The Effect Of Father Absence In Childhood On Gender Roles And Love Attitude Of College Student: The Mediating Effect Of Mother-child Relationship

Father absence can be defined as two condition following:(a) the father isdead, divorced or working out, this is biological absence;(b) the fathercommunicates little with children, or be indifferent to them, even treats them withuncorrected ways, this is psychological absence. Father absence may cause mental,personality and behavior disorder, influencing their social development and mentalhealth. So, the aim of the study is to explore the general situation of father absencein childhood on the undergraduate, and discuss the relationship among fatherabsence in childhood, gender-role, love attitude and mother-child relationship. Theresults showed as follows:1. The prevalence of father absence in childhood was30.98%, and the urbanstudents experienced more father absence than the rural ones.2. Father absence had a significant positive effect on the attitude of Agape. Thestudents whose father absenced may have more agape attitude; similarly, father absencehad a significant positive effect on the Femininity of the students. The scores of thestudents with father absence were lower than the ones with father presence.3. The types of father absence impacted the students’ development ofgender-role and love attitude. Death and divorce affected much more on theMasculinity of the student; except that, the psychological absence affected muchmore on Mania、Agape and Femininity. Students of psychological absence gotlower scores on these subscales.4. In dimensions of gender-role as mediator variable of simple mediation model:(1) The mediator effect of Femininity between father absence and Eros wasconfirmed.(2)That of Masculinity between father absence and Ludus was alsoconfirmed.5. In dimensions of mother-child relationship as mediator variable of simplemediation model:(1) The mediator effect of mother-child relationship between fatherabsence and Masculinity/Femininity were both confirmed.(2)The mediator effect ofmother-child relationship between father absence and five types of love attitude was also confirmed. The five types of love attitude included: Eros, Ludus, Pragma, Maniaand Agape.(3)The mediator effect of mother-child relationship and sex-roles betweenfather absence and love attitude were also confirmed.