Research on Black Fatherhood in Canada and the United States: Theoretical and Methodological Considerations

Abstract

This literature review examined the methodological and theoretical considerations underlying research on Black fathers in the United States and Canada. Drawing on 38 journal articles published between 2014 and 2024, we highlighted the methodological and theoretical characteristics of studies about Black fathers and explored the extent to which Black communities were involved in the research process. Most of the studies were qualitative, and the most commonly used theoretical framework was ecological systems theory. We also found that the involvement of Black communities in research on Black fathers was limited to recruiting participants and providing data for analysis. We contend that researchers need to increase the involvement of Black communities in research about Black life in the United States and Canada, and we propose community-based participatory research as a viable way to do so.

1. Introduction

The family unit has been a key feature in Black communities in North America since the enslavement of Africans during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade (Lloyd et al. 2022). In the United States and Canada, Black communities are diverse and longstanding, with many tracing their connections to North America across generations. Black people in America and Canada currently constitute a considerable part of the population and comprise descendants of formerly enslaved Black people, new Black immigrants, and descendants of Black immigrants. As of 2022, the estimated number of individuals in the US who identified as Black was 47.9 million, accounting for 14.4% of the country’s total population (Moslimani et al. 2024). According to the 2021 Statistics Canada Census of Population, the Black population in Canada stood at 1.5 million, accounting for 4.3% of the total population; most of this population migrated from the Caribbean and Africa (Statistics Canada 2024).

The tendency for studies on Black families to use deficit lenses and ignore the debilitating role of racism in the lives of Black men has engendered critical conversation among scholars. Black scholars, especially, have contended that deficit approaches often reproduce dominant narratives in research findings, ultimately pathologizing Black people in general (Williams 2023) and Black fathers in particular as “volitionally disengaged and negligent; as absent; and as damaged by their own intergenerational experience with absentee, disengaged, or negligent fathers” (Mattis et al. 2021, p. 456). Researchers have also been blamed for not considering how racial discrimination and ongoing legacies of slavery affect the lived experiences of Black families and Black fathers (Baker and O’Connell 2022; Rice 2023). The impacts of the afterlife of slavery have been discussed by scholars like Hartman (2007), who notes that Black people in North America have still not recovered from the violence of the Transatlantic slave trade and that these harms manifest in “skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment” (p. 6).

In the US and Canada, research on families and their structures and ideals has been dominated by white/Eurocentric views. Black feminist thinkers and Black family scholars, who are underrepresented in the academy, astutely argue that a white American conception of family has become the benchmark against which Black families are measured (Chatters et al. 2022; Hill 1971; Letiecq 2019; Williams 2019). When different groups are judged with the same yardstick, regardless of privileges and affordances, there is a tendency to produce skewed narratives. When scholars researching Black families do not consider the specific situations of Black families, they resort to deficit approaches (Butler 2021; Pacini-Ketchabaw and Nxumalo 2025; Sharpe 2016; Williams 2019), which tend to perpetuate harmful stereotypes. These approaches to researching Black people have led to the blaming of Black communities for all the problems they endure. Furthermore, Hartman (2019) and Jackson (2024) contend that when researchers fail to recognize the myriad ways Black people engage in refusal and joy amid ongoing degradation, distorted and demeaning narratives often prevail.

Consequently, in this research, we examine studies on Black fathers, paying particular attention to the theoretical frameworks and research methods employed. We propose community-based participatory research, a collaborative approach that involves community members and stakeholders throughout the research process, as a viable means of involving Black communities in research on Black fatherhood. We also highlight the role of Community Advisory Boards (CABs) as key representatives to ensure that research aligns with community priorities. This approach is particularly important when researching Black fatherhood, as CABs help foster trust, prevent stereotypical or deficit-based research, and ensure culturally appropriate methods are used to reflect community perspectives and needs accurately.

While the pathologization of Black bodies dates back to the enslavement era (Groba et al. 2023), contemporary pathologizing of Black families can, perhaps, be traced to 1965, with the release of the Moynihan Report, wherein the supposed dysfunctionality of Black families was brought to the fore (Gans 2011). This landmark report, entitled “The Negro Family: The Case for National Action,” revealed that, unlike white families, many Black families were headed by women. It proceeded to claim that this was the main reason for the problems in Black communities: “At the heart of the deterioration of the fabric of Negro society is the deterioration of the Negro family” (Moynihan 1965, p. 5). Many people have since researched and written extensively about Black families and Black fathers, often blaming the ills of the Black community on the unstable nature of Black family life while disregarding the role of racism in the lives of Black people (Williams 2023). Typically relying on quantitative metrics and statistical inferences from census data and surveys and employing deficit frameworks, the majority of these studies have focused on “race comparative analysis” and have treated Black communities as a homogeneous unit, thereby obfuscating the “within-group differences” existing among Black populations (Bryant et al. 2010, p. 157). Black scholars have long countered these essentialist views (McAdoo and McAdoo 1998, 2002), noting the myriad ways Black family life is experienced in the US and Canada. Such work points, for example, to the adverse impact that disparities related to accessing healthcare, fair judicial processes, and educational opportunities have on Black families (Agbe et al. 2025; Cooper et al. 2021; McAdoo and McAdoo 1998, 2002). Increasingly, researchers are called on to acknowledge and situate their studies on Black fathers within the wider social, economic, historical, and political realities of Black people in North America (Cooper et al. 2021).

