Authors Depict Stay at Home Dads Negatively

An author reports compiling 83 novels (from the 1970s through 2024) that feature full-time stay-at-home fathers after extensive archival research. He finds more recent books show both increased hands-on caregiving and a rise in negative depictions—18 titles this decade and nearly half of post-2020 novels involve physical danger or severe dysfunction. The work illustrates shifting cultural attitudes toward men as primary caregivers.