Impacts of Korean fathers’ attachment and parenting behavior on their children’s social competence

The impacts of fathers’ childhood attachment representations and their parenting behavior on 5-year-old children’s social competence were examined. One hundred and sixty Korean fathers cohabiting with their children (85 boys and 75 girls) answered questionnaires. The questionnaires related to the attachment representations of their parents based on their retrospective childhood memories and their own parenting behavior as the fathers of preschoolers. In addition, the children’s preschool teachers rated their levels of social competence. Structural equation modeling indicated that the fathers’ childhood attachment representations had significant indirect impacts on boys’ social competence because of their own parenting behavior. There was no impact of fathers’ childhood attachment representations, but fathers’ parenting behavior had a significant direct impact on their daughters’ social competence.