The media is also complicit in the framing of Black fathers as absent and as deadbeats (Moody-Ramirez et al. 2024; Ransaw 2013). In 2005, an opinion piece in a major Canadian newspaper, The Globe and Mail, bemoaned the fatherlessness of Black families in Toronto, blaming this for the killings among Black youth in the city (Rivers 2005). Well-known politicians have also made public comments indicting Black fathers for shirking their responsibilities. In the United States, President Obama’s 2008 Father’s Day exhortation to Black fathers to remain in their children’s lives is a prime example (Dyson 2008). Current studies suggest that these negative portrayals, imagery, and representations of Black fathers have a profound impact on their identities and beliefs (Cooper et al. 2021).

In the spirit of “refusing to speak against ourselves and our communities” (Tuck and Yang 2023), many Black scholars are making conscious efforts to adopt methods that are not damage-centered (Sharpe 2016; McKittrick 2022). Yet, despite the criticisms of the ways Black fathers are positioned in scholarly spaces, no study, to our knowledge, has looked at the methodological and theoretical considerations that underpin research on Black fathers.

This article aims to address this gap by providing a snapshot of what researchers of Black fathers are studying, exploring the theories they employ, and investigating the research methods used in studies of Black fathers. We focus on theories and methods, knowing very well that they often enjoy a symbiotic relationship—theories determine methods and vice versa. Afterward, we explore the extent to which Black communities engage in research about Black fathers, focusing primarily on participants’ involvement in the research process. Finally, we call on researchers to ensure that Black fathers are actively involved in research concerning Black fatherhood. In what follows, we discuss our conceptualization of theory and methodology, following a brief discussion of our positionality.

1.1. Authors’ Positionalities (Biographical and Epistemological)

Positionality refers to the inherent connection between researchers and their subject matter. It encompasses researchers’ backgrounds, belief systems, assumptions, and worldviews and how these elements influence researchers in the conduct of their research. According to Jacobson and Mustafa (2019), positionality is a “research tool” because researchers not only generate their data but are also responsible for analyzing and interpreting that data. Consequently, it is vital to explicate our positionality in relation to this study. Not only is this important for our ongoing process of reflexivity, but it is a means of enabling our readers “to better understand how we produced the data” (Jacobson and Mustafa 2019, p. 2).

The first author is a Black man, a husband to a Black woman, and a father of three. He was born in Ghana and came to Canada as an international student. He considers himself an insider in the study, experiencing societal perceptions, institutional structures, and local programs firsthand as he navigates fatherhood in Canada. The second author, a Black woman, is a faculty member in the Department of Education at a Canadian university. She is the wife of a Black immigrant man and has two children. She was born in Canada and traces her roots to Jamaica. She has written extensively about Black families, particularly the experiences of Black mothers in Canada. She is from a multilingual immigrant family. The second author considers herself to be an insider-outsider, witnessing her husband and other members of her community define and perform their fatherly duties. The third author is a white senior academic who has written about fathering and care for thirty years and has recently co-conducted community-based research with Black colleagues on young Black Caribbean mothers in Toronto. She considers herself an insider-outsider on the topic of Black fatherhood: an insider in the sense that she has been writing about fathering and social exclusion issues for many years and has learned a great deal from her Black colleagues (especially Sadie Goddard-Durant) on Black families living in Caada and an outsider to this topic because of her white identity and lived experiences.

We also want to clarify our methodological and epistemological positionings. Our commitment from the outset was that our review of research on the lives of Black fathers should be rigorous and useful not only to researchers but also to those who design and deliver programs and policies for Black families. Broadly speaking, our epistemological grounding is rooted in relational and reflexive sociology, with selective writing on philosophies of knowledge making, Black feminist epistemologies, and decolonizing methodologies and epistemologies, which all emphasize, in varied ways, the partiality and situatedness of all research endeavors (for an overview, see Doucet 2018a, 2018b; Goddard-Durant et al. 2023a, 2023b; Hill Collins 2009). In a nutshell, we emphasize three epistemological points.

First, we approach knowledge making, including this review, from a position of epistemic reflexivity, which recognizes that researchers do not just engage in producing “findings” but that their epistemic, theoretical, and social locations shape the research process and products (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). In this vein, we are deeply cognizant of how Black fathers in North America have been characterized as absent or uninvolved in the lives of their children; how Black people in North America have to contend with everyday racism, which involves diminished economic opportunities and increased experiences of police brutality (Maynard 2017); that Black men are disproportionately incarcerated in the United States and Canada; and that much research about Black families employs deficit frameworks, thereby running the risk of devaluing Black families in scholarship.

