Study: Good Parenting by Dads Decreases Risky Sexual Behaviour by Daughters

The father – daughter bond is special. Young girls are often seen as Daddy’s little girl, and fathers are always guilty of allowing their little princesses to wrap them around their fingers. It’s no doubt that a girl’s relationship with her father greatly influences her decisions in relationships, as she grows up – good, bad or ugly.

A recent study published in the journal Development and Psychopathology studied the impact of the father-daughter relationship on sexual behaviours of girls. They found that girls who did not have a good relationship with their father engaged in risky sexual activities. These activities included sex without a condom, having sex while intoxicated, multiple sexual partners and becoming pregnant before age 19.

“Girls who receive lower quality fathering tend to engage in more risky sexual behavior in adolescence. We know that poor fathering and daughters’ risky sexual behavior go together, but we haven’t known why and haven’t known how. Our study was meant to figure out that issue,” says Bruce J. Ellis, the study’s lead author and the John and Doris Norton Endowed Chair in Fathers, Parenting, and Families at the UA Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences.

They monitored 59 pairs of sisters of divorced families where the father had moved out and compared them with 42 pairs of sisters from families that were still together. As well as examined whether length of exposure had any impact.

“It turned out that it didn’t matter that much how long each daughter lived with her father, but rather what he did when he was there,” said Ellis.

However, the more time spent with a father with poor parenting skills, actually increased risky sexual behaviour. While the longer time spent with a good Dad did reduce risky sexual behaviour.