Abstract: This exploratory study provides an examination of Italian fathers’ perception of their child care capacity and their concepts about fatherhood and parental sharing before and after childbirth. A snowball sample of fifty fathers living in a big city of Southern Italy, with social and cultural heterogeneous background and children aged one to six, was interviewed. Subjects declare their willingness to accept new models of fatherhood, showing a positive attitude towards parental sharing, although these purposes appear scarcely applied in their daily life. Their involvement in child caring seems to be limited to slight activities, whereas primary care remains an almost exclusive mothers’ prerogative. The results show that paternal role appears still to be “under construction” when compared to the maternal one and in search of its own and independent identity.
Keywords: new fathers; child care; parental sharing; gender roles; parental leave.
To cite the article: ROSSINI, Valeria, LOIACONO, Fiorenza. “How Italian fathers’ perception of their childcare capacity is changing between tradition and modernity”. International Journal of Cross-Cultural Studies and Environmental Communication 2.2 (2013): 158-168.
International Journal of Cross-Cultural Studies and Environmental Communication 