Second, and in light of these points, we are aware that our questions and investigations are never “innocent”; rather, they “contain a priori decisions about how we understand the social world to be constituted” (Somers 1996, p. 71) and are “driven by [our] place and concerns in the world” (Somers 2008, p. 9; see overview in Doucet 2018a). This means that although we have attempted to conduct a thorough review that draws on a diverse array of theoretical and empirical studies and approaches, we do not purport to be “neutral” nor detached in this process.

Finally, guided by our reading of Black feminist epistemologies and especially the work of Patricia Hill Collins, we emphasize an “ethic of personal accountability,” with a focus on how “knowledge claims made by individuals respected for their moral and ethical connections to their ideas” will carry more weight, especially where it is clear that researchers “really cared about [their] topic” (Hill Collins 2009, p. 265).

1.2. Theories, Theoretical Frameworks, Conceptual Frameworks

According to Kivunja (2018), although many authors use theory, theoretical framework, and conceptual framework as synonyms, the terms have different meanings. This view aligns with that of Varpio et al. (2020, p. 990), who define a theory as “an abstract description of the relationship between concepts that help us understand the world” and a theoretical framework as “provid[ing] grounding” for research and reflecting the “work the researcher engages in to use a theory in a given study” (p. 990). A conceptual framework articulates a particular study’s reason and relevance. Kivunja (2018) captures this beautifully when he defines a conceptual framework as “the total, logical orientation and associations of anything and everything that forms the underlying thinking, structures, plans and practices and implementation of your entire research project” (p. 47). Recognizing and understanding these distinctions is essential because applying them appropriately is the first step to designing studies that are not only robust but also conceptually sound and methodologically aligned.

1.3. Distinguishing Between Methods and Methodology

In the studies reviewed for this paper, researchers use the terms methods and methodology interchangeably. However, these two related terms hold different meanings. Whereas methods are the various techniques and procedures involved in gathering and making sense of the data, methodology encompasses the broader research approach adopted by the researcher (Aguiar 2024). The methodology is often informed by the researcher’s theoretical perspective and beliefs. Broadly speaking, methodologies are divided into three groups: quantitative, qualitative (including community-based research), and mixed methods.

2. Methods

How the Review Was Compiled

The first and second authors compiled the data for this literature review through a thorough search of the literature about Black fathers. Relying on the York University library, we assembled many published works on Black fatherhood using the search terms “Black fathers,” “Black dads,” “Black American fathers,” “African American fathers,” and “Black Canadian fathers.” As expected, this search yielded countless results comprising journal articles, books, book chapters, theses, and dissertations. After this, we met several times to discuss and determine the criteria for exclusion and inclusion. We decided to work with only peer-reviewed journal articles because they tend to be more rigorous than other publications (Lomotey 2019).

We limited our study to two countries in North America (Canada and the US). The history of the US is rooted in slavery, emancipation, segregation, the Civil Rights Movement, and ongoing struggles for racial justice. Although Canada was a destination for many Black people escaping slavery via the Underground Railroad, it has its own history of enslavement, Black migration, settlement, and systemic discrimination (McCorkindale 2023). Black populations in both countries constantly contend with systemic racism, discrimination, police brutality, and social exclusion (Hoggard and Lutchman 2024; Yankey 2025).

Drawing on articles published between 2014 and 2024, we winnowed our larger dataset to a subset of 110 articles published in English, focusing on Black fathers in America and Canada. Next, we excluded studies that do not have Black fathers as the main participants. For example, we eliminated studies that did not focus solely on Black fathers (e.g., comparing Black and Hispanic fathers) and articles in which the researchers spoke to other people (e.g., birth attendants, single moms, wives, or children) about their perceptions of Black fathers. We also excluded studies about Black fathers that did not center on the care of their children and Black fatherhood. We thus arrived at 38 peer-reviewed articles that focused on Black fathers and how they care for their children. Following the African proverb that “it takes a village to raise a child,” we included articles highlighting other-fathering or social fathering in Black communities.

To help organize and manage the data, we imported the sample of 38 articles into ATLAS.ti 23, a qualitative analysis research software, and we engaged in multiple readings to code the data. In the first analysis stage, we coded and categorized the studies as qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods. In the second analysis stage, we identified and coded for the theoretical frameworks adopted by the study authors. Deductive codes included “critical race theory (CRT),” “standpoint theory,” “cultural analysis,” and “intersectionality theory.” Through inductive reasoning, we supplemented these initial codes generated from the literature with other codes. The third stage of analysis involved exploring how data were generated in each research study, focusing mainly on the extent to which Black fathers and Black communities were involved in the research process. We considered, for example, how research participants were recruited and what their roles in the research process were vis-à-vis the researchers. Particular attention was devoted to the data collection method employed by the authors. In what follows, we discuss the findings of the review.

