Where’s the daddy?

Second addresses and families

across households
Rebecca Goldman
Research Associate, Fatherhood Institute
Independent research consultant

With Adrienne Burgess at the Fatherhood Institute

 This presentation – A ‘user case’
For national statistics and our descriptive terms to reflect
increasing family diversity and capture family realities
• Parents & children in intact, separated & blended families
• How people live together - Second addresses/ part-time residence
• Families, couples and parent-child relationships across households

Based on a review of large-scale current datasets using bespoke

data collection for statistics & research purposes
Does not provide the answers for an Administrative Data Census
but raises issues for administrative data experts to take into
account in developing new statistics on households and families
And can inform design of future household surveys carried out to
complement administrative data
 The Fatherhood Institute

• Charity founded 1999

• Research summaries to disseminate knowledge and
understanding about fathers/ fatherhood
• Some original research e.g. our datasets review
• Policy (currently Special Advisors to the Women &
Equalities Select Committee/ Fathers in the
Workplace Enquiry) and ‘father-inclusive’ practice
with family services, employers and fathers
 Where’s the Daddy?
Fathers & father-figures in UK datasets

Do 16 large-scale statistical and research datasets take account of family diversity to

adequately inform family policy? Can they identify and differentiate categories of
fathers for analysis?
•Who’s a father? Birth, adoptive, step and foster fathers
•Who’s a father? Resident and non-resident fathers
2011 Census, LFS, FRS, ONS Opinions & Lifestyle Survey, British Social Attitudes, UK
Time Use Surveys, Health Survey for England, birth reg., Growing Up in Scotland, other
longitudinal studies

Funded by the Nuffield Foundation

Part of a broader project led by Adrienne Burgess at the Fatherhood Institute: Fathers in the UK: what
do we know? what do we need to know?
Supervisory Group: Professor Kath Kiernan (University of York), Professor Margaret O’Brien (UCL),
Professor Wendy Sigle (LSE), Svetlana Speight (NatCen)
 New language describing family realities
Resident and non-resident parents

”there are revolving doors to family life with many parents and children living
together only some of the time” (Kiernan, 2006)
“3% of non-resident fathers have their child to stay for half the week”
(anonymous research report)
Resident or non-resident? Resident and non-resident?
A focus on ‘residence’ and overnight stays (“live with/ together”)

Resident Full-time or regular part-time overnight co-residence of father + child

including 1 or 2 nights a week
•Fathers & father figures cohabiting part-time with a resident mother or father,
or part-time away for work
•Two-household ‘overnight care’ children (co-parenting)
Non-resident No regular overnight co-residence
Full-time resident fathers
Part-time resident fathers
• Part-time away fathers
• Fathers of part-time away children
• Overnight care fathers
• Minority overnight care
• Equal overnight care
• Majority overnight care
Temporarily non-resident fathers (longer-term
non-residence)
• Long-term away fathers
• Fathers of long-term away children
Other full-time non-resident fathers
 Family statistics based on parents and
children living in one household
• 2017 Families and Households 1.8 million ‘lone parent families’
with dependent children (UK/ Labour Force Survey)
• ‘Lone parent family’ or ‘two-household/ two-parent child’?
• ‘Lone parent’, part-time resident ‘majority overnight care’
parent (regular overnight stays of child with other parent), or
parent with ‘part-time away’ or non-cohabiting partner?
• Yet second address questions in 2011 Census in England & Wales
• A ‘lone parent’ or ‘one parent family’ – may describe a parent
without a cohabiting partner, but suggests parenting alone and a
lack of involvement from the child’s other birth/ adoptive parent
• Of course a subcategory of ‘lone parents’ do parent their child
without input from another parent or a partner
Substantial categories of potentially disadvantaged children and
fathers (UK-wide data)
A third of all children (aged 0-16) experience parental relationship
separation
Between a third and a half of these children, and 5 - 10% of all
fathers (of dependent children), experience regular overnight stays
of ‘separated’ father and child (depending on who you ask, and age of child
- from longitudinal studies/ outdated surveys)

