, who is leading a two-year study titled The Moral Habitus of Fatherhood, believes men who feel obliged to become actively involved in pregnancies are left with a sense of failure and self-doubt as they realise they can offer only passive support to their partners.

"Having begun the fathering role already feeling a failure may destroy his confidence," the Telegraph quoted Dr Ives, as telling the Guardian.

He added: "It can then be very difficult for him to regain faith in himself once the baby is born and move from that passive state to being a proactive father. His role in the family is no longer clear to him. He effectively becomes deskilled as a parent and this can lead to problems bonding with the child.

"We're not trying to undermine the progress that has been made encouraging male involvement, but we want to query what kind of involvement men can have and for society to admit that some varieties of male involvement might not be justified."

Source-ANI