The child may learn that males are strong and dominant and females are weak and submissive, if this is the pattern communicated to him by his parent's interaction. This tells the child something about what to expect from other males and females and also about what should be expected of him, i.e. it tells him about the prescribed roles and the role prescriptions expected in the society.
Psychologist, educators and sociologist all agree that family influence happens to be the most significant single influence for childrens' development" Bronn Fen Bernner 1977.
The parents or the family is the primary educating structure for children. Children basic right implies that parents accept a particular responsibility for the well being of their children. Parents take care of all their needs. Parents and family members are held with major responsibility of rearing and socializing the child. They provide a number of incentives to their children to promote them.
Many of the researches support that a loving and active father in a child's life improves outcome of children. Fathers who live with their children are more likely to have close, enduring relationship with their children and significantly more likely to do well in academic performance have healthy self-esteem, exhibits empathy and social behaviour and avoid high - risk behaviors including drug use, truancy and criminal activities.
However, the mother has more opportunities than the father to influence the offspring. The father has his own importance and influences on his childrens' behaviour in a variety of direct and indirect ways.
In the patriarchal pattern of society as it exists in India, father occupies a very important position in family. In most homes, he constitutes the court of highest appeal in disciplinary crises. It is he who influences even the mother's attitude towards home and child management. Even during the father's absence from home, the mother is often heard saying 'your father won't approve of it' or 'I'll tell your dad about this when he comes home'.
"Boys who grow up in father absent homes are more likely that those in father present home to have trouble establishing appropriate sex role and gender identity"
Fathers are important to both boys and girls in terms of sex role identity, especially boys, who identifies more with their fathers than their mothers. They also help adolescent girls for their opinion of man as well as their abilities to relate them. Many children say they consider their father to be stricter than their mothers; they also appear to respond more readily to the system of reward and punishment that father tends to use.