Minority groups count for social policy – let’s count them

Adoptive, foster, ‘equal overnight care’, ‘part-time away’
Let’s track prevalence over time because families may change
Census, & sufficient sample numbers in largest household surveys
(Annual Population Survey/ Labour Force Survey) if combine waves
A gender data gap: ‘Minority overnight care’ &
non-resident parents not identifiable as parents
Summary of request to ONS: Estimated number of
mothers and fathers with dependent children aged
between 4 and 9 in the UK in 2015
ONS response: Mothers and fathers with at least one
child aged 4-9 in the household, UK, 2015 (LFS)
“Only parents who have their child [primarily] resident with
them at the time of the survey are included in the data E.g. a
[primarily] non-resident parent would not be included in the
data as a mother or father.”
So identify nearly all mothers of dependent children,
but miss around a tenth of fathers
 Our recommendations – Measure family diversity
Administrative Data Census - Not just counts - Within-household
parental relationships key for secondary analysis + social policy
eg Gender pay gap/ Fathers in the workplace
Adequate parenthood variables (cognitively tested/ harmonised across
UK datasets) for both men & women, alongside core demographic
variables eg socioeconomic group, economic activity and ethnicity
Datasets routinely identify
(i) Fathers and mothers with dependent and/or adult children living
wholly or partially elsewhere
(ii) Dependent children with a living birth/ adoptive father or mother
living wholly or primarily elsewhere
Identify part-time residence/ overnight care (whether included or
excluded from household for statistical purposes) & explicitly take into
account in question wording & household inclusion criteria
 Precedents
√ Family Resources Survey Do you have any (other) children aged 19 or under …
who live outside this household with their other parent? Department of Work &
Pensions Committee’s Child Maintenance Inquiry
√ 2014-15 UK Time Use Survey Do you have any children under 18 who do not live
here with you and with whom you have contact?
√ 2011 Census for England & Wales not Scotland Do you stay at another address
for more than 30 days a year? Another parent or guardian’s address/ Work-related/
Student + clear on household inclusion
√ Scottish Health Survey/ Health Survey for England/ US Census Relationship
codes for biological/ adoptive/ step/ foster parents/ children
√ ONS Opinions Survey How often does [child] stay overnight with their
non‑resident parent? (see Wilson, 2010 in Population Trends 140)

? Too sensitive? Q in Census/surveys with likely under/over-count: mental health

problems, looking for work/ work hours, religion, sexual identity, income, alcohol use
Online data collection
 Possibilities for the future?
Parenthood & part-time residence in Government harmonised variables?
Cross-sectional time series (separated families & non-resident parents)?

CENSUS Population Coverage Survey? (Administrative data?)

Potential Census analyses Economic activity, work hrs, household
relationships, no of bedrooms, socio-demographics, health/ mental health
Annual Population Survey and Labour Force Survey? (largest datasets)
eg Do ‘separated’ fathers whose children regularly stay
overnight take up parental leave or use flexible working arrangements?
Second address questions in 2021 Census and household surveys?
Differentiate part-time residence + longer-term absences where possible
Link Census records when two addresses, if permitted for internal
analysis? Longitudinal analyses of ONS/ Scottish Longitudinal Studies
 A time of change and an opportunity
An international agenda...Ireland, USA, New Zealand, Australia, France

“With the role of the Census being to collect information on the social condition,
then we need to move and reflect the society we live in, often collecting new
information which previous generations would not have imagined” ONS, Dec 2017

"Cherlin provided an anecdote about a Census Bureau employee named Paul

Glick, whom he described as the “the father of family statistics.” At one
point, Glick asked his superiors if they would insert a question into the Census
asking if a marriage ended in divorce. They responded that such a question would
be far too sensitive and it could not possibly be added to the Census. Glick went to
his office, thought for a few minutes, and came back to ask, “Would you add a
question about whether your previous marriage ended in the death of your
spouse?” They readily agreed. Cherlin concluded the anecdote saying, “And that
backhanded way was how divorce first became part of the statistical system.”
US conference report Counting Couples Counting Families
 Where’s the Daddy? outputs

Executive summary (if short of time!)

Condensed report (30 pages)

Full working paper (56,000 words) (bedtime read!)

www.nuffieldfoundation.org/fathers-uk-what-do-we-know-w
hat-do-we-need-know
www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2017/contemporary-fathers-in-
the-uk/
 CITATION
Goldman, R. & Burgess, A. (2017). Where’s the
daddy? Fathers and father-figures in UK
datasets. Contemporary Fathers in the UK series.
Marlborough: Fatherhood Institute.
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2017/conte
mporary-fathers-in-the-uk/
Lead contact
AdrienneBurgess@fatherhoodinstitute.org

The study was funded by the Nuffield

Foundation, but the views expressed are those
of the authors and not necessarily those of the
Foundation