The 38 studies in our sample are notably interdisciplinary, a feature reflected in the range of journals in which they appear. The largest share of studies is situated in psychology (published in journals such as the Psychology of Men and Masculinity and American Psychologist), followed by studies in sociology and family studies (Social Science Quarterly, Journal of Family Issues, and the Journal of Family Theory and Review). Education is likewise well represented (e.g., Urban Education and the Canadian Journal of Education), alongside contributions from social work and men’s health (e.g., the American Journal of Men’s Health and the Journal of the Society for Social Work and Research) and from Black studies (e.g., the Journal of Black Studies and the Journal of Black Masculinity). This disciplinary breadth underscores the cross-cutting scholarly interest in Black fatherhood and helps explain the diversity of theoretical frameworks and methodologies discussed below.

3. Findings

3.1. What Do Researchers Study Regarding Black Fathers?

We identified four types of studies in this review. The first group (12 studies) comprised studies that explore the factors working against Black men being good fathers. Five of these examined the impacts of incarceration on the performance of fatherhood duties; three addressed how gendered anti-Blackness hurts Black men and limits their capacity to function optimally with regard to their fatherly duties; three focused on how Black fathers’ nonresidential status affects their dedication to performing their fatherly roles; and one study addressed the strengths and barriers to engaged fatherhood for Black men.

The second group (ten studies) focused on issues related to Black fathers and their role in their children’s schooling. The third group (nine studies) investigated how Black fathers socialize with their children and looked especially at the role of Black fathers in shaping their children’s understanding of Black masculinity, addressing stereotypes, fostering a sense of belonging, and negotiating safety in a violent society. Three of these nine studies focused specifically on fathers and their relationships with their daughters. The fourth group comprised six studies about the diverse and expansive ways that Black fatherhood is experienced within Black communities. For example, these articles investigate the fatherhood realities of Black stepfathers, Black social fathers, single Black fathers, unmarried expectant Black men, Black fathers who are gay, and Black fathers who are counselor educators.

3.2. What Theoretical Frameworks Do Researchers Employ When Studying Black Fathers?

Thirty-one different theoretical frameworks are employed in the 38 studies in this sample. In 24 studies, the authors adopt a single theoretical framework for their research, while in 11, the authors draw on more than one framework. In three studies, the authors do not refer to any theoretical framework and proceed to their methods after reviewing extant literature.

Ecological systems theory: Nearly one out of every five studies (18%) draws on ecological systems theory to examine specific issues regarding Black fathers and how they care for their children. Of these seven studies, four use ecological systems theory as the sole theoretical framework, two complement ecological systems theory with a risk and resilience framework, and one study uses an ecological systems framework and intersectionality theory.

Critical race theory and hegemonic masculinities: In three studies, authors draw on hegemonic masculinity to frame their research, and in two studies, critical race theory (CRT) is drawn upon. Whereas hegemonic masculinity is employed as the sole framework in some studies, CRT is always used with another framework, such as QuanCrit (one study) or queer theory and Black Feminist Thought (one study). In one of the 38 studies, risk and resilience theory is used as the sole framework for understanding issues related to Black fatherhood in America.

Other theoretical frameworks: One study is guided by the Africanity model of investigating Black families. This Afrocentric theoretical framework was specifically developed to examine African American families and the development of research applications and initiatives aimed at improving Black family life (McDougal et al. 2018). Other frameworks drawn upon in the sample studies include anti-Black misandry, gendered anti-Blackness, family system theory, social and cultural capital framework, identity theory, ethnic-racial socialization, life course theory, intersectionality, attachment theory, theory of planned behavior, generative parenting frame, double consciousness theory, and standpoint theory, depending on the direction of the studies. These theories seek to deepen the understanding of Black communities and Blackness. As stated earlier, most studies employ only one theory, though some use two or more in conjunction with other theories. For example, in one study, the author draws on Black feminist thought, queer theory, and CRT to understand and explain issues surrounding Black fathers and how they father their children.

3.3. Methodologies Used in Research Regarding Black Fathers and How They Care for Their Children

From the analysis of our sample, we find that most studies concerning Black fathers employ qualitative methodologies. Of the 38 articles reviewed for this study, 31 (81.6%) employ qualitative methods, while six studies (15.8%) use quantitative methods. Only one study adopts a mixed method, combining quantitative and qualitative methodologies. We next discuss the specific methods adopted by the authors to collect and analyze data, beginning with the qualitative studies.

Altogether, the qualitative studies (31 studies) use ten methods to collect data. The authors draw on semi-structured interviews to gather data in 22 of these studies, 18 of which rely on semi-structured interviews as the sole method for gathering data about the lives of Black fathers. In the remaining four studies, semi-structured interviews are combined with other data collection methods: a focus group discussion and photo elicitation interviews (one study), participant observation (one study), an ethnographic approach (one study), and participant questionnaires.

The other noteworthy data collection method used in six of the 31 qualitative studies is focus group discussions; four studies used it as the only data collection method, and in two cases, focus group discussions were paired with other methods. Of the five remaining qualitative studies, one study is a literature review focusing on the role of Black fathers in raising their daughters, one study is an autoethnographic account, one focuses on the fathering practices of two gay Black fathers, another features a clinical vignette without stating explicitly how data were collected, and in one study, participants respond to questions in writing.

