This symposium draws on four papers to examine reciprocity at the core of father/child relationships as they unfold in families over time.  We focus on mechanisms and meanings systems by which children absorb risks – low academic achievement, income inequality, health disparities, immigration status, substance use, incarceration – from family relationships.  The papers collectively utilize a range of methodological approaches – large national data sets as well as life history interviews– on a diversity of  White, Black and Latino fathers; married, co-resident, nonresidential, and unmarried men; and men with children of various ages, from infants to adolescents to young adults.  This panel offers new directions in our study of reciprocity among fathers and children, with a richer understanding of transmission of inequalities over time and within families.

Objectives

To examine father/child reciprocal relationships from a range of methodological perspectives, including large national data sets and smaller life history interview samples;To move from a focus on associations of father involvement with child outcomes, toward a nuanced view of mechanisms of reciprocal involvement as fathers and children age over time;To identify new processes of transmission of inequality across generations in families.