As a mother, women benefit from knowing they are the biological parent to their child.
But the same cannot be said for fathers.
With no right to proof, some fathers are often unsure if they are the biological parent, and often this has impacts on their ability to bond with the child they love, or feel part of the family.
And this isn’t a trivial problem either, with potentially one in 25 fathers raising a child they think is theirs, but isn’t.
However by its very nature, misattribution of paternity is very difficult to study.
We know that half of fathers who take paternity tests, sadly find out they are not the biological parent – but this of course is self selecting data, as those taking tests do so with at least one parent having pre-existing doubts.
Conversely, mothers who suspect the child is not of biological origin to the the father, will understandably be very reluctant to participate and reveal so in paternity studies, which will also lead to bias data in the opposite direction.
So what is the answer?
Should fathers have the right to know that a child is theirs?
And should fathers who find out they aren’t the biological dad, still be compelling to pay financial support for a child that isn’t theirs?
What do you think?
Sources
[1] https://tinyurl.com/2p82zhce
[2] https://tinyurl.com/yck27h8r
Paternity Court Video https://tinyurl.com/y4sjvrfy