In most of the qualitative studies included in this review, the authors employ inductive coding to identify emergent themes in the data, expressed in diverse ways. For instance, authors report conducting “a line-by-line coding,” “open coding,” “analytic induction,” and “latent coding.” In the few cases in which the authors use deductive or a priori codes, these are combined with inductive coding drawn from thematic analysis (Clarke and Braun 2017). Some authors go to great lengths to ensure their analysis captures the participants’ views. For example, Brooks et al. (2021) adopt a hermeneutical stance, implying that reality is relative. Welch et al. (2019), on the other hand, precede their analysis by suspending judgment, thus ensuring that “personal dispositions did not interfere with the interpretation of the narratives gathered from the participants” (p. 506).

As already stated, six studies in the 38-study sample are quantitative. Four of these rely on surveys to collect data, and two leverage data collected for other research. In one study, the authors utilize data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009/2011, a dataset collected by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), extracting a random sample of Black male students and their Black fathers (Harmon et al. 2023).

The quantitative studies used different predetermined standardized analytical instruments, including the Nurturant Fathering Scale (Finley and Schwartz 2004), the Ethnic-Racial Socialization Scale (Lesane-Brown et al. 2008), the Multidimensional Inventory of Black Identity scale (Sellers et al. 1997), and the Absent Fatherhood Subscale of the African American Gendered Racism Stress Inventory (Schwing et al. 2013).

In other cases, the researchers developed their own instruments to measure how Black fathers care for their children. For example, in one study, the authors measure Black fathers’ home involvement with their children using a four-item Likert scale to ascertain how often a father interacts with their children at home. In another study, Black fathers’ school involvement is assessed using a six-item scale to indicate how often Black fathers become involved in school-related activities such as “(a) attending school events; (b) meeting child’s teacher; (c) going to parent-teacher conferences; (d) volunteering in child’s classroom; (e) attending a parent-teacher association (PTA)/parent-teacher organization (PTO) meeting; (f) talking informally with child’s teacher before or after school.” (Cooper et al. 2021, p. 446). In one study, the authors developed the Relationship with Child Questionnaire to investigate and measure Black fathers’ involvement with their children.

Finally, in the only study that adopts a mixed methodology, the authors draw on interviews, self-report measures, and administrative records to collect data, which they analyze both quantitatively and qualitatively. We now turn our attention to how participants are recruited.

3.4. Sampling Procedures

The dominant sampling procedures the researchers adopt in the 38 studies are purposive sampling, convenience sampling, and snowball sampling. This is not unreasonable since the researchers were interested in understanding the perspectives of specific populations of Black fathers. Recruitment methods used in these studies include flyer distribution, word-of-mouth invitations, newspaper advertisements, social media posts, group chats, electronic interest forms, and consultations with prominent members of the Black community. Most of the studies included in this review relied on existing organizations, mainly community-based organizations, to recruit participants for their studies. Through these organizations, the researchers connected with key community stakeholders who helped secure participants possessing the characteristics required for the research. For example, Dill et al. (2016) recruited participants through existing organizations, some of which are Black-focused and Black-led. Doyle et al. (2014) and Goodman (2018) recruited participants via community centers and local businesses like barbershops, churches, and neighborhood youth activities, and Prior and Farough (2021) interviewed people in an existing prisoner re-entry organization. Posey-Maddox (2016) worked closely with the African American Parent Organization (AAPO), a predominantly Black organization in the suburb they studied, while Welch et al. (2019) recruited their participants from Volunteers of America (VOA), an organization in San Diego County, Southern California. In other cases, scholars relied on their existing networks of key actors within the Black community, who functioned as liaisons between the researchers and participants. In one study, the researchers enlisted Black fathers via an online Qualtrics Panel Study, a platform specifically designed for recruiting eligible individuals to participate in a survey. Qualtrics draws heavily on digital fingerprints and IP addresses to ensure data validity and reliability (Guillory et al. 2016).

Significantly, in most of the studies, the authors relied on churches to recruit participants. This approach makes sense, as spirituality has been a defining characteristic of many Black communities since slavery (Lomotey 2019). Black churches provide Black populations in American society a place of refuge and a site of hope and resilience as they contend with structural and systemic racism (Lomotey 2019). Black churches “provide safe havens; facilitate strong social networks; disseminate knowledge about moral, professional, and educational life; mobilize congregants to contest injustice; mediate black communities and the broader social world; and generate untold social capital” (Thompson et al. 2019, pp. 248–49). For many Black people in white communities, the church is not solely about spirituality but also about community, and Black church leaders are revered personalities within Black communities. In the next section, we discuss the main findings of this review.

4. Discussion

4.1. Overview

This review investigated the theoretical and methodological considerations that undergird studies about Black fathers and how they care for their children. It also explored the extent to which Black communities were involved in 38 research studies concerning Black fatherhood. This review is important because research questions, theoretical frameworks, and methodologies have a reciprocally influential relationship. Research aims can inform theoretical frameworks, and theoretical frameworks can determine how a research problem is understood and approached, the types of questions asked, and how these questions are posed and analyzed. Moreover, research aims and theoretical underpinnings inform the research design, methodologies, and methodological decisions made during the research.

