The Father-Daughter Relationship: How He Affects Her Life

The Importance Of The Father-Daughter Relationship

Fathers have an immense impact on the mental and emotional development of their daughters. Here are a few ways this relationship is important and meaningful:

1. It Can Boost Mental Health

Daughters who share an intimate, positive relationship with their dads have better mental health than daughters who are in unhealthy relationships with their fathers.

Not only are these girls less likely to feel lonely and depressed during important development years, but they are also more equipped to deal with different mental health issues such as anxiety and depression. They are also more capable of tackling typical stressors experienced in one’s day-to-day life as adults.

2. It Greatly Influences Her Future Romantic Endeavors

Many experts currently believe that the father is often used as the model for their daughter’s potential romantic partners. In fact, according to them, straight daughters will often pick men that share similar personality traits as their father.

Not only that, but many women also use their father’s relationship with their mother and themselves as a base for how they would be expected to be treated in future romantic relationships.

As such, women who experience creepy or unhealthy father-daughter relationships are more likely to accept the same treatment from their romantic partners.

3. It Can Impact A Woman’s Sense Of Worth

The father-daughter relationship massively influences how a child handles loneliness and deals with mental health issues like anxiety and depression. However, it can also play a big role in a woman’s self-esteem.

It is believed that daughters with emotionally distant fathers tend to experience more self-esteem issues. This is mainly because these women had to consistently prove themselves worthy of their father’s affection.

On the other hand, women with good father-daughter relationships tend to have a better sense of self and are generally more confident when handling the daily vigors of life.

4. The Daughters Do Better Academically

When it comes to traditional households, the mothers are typically in charge of looking after the children and helping them with their homework and education in general. However, many experts now suggest that daughters tend to have a better chance of success when their fathers are also involved.

This way, children get more help and access to the tools required for academic advancement and are also often encouraged to take up and attempt to ace more challenging subjects, which in turn gives them more educational and job opportunities later on in life.

That said, the influence of a father-daughter relationship on one’s education is still being researched.

5. The Daughters To Experience Fewer Body Image Issues

According to an exploratory study conducted in 2020, daughters who had toxic relationships with their fathers were more likely to develop various body image issues (1). This is especially true in cases where the fathers indicate, either through verbal or non-verbal cues, that a woman’s worth is only as good as her appearance.

Additionally, daughters of men who constantly berate them and/or their mothers about their appearance are more likely to develop a multitude of eating disorders in the long run.

6 . The Daughters Are More Likely To Take Risks

Believe it or not, women in positive father-daughter relationships are more likely to take risks and be adventurous. This personality trait enables women to enjoy a larger variety of experiences. This results in an increase in opportunities and a heightened sense of contentment in life.

7. It Can Impact Her Communication Skills

Interestingly, the type of relationship that a father and daughter share can greatly impact a woman’s social interactions in the long run. For example, women who experience a broken father-daughter relationship tend to find it more difficult to express their emotions, thoughts, and intentions to their male and female friends.

Inversely, women who have a loving father-daughter relationship do not face a similar issue. That said, more scientific evidence is required to prove the same.

As you can see, there is nothing more important than the relationship between a father and his daughter. This is why it has been widely explored throughout literature. Check out the next section for the most popular quotes on this relationship.

Beautiful Quotes On Father-Daughter Relationships

Mentioned below are a few quotes about the father-daughter relationship that we’re sure you will enjoy.

• “It is admirable for a man to take his son fishing, but there is a special place in heaven for the father who takes his daughter shopping.” – John Sinor

• “You fathers will understand. You have a little girl. She looks up to you. You’re her oracle. You’re her hero. And then the day comes when she gets her first permanent wave and goes to her first real party, and from that day on, you’re in a constant state of panic.” – Stanley T. Banks

• “Being a daddy’s girl is like having permanent armor for the rest of your life.” – Marinela Reka

• “Ordinary father-daughter love had a charge to it that generally was both permitted and indulged. There was just something so beautiful about the big father complementing the tiny girl. Bigness and tininess together at last – yet the bigness would never hurt the tininess! It respected it. In a world in which big always crushes tiny, you wanted to cry at the beauty of big being kind of and worshipful of and being humbled by tiny. You couldn’t help but think of your own father as you saw your little girl with hers.” – Meg Wolitze

• “A daughter needs a dad to be the standard against which she will judge all men.” – Unknown

• “I’ve made it my business to observe fathers and daughters. And I’ve seen some incredible, beautiful things. Like the little girl who’s not very cute – her teeth are funny, and her hair doesn’t grow right, and she’s got on thick glasses – but her father holds her hand and walks with her like she’s a tiny angel that no one can touch. He gives her the best gift a woman can get in this world: protection. And the little girl learns to trust the man in her life. And all the things that the world expects from women – to be beautiful, to soothe the troubled spirit, heal the sick, care for the dying, send the greeting card, bake the cake – all of those things become the way we pay the father back for protecting us.” – Adriana Trigiani

• “Certain is it that there is no kind of affection so purely angelic as of a father to a daughter. In love to our wives there is desire; to our sons, ambition; but to our daughters, there is something which there are no words to express.” – Joseph Addison

Frequently Asked Questions

What do daughters need from dads?

The most important thing daughters need from their dads is that they set a good example. Dads need to be present and involved in their daughters’ lives, encourage them and make them self-sufficient and brave. Daughters do not just need their dads to protect them but also to teach them how to protect themselves. Dads also need to ensure that their daughters grow up in a healthy domestic environment where they treat the other members of the house with respect so that these daughters grow up knowing their self-worth and what kind of treatment they deserve.

What is fatherless daughter syndrome?

The fatherless daughter syndrome, also referred to as “daddy issues” in slang, defines a set of dysfunctional behavioral characteristics where girls get into toxic emotional entanglements with men. The reason is traced to the lack of an ideal relationship with their fathers, or the absence of a good father figure in their lives.

Are dads more protective of their daughters?

Fathers do tend to be protective of their daughters. As girls are biology built to be gentler, fathers assume the role of protectors in their daughters’ lives.

Why do girls marry guys like their dads?

Girls tend to prefer guys who are like their dads because fathers are the first and the closest males girls interact with. If girls have an ideal relationship with their dads, they’d prefer to marry a man who is similar to their father in appearance and demeanor. This method of picking a mate is called sexual imprinting where the template of one’s parents is used to find a suitable partner.

References:

Was this article helpful?

The following two tabs change content below.

• Author

Harini Natarajan

As Head Of Content Operations, Harini sets the tone and editorial direction for StyleCraze to deliver engaging, interesting, and authentic... more