This study, completed by the University of Newcastle in England, looked at the time that fathers spent with their children and then compared that to the children’s IQs and their long-term career success. A higher IQ was correlated with time fathers spent with their children. And even when a person was over the age of 40, a correlation was still present between time spent with a father during childhood and career success.
Is this important from a worldview perspective? We are all well aware of the denial in our secularizing culture of the importance of the role of the father in the home. However, from Deuteronomy’s specifics about teaching and talking with children while sitting at home, while traveling, and when preparing for bed and getting up in the morning (Deuteronomy 11:19) to the New Testament’s directives to dads about not exasperating their children but instead teaching them about the Lord (Ephesians 6:4), God makes clear the importance of the father in the home. From a worldview perspective, this research underscores Scripture’s repeated emphasis on the importance of fathers in the lives of their children. Dad simply spending time with the children has links both with children having higher IQs and with long-term career success.