Our review of the studies included in this paper demonstrates that many and varied lenses have been adopted to understand Black fathers and how they care for their children. This indicates that Black fathers are not viewed as a monolithic or homogenous group (Williams 2019).

4.2. Theoretical Approaches

Significantly, the most frequently used theoretical framework in the studies in this review was the ecological systems framework. Other key frameworks include hegemonic masculinities, anti-Black misandry, CRT, and standpoint theory.

The ecological systems theoretical framework provides an aperture for investigating not only microfactors that affect Black fathers but also macrofactors. Ecological systems theory holds that all individuals are influenced by the environments in which they find themselves (Bronfenbrenner 1986). The theory holds that children’s development is shaped by different layers of environmental factors, from close family ties to larger social influences (Yang and Oh 2024). Thus, “the person [is] at the center” (Darling 2007, p. 207), affecting and being affected by multiple kinds of environments in which systems affecting individuals are interconnected and interdependent (Neal and Neal 2013).

The ecological systems framework proves particularly useful for capturing the experiences of Black fathers at the macro level, including factors within state apparatuses, the legal and judiciary systems, and the education system, for instance. Instead of looking at the systems affecting Black fathers as independent of each other, it is crucial to view systems as nested and interconnected influences informing Black fathers’ life opportunities to care for their children. Systemic racism in an educational system with a Eurocentric curriculum and negative labeling of Black students limits the educational attainment of Black people (James 2012b). Scholars like Maynard (2017) and Dumas and Ross (2016) point to anti-Blackness manifested in many forms, including racist policies such as the zero-tolerance policy in schools, which systemically push Black boys out of the educational system (Bell 2015; Curran 2016; Ford 2021; Henry et al. 2022). Anti-Blackness is also evident in the over-policing of Black communities and in police brutality against Black people. For example, James (2012a) found that Jane and Finch, a predominantly Black neighborhood in Toronto, is over-policed. Mensah et al. (2021) corroborate this sentiment, noting that the police tend to over-police and target Black neighborhoods for drug raids and concomitant arrests. These arrests translate into criminal records, significantly limiting individuals’ chances of gaining employment (Agan and Starr 2017; Dill et al. 2016; Sugie et al. 2020). Unemployment and poverty, paired with family commitments within a system where the duty of breadwinning falls predominantly on fathers, forces some Black fathers to return to crime, thus resulting in recidivism. As suggested by a Black father in the study by Dilworth-Bart et al. (2022), a man has to provide for his “family by any means necessary” (p. 1905). These realities support Hartman’s (2007, p. 6) assertion that “Black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery—skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, impoverishment.”

The use of ecological systems theory is not without drawbacks. For example, Guy-Evans (2020) argues that employing the ecological systems theory can lead to assumptions about people based on their environment and their relationships within it. In the case of Black fathers in North America, it is essential that research methodologies and theoretical frameworks center the ways Black communities experience and resist anti-Blackness in their daily lives.

Our review found that ecological systems theory was also complemented by intersectionality theory. By using intersectionality to frame their studies, scholars acknowledge the need to examine the complexities of Black life and how several factors intersect to determine how seemingly similar people experience the same phenomena (Tefera et al. 2018). At its core, intersectionality holds that individuals with more disadvantaged identities will experience more disadvantages than those with less disadvantaged identities and that marginalization and oppression cannot be attributed to a single factor (Haynes et al. 2020). Intersectionality acknowledges that Black fathers differ in age, history, ethnicity, social class, residential status, marital status, and immigration status, among other identities. It helps researchers ascertain the mediating roles of each of these factors on Black fathers, positing that racism affects all Black fathers and their children, albeit in diverse ways.

In addition to ecological system theory and intersectionality, the studies explored in this paper also used a wide set of frameworks, such as hegemonic masculinities, anti-Black misandry, CRT, and standpoint theory, to underscore the racist structures affecting Black fathers in American societies. Hegemonic masculinity and anti-Black misandry, for instance, acknowledge the disproportionately gendered nature of anti-Black racism, whereas CRT operates on the assumption that racism has become normalized in American societies (Delgado and Stefancic 2017). CRT focuses primarily on racism but also draws attention to how sexism, classism, and other forms of oppression intersect to impact an individual, in this case, Black fathers (James 2012b). Counter-storytelling is a valuable tenet of CRT (Ladson-Billings and Tate 1995); it is “a method of telling the stories of those people whose experiences are not often told, including people of color, women, gay, and the poor” (Solórzano and Yosso 2002, p. 26). CRT and Standpoint Theory use stories and focus “on overcoming oppression” (Lomotey 2019, p. 340), drawing attention not only to the oppression experienced by Black people in North America but also acknowledging the challenges confronting Black fathers as they care for their children. Although CRT aims to explain the experiences of Black people and communities, Dumas and Ross (2016) propose, instead, using BlackCrit, a theory that specifically looks at anti-Blackness. Apart from its view that anti-Blackness is endemic, BlackCrit acknowledges that “Blackness exists in tension with the neoliberal-multicultural imagination” (p. 430). As Dumas and Ross (2016) argue, BlackCrit provides an opening for Black liberatory fantasy, resisting reconstructed history that seeks to ahistoricize white domination. Frameworks that center Black life, like the Africanity model and CRT, help researchers ground their studies in the complex realities of Black fathers’ lives in North America (Wade 2017).

