Engagement of Teenage Mother’s Partner in Child Health Development

The purpose of this study is to describe the engagement of partners of teenage mothers in the child health development. Using a cross-sectional research design, 73 couples were chosen purposively based on their exposure and experience with their children. The husbands and wives, in a dyadic process
accomplished 2 sets of questionnaires. Descriptive statistics was used to describe the variables. Majority of the respondents are 18 – 19 years old, high school graduate ,have 1- 2 children and are currently employed. Both couples perceived that the fathers are moderately engaged, and the teenage father identified that he is competent in caring sometimes. The mother confidently answers that her partner often displays competence in childcare. At the beginning, the researchers expected that the quality of the father–child relationship to be lower on average for adolescent fathers because not only they are less likely to be co- resident and therefore likely less involved in the child’s day-to-day life, some teen fathers have also been found to have less competent parenting skills. However, the adolescent fathers reported feeling more attached in terms of both talking and thinking about the child, which contradicted our expectations.
Moreover, this study shows that the engagement of the teenage mother’s partner is not dependent on their caring competency and demographic profile. Also, the perception between the couples about engagement and child care differs, teenage mothers believes that their partners are able and is cu rrently competent in the childcare, while their partners are not confident about it. The result will help the community to formulate seminars and trainings to engage the fathers in the childcare and improve their competency in this parenting area. Colleges and Universities can also benefit from this study as a part of their community service. They can use this as a guide for the development of service to the teenage fathers. In addition to that, the study will help the fathers of every community enhance their capability in developing their child’s health. Finally, this can also help the teenage mothers guide their partners in engaging themselves in the child’s health development.

Keywords – fathers, teenage pregnancy, paternal engagement, child health development