Cross-culturally throughout history, fathers had a bad stigma with not contributing to parenting. Theorist and scientist only focused on mother and infant relationships, not even thinking about putting fathers into the mix. Results from studies mention that fathers provide less direct care to infants than mothers. All cross-cultural studies shows that other female members in the family would provide more care to infants than fathers (Hewlett 42.) Current studies now are focusing on infant attachments to fathers. It has always been known that mothers are the ones that help infant’s developmental skills. Hewlett explains this through this statement; “The idea is that mother-infant bonding develops as a consequence of the frequency and intensity
