The Disengaged Noncustodial Father: Implications for Social Work Practice with the Divorced Family

Abstract

Despite alternatives to adversarial resolution of divorce-related issues and a wider range of postdivorce parenting options, maternal custody with paternal visitation of children continues as the dominant structural arrangement for divorced families in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain. Furthermore, the reported rates of postdivorce paternal disengagement in each of these countries are identical: Half of noncustodial fathers gradually lose all contact with their children. This article examines the results and practice implications of a Canadian and British study building on earlier U.S. research of the impact of divorce on noncustodial fathers and the phenomenon of noncustodial fathers' disengagement. The results generate two distinct profiles of noncustodial fathers and a marked discontinuity between pre- and postdivorce father-child relationships. Practice implications focus on the lack of fit between divorced fathers' therapeutic needs and social work methods. Methods of modifying the therapeutic process to meet fathers' needs before, during, and after divorce are considered.