Another framework used was hegemonic masculinity. First coined by Connell (1987), it prescribes normative standards for men relative to women and especially for white men in relation to white women. While hegemonic masculinity is in juxtaposition with femininity and treats women as subservient to men, it also repudiates the lived experiences of men who do not act in a manner consistent with its standards (Hopkins and Giazitzoglu 2025; Jewkes and Morrell 2012). Black misandry could be described as prejudice, dislike, or discrimination specifically against Black men and boys. This is often evident in negative stereotypes and societal biases about their behavior, character, or worth. It is a form of racism that is specific to Black males (Brooms 2025; Dumas and Ross 2016).

Finally, tracing its roots in the work of Karl Marx, we also encountered standpoint theory in our selection of studies on Black fathers. It regards knowledge and power as relative and contingent on one’s social standing. Thus, marginalized populations or oppressed groups have critical insights into how power and social structures that oppress them operate (Friesen and Goldstein 2022). The goal of standpoint theory is to overcome oppression (Lomotey 2019).

Researchers using these frameworks respond to Black communities’ calls that scholarly inquiries on Black people and their families should adopt lenses that uphold Black experiences, epistemologies, and ontologies (McKittrick 2022).

4.3. Methodological Approaches

Most of the studies in this review (80%) employed qualitative research methodologies because they allow researchers to deeply explore Black fathers’ insights on their lived experiences and their social worlds. In qualitative research, the researcher plays an active role in gathering, organizing, analyzing, interpreting, and representing data, while paying close attention to how participants and contexts provide meaning to concepts and phenomena (Tilley 2016). Holley and Harris (2019) advise using qualitative research when (1) “the topic is not well understood… (2) …the topic is complex and system-oriented, and … (3) the topic is sensitive or traumatic” (pp. 7–8)—provisos that all apply to Black fathers and fatherhood. Qualitative research is better suited for capturing the perspectives of minorities and people of color (Campbell et al. 2021), particularly because, as Dei (2018) argues, “Blackness is an absented presence in our academic spaces” (p. 123). Black fathers and Black fatherhood have been under-explored and overlooked in scholarship; when these topics are studied, researchers have often employed a deficit approach and positioned white families as the normative standard (Williams 2023) by which to assess Black fathers, fatherhood, and families.

In the studies explored for this review, grounded theory figured prominently because it emphasizes data-driven theory rather than theory being imposed on data (Charmaz and Thornberg 2020). Grounded theory departs from the traditional positivist approach to social research by focusing on participants’ experiences and meaning-making. Researchers employ grounded theory to “construct theory” rather than to confirm theory (Corbin 2017, p. 302). Black fathers were thus not the objects of the analysis. Rather, the concepts generated by researching Black fathers were analyzed. Grounded theory is a valuable counterpoint to deficit theories for framing studies about Black fathers.

We do not assume that every Eurocentric lens is a deficit lens. However, we posit that applying a Eurocentric lens to Black families will lead to outcomes that, at best, do not represent the views of Black populations, and, at worst, pathologize Black families. The complex nature of the Black family stems from myriad historical and contemporary challenges that Black men contend with, including the legacy of slavery (Bertocchi 2016), racism (Williams 2023), and the impact of segregation, including residential segregation (Pearcy 2020).

The prioritization of qualitative research interviews and focus groups for collecting data from and about Black fathers is connected to strong arguments about how qualitative research interviews are more suitable when the researcher aims to uncover the subjective viewpoint of the interviewee regarding a topic rather than producing generalizable conclusions about groups of individuals (Campbell et al. 2021; McGrath et al. 2018). Interviews produce “highly personalized“ data and provide the opportunity for deeper and wider probing (Gray 2004, p. 214). They are often used as a follow-up to quantitative surveys to investigate underlying reasons for identified relations and patterns (Gray 2004). For scholars interested in avoiding damage-centered research—countering the stereotypes associated with Black fathers—interviews provide valuable opportunities for participants to tell their own stories. Moreover, the dialogic nature of interviews also fosters a cordial relationship between researchers and the participants and can create an atmosphere of trust, because research participants are more willing to talk about their experiences (see Goddard-Durant et al. 2021, 2023a, 2023b). An atmosphere of trust and cordiality is vital in research involving hard-to-reach participants, such as formerly incarcerated fathers, nonresident fathers, prostitutes, and drug addicts (Ellard-Gray et al. 2015).

The prevalent reliance on inductive methods for analyzing data generated from Black fathers is expected and commendable. Qualitative methods are critical for opening up new listening pathways. This is important when investigating Black fathers, who have long been pathologized and stereotyped as absent, uncaring, and deadbeat (Cooper et al. 2023; Moody-Ramirez et al. 2024; Rambert 2021). Given the adverse perception of Black fathers within popular and academic discourses, qualitative methods offer opportunities for researchers to prioritize participants’ views and to reshape public and scholarly discourses and knowledges.

