Parental strategies for limiting youths’ exposure to online risks

Given the new risks and opportunities generated by the use of the Internet since childhood, it seems necessary to deepen the parental mediation strategies with which parents can protect their children from exposure to online risks, perpetration of inappropriate behaviours online and psychosocial risks associated with a dysfunctional use of the web. This scoping review aims to analyse the literature of the last ten years on the strategies and attitudes of parents towards online risks. Twenty-nine scientific documents about parental mediation outcomes on children’s use of digital tools have been examined. Literature has been investigated in the PubMed, PsycINFO and Scopus databases. Only studies with a paediatric population published in the last ten years (from 2009) have been selected. The results suggest that empathy and interest are protective factors towards the exposure and perpetration of online risks of children, without limiting the opportunities offered by the Web.

Parental Attitude and Parental Intervention Strategies on Digital Media Usage Among Young Children

Technology-focused parenting has evolved to provide a constantly updated digital experience for the new digital populations while parents mitigate the risks of digital media exposure in this modern society. This study explores parental attitude on the impact of digital media and their respective parental intervention strategies. There were five parents recruited through purposive sampling technique and they participated in in-depth interview. Parents generally hold positive attitude towards digital media. They apply different parental strategies for children’s media activities and its contents. This study addressed relationships pertinent to current parental strategies, media and child’s factors. Considerable possibilities and patterns to nurture young children with digital media has been elucidated through uncovering parents’ perspectives and challenges.

Daily life participation in childhood chronic disease: a qualitative study on the child’s and parent’s perspective

ObjectiveTo understand how a child with a stable chronic disease and his/her parents shape his/her daily life participation, we assessed: (1) the parents’ goals regarding the child’s daily life participation, (2) parental strategies regarding the child’s participation and () how children and their parents interrelate when their goals regarding participation are not aligned.MethodsThis was a qualitative study design using a general inductive approach. Families of children 8–19 years with a stable chronic disease (cystic fibrosis, autoimmune disease or postcancer treatment) were recruited from the PROactive study. Simultaneous in-depth interviews were conducted separately with the child and parent(s). Analyses included constant comparison, coding and categorisation.ResultsThirty-one of the 57 invited families (54%) participated. We found that parents predominantly focus on securing their child’s well-being, using participation as a means to achieve well-being. Moreover, parents used different strategies to either support participation consistent with the child’s healthy peers or support participation with a focus on physical well-being. The degree of friction between parents and their child was based on the level of agreement on who takes the lead regarding the child’s participation.ConclusionsInterestingly, parents described participation as primarily a means to achieve the child’s well-being, whereas children described participation as more of a goal in itself. Understanding the child’s and parent’s perspective can help children, parents and healthcare professionals start a dialogue on participation and establish mutual goals. This may help parents and children find ways to interrelate while allowing the child to develop his/her autonomy.

Participation of young children with developmental disabilities: parental needs and strategies, a qualitative thematic analysis

ObjectivesParticipation refers to a person’s involvement in activities and roles that provide interaction with others as well as engagement in family and community activities. Young children with developmental disabilities (DD) such as attention deficit hyperactive disorder, autism spectrum disorder and developmental coordination disorder are limited in their participation compared with their typically developing peers. This study aimed to obtain information regarding parental needs and strategies used to enable their child’s participation.DesignA thematic inductive approach with in-depth interviews was used to explore parental experiences. Eleven women and two men, between 30 and 40 years of age, who had a child (4–9 years old) with a DD diagnosis based on Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria, participated in semistructured interviews.ResultsTwo central themes emerged: parental needs and parental strategies used to enable their child’s participation. Parental needs were the following: increasing awareness, ameliorating parental burden, providing tailored interventions and supporting parents in finding suitable leisure activities. Parental strategies aimed at increasing their child’s resiliency, attaining maximal fit between activity requirements and child capacity, and creating inclusive opportunities and awareness.ConclusionsUnderstanding what families’ needs are and how families use and integrate strategies within the context of their daily lives provides practitioners with insights needed to support families’ resiliency in promoting their children’s participation. The results have implications for professionals as this information can be used to inform, refine, or tailor participation-based and family-centred services.

Gendered parenting and returns from children in contemporary India: A study of IIT students and their parents

This article seeks to understand the modern-day value of children to middle class Indian parents. It examines parental strategies aimed at raising successful children by providing them with the best education possible. These strategies, involving ‘concerted cultivation’ and gendered ‘educational labour’, are analysed in relation to schooling and preparation for a highly competitive national entrance exam, for admission to an elite engineering college in the country. Describing and analysing the classed and gendered nature of these strategies, the article explores the shifting nature of returns that middle class parents expect from their grown children. As the article shows, gendered burdens and class location of parents are crucial in shaping the value of children. Mothers across class contribute disproportionately to children’s educational training and highly educated mothers are withdrawn from the labour market to immerse themselves in educational labour. Ironically, educated mothers’ own educational inputs remain invisible even to themselves, resulting from an acceptance of culturally constructed norms around the gendered division of labour. Family strategies are oriented towards aspirations of upward social mobility, a return that parents seek to derive from educationally and professionally successful children.

The sibling as a factor of parental control over the use of gadