Measuring German Fathers' Involvement in Childcare

In fatherhood research, there is an ongoing question of how to measure fathers' engagement in childcare. Recent studies mainly use (1) the amount of time spent on childcare and/or (2) the use of paid parental leave as core indicators of paternal involvement. To examine how these two indicators of fathers' engagement have to be understood differently, this study juxtaposes the determinants of these indicators, also differentiating between absolute and relative (i.e., compared to their partner) measures. Four negative binomial regression models are conducted with German Socio-Economic Panel data on 712 fathers with a child born between 2007 and 2013. The results indicate that there are distinct relationships behind the four different measures of fathers' engagement. Fathers' absolute and relative time for childcare is mostly explained by other time-use measures and a couples' employment participation. With regard to fathers' parental leave use, the absolute rather than the relative measures might be more suitable to explain fathers' constraints to take up parental leave that are aligned to their work situation.