It is refreshing to note that in almost all the studies included in this review, Black communities were considerably involved in participant recruitment. Organizations in the community, including pre-existing non-governmental organizations serving Black communities, churches, barbershops, and community centers, were leveraged. The authors of several studies in this review also engaged participants in member-checking research data, allowing participants to validate researchers’ interpretations of their interviews (Candela 2019). Although these efforts demonstrate that Black communities do participate in research about Black fathers, we contend that more needs to be done to involve Black communities in research about Black people in general, and Black fathers in particular.

4.4. Implications

A cursory look at all the studies in this review revealed that the projects had already been delineated before the researchers consulted the Black communities. This is typical of how most academic studies are conducted. Scholars, mainly university professors, conceptualize the research, choose collaborators, and apply for the necessary funding. When the funding agency makes the funds available, research then commences. The same is true for graduate students, who must first choose topics, write research proposals, and then have the proposals approved by their research committees and ethics boards before moving to the research site (Tilley 2016). This implies that Black participants and communities often do not participate in decision-making about what is being researched about them. One exception is community-based participatory research (CBPR), a broad category of approaches developed across the past few decades (see, for example, Collins et al. 2018; Salimi et al. 2012) that, we maintain, is a viable way to involve Black fathers in research about Black fathers.

Overall, CBPR seeks to involve community members, researchers, and other stakeholders in all phases of the research process. It is built on collaboration, co-generation of knowledge, reciprocity, and equity (Collins et al. 2018; Goddard-Durant et al. 2021, 2022; Weinstein et al. 2023; Yuan et al. 2020) and acknowledges that different individuals bring different and unique perspectives to the research process. CBPR seeks to “create positive, transformative and sustainable change together with, for and in communities” (Collins et al. 2018, p. 884) and aims to include community partners in identifying crucial concerns, developing the research study, executing the project, disseminating research findings, and implementing evidence-based interventions (Cramer et al. 2018).

Adopting a CBPR approach ensures cultural humility and interdependence between the researchers and the community being researched. It also fosters trust between researchers and the community, which ensures that research is feasible because community members and stakeholders advise researchers on pragmatic ways of achieving their research objectives. Central to any CBPR process is the Community Advisory Board (CAB).

Researchers cannot engage every member of a community. For this reason, they rely on CABs (Yuan et al. 2020), a collection of community members and organizational representatives who offer advice on a research project or initiative and partner with researchers in the research process. A CAB represents the community’s voice and serves as the liaison between the community and the researchers (Newman et al. 2011; Mwinga and Moodley 2015): They “are integrated into the research process and ensure the work aligns with community priorities” (Nelson et al. 2024, p. 1). A CAB can help identify, recruit, and conduct research with research participants (Nelson et al. 2024; Weinstein et al. 2023). In studies about Black communities, they can also suggest appropriate theories and methods for conducting research in Black communities, ensure that Black participants’ perspectives are brought on board during the analysis and interpretation of data (Goddard-Durant et al. 2021, 2022; Newman et al. 2011), and help disseminate findings. This fosters community trust for researchers and allows communities to enact agency over all aspects of the study and inquiry processes (Mwinga and Moodley 2015). Researchers must also recognize that CAB members’ social locations and assumptions can affect the inquiry process. Consequently, researchers must be intentional when forming a CAB, situating members’ insights within the socioeconomic, historical, and political landscape of the study’s setting. When recruiting, researchers must account for CAB members’ positionality and their historical and current relationships with the target communities.

5. Conclusions

Black communities have long been an important part of American and Canadian societies, yet researchers have consistently drawn on deficit and Eurocentric lenses to discuss Black families in general and Black fathers in particular. Like other scholars (Bryant et al. 2010; Cooper et al. 2023; Williams 2023), we posit that using white families as the benchmark for measuring Black families, ignoring the legacies of slavery, and obfuscating the impact of structural and systemic racism leads to narrow and often misleading views of Black families and Black fathers. It is, therefore, refreshing that several Black scholars have entered the fray and are adopting theories and methods that do not seek to blame Black families for their problems but consider how factors within and outside Black families and communities have contributed to the problems of Black men and fathers. The use of qualitative research methods, such as in-depth interviews and focus group discussions, presents excellent opportunities for producing counter-narratives about Black fathers.

There is still much to be done to shed light on the lived experiences of Black fathers. In the Canadian context, there is a paucity of studies on Black fathers. This is surprising given that Canada’s Black population is over 1.5 million (Statistics Canada 2024). It is worth noting that there is a rich and growing body of work on the education of Black people (Dei 1993, 1996; James 1995, 2005, 2012b) and on Black mothers (Fearon 2022; Goddard-Durant et al. 2023a, 2023b). It remains the case, however, that members of the Black community need to be more involved in identifying key issues and problems to be studied, in conceptualizing research studies, and in helping to provide culturally relevant interpretations of research findings. The involvement of Black communities through CBPR will make research more relevant to the needs of Black communities.