Fathers are more than social accidents. Research has demonstrated that fathers matter to children's development. Despite noted progress, challenges remain on how best to conceptualize and assess fathering and father–child relationships. The current monograph is the result of an SRCD‐sponsored meeting of fatherhood scholars brought together to discuss these challenges and make recommendations for best practices for incorporating fathers in studies on parenting and children's development. The first aim of this monograph was to provide a brief update on the current state of research on fathering and to lay out a developmental ecological systems perspective as a conceptual framework for understanding the different spaces fathers inhabit in their children's lives. Because there is wide variability in fathers’ roles, the ecological systems perspective situates fathers, mothers, children, and other caregivers within an evolving network of interrelated social relationships in which children and their parents change over time and space (e.g., residence). The second aim was to present examples of empirical studies conducted by members of the international working group that highlighted different methods, data collection, and statistical analyses used to capture the variability in father–child relationships. The monograph ends with a commentary that elaborates on the ecological systems framework with a discussion of the broader macrosystem and social‐contextual influences that impinge on fathers and their children. The collection of articles contributes to research on father–child relationships by advancing theory and presenting varied methods and analysis strategies that assist in understanding the father–child relationship and its impact on child development.

中文翻译：

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推进关于父亲和儿童发展的研究和测量。

父亲不仅仅是社会事故。研究表明，父亲对孩子的成长很重要。尽管取得了显着进展，但在如何最好地概念化和评估父亲关系和父子关系方面仍然存在挑战。目前的专着是 SRCD 赞助的父亲学者会议的结果，会议聚集在一起讨论这些挑战，并就将父亲纳入育儿和儿童发展研究的最佳实践提出建议。这本专着的第一个目的是简要介绍有关父亲的研究现状，并提出一个发展生态系统的观点，作为理解父亲在孩子生活中居住的不同空间的概念框架。因为父亲的角色千差万别，生态系统观点将父亲、母亲、孩子和其他照顾者置于一个不断发展的相互关联的社会关系网络中，在这个网络中，孩子和他们的父母随着时间和空间（例如，居住地）而变化。第二个目的是展示国际工作组成员进行的实证研究的例子，这些研究强调了用于捕捉父子关系可变性的不同方法、数据收集和统计分析。专着以评论结尾，详细阐述了生态系统框架，并讨论了影响父亲及其子女的更广泛的宏观系统和社会背景影响。