[From man to father--a review of nursing research]

This literature review describes the work that has been done in the field of nursing research on growth into fatherhood starting from pregnancy and through the infant's first year of life. The purpose is to describe and analyse the existing research knowledge on this subject. The material of this review consists of 56 articles derived from the Cinahl (1983/1995) and Medline (1966-9/1995) databases using the keywords father, fathers, fathering and fatherhood. The method of content analysis was employed. The focal concern was with the contents of the articles and with the research designs and methods used. Five main content areas were identified: man's health, growth from manhood into fatherhood from the points of view stress and social support, fatherhood as a significant life experience, the relationship between father and child, the couple relationship and family functioning. It is obvious that more information is needed in Finland on male processes also in nursing research so that we can better understand those processes and further improve nursing interventions. Male processes have primarily been studied by using quantitative methods and cross-sectional settings. The main difficulties with the studies have been their small sample sizes and accordingly lack of generalizability. More qualitative information is required so that we can reach a deeper understanding on male processes, expectations and wishes.