Culture, Well-being and the Transition to Fatherhood in a Congolese Village

• In Event: Transition to parenting: International experiences of new parent well-being, co-parenting and relationships

Abstract

In this presentation I will discuss the results of recent ethnographic research on well-being and the transition to fatherhood among men in two ethnic groups in the northern Republic of Congo. Most of our knowledge of fatherhood, including well-being, comes from research in large-scale, urban, middle-class societies, often influenced by Euro-American cultural values. However, men’s experiences as fathers are diverse and flexible, varying in relation to ecological, cultural, and social contexts. For example, my team’s research among the BaYaka and Bondongo reveals that cultures vary in what is expected of fathers and that men vary significantly in their ability to meet these expectations—but also that the effects of variation in the quality of men’s care on children’s well-being depends on the cultural context. In particular, among the egalitarian BaYaka, we found that variation in men’s quality in terms of cultural valued domains of fatherhood do not significantly impact their children’s health, while they do among the hierarchical Bondongo. This finding reflects, in part, the BaYaka’s emphasis on community wide resource sharing, but also a cultural model of fatherhood that includes obligations to the community, not just to their own nuclear families as among the Bondongo. Given this backdrop, I will discuss recent qualitative, ethnographic research on the transition to parenthood among young men in these two groups—their expectations, fears, hopes, and the practical matters they consider. My analysis emphasizes how men’s concerns are common to new parents around the world – e.g. birth is dangerous, social support is required – but that culture and individual differences play important roles in shaping men’s approaches to becoming a father. I then place the psychological and social aspects of the transition to parenting into a larger theoretical context of human adaptation, which is fundamentally biocultural.

Author

• Adam Howell Boyette, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
  Presenting Author