The fathers and the Child Protection Service. A qualitative study of perceptions and experiences.

This research project is a small-scale qualitative study aiming to get insight into the Child Protection Service (CPS) perceptions of fathers, fathers' experience from meeting the CPS, and how the disproportionate female dominance among CPS workers can influence the perceptions and experiences. Knowledge about this is collected from two qualitative focus group interviews with CPS workers and five individual interviews with fathers. CPS workers discuss how they perceive fatherhood and what consequences this may have for the service delivered. The fathers talk about how they have experienced contact with CPS and how this has affected their relationship with the CPS and their identity as fathers. Such knowledge is essential for understanding the parents' needs, for them to provide good caring and development conditions for their children. The main methodology was a discursive and narrative approach. The findings from focus group interviews with the male and female CPS workers provide insight into their desire to include fathers versus a view of fathers as more dispensable than mothers. Gendered language may be a challenge, and anger is experienced differently between male and female CPS workers. The fathers’ stories are about mixed experiences from meeting with CPS, ranging from very good relationships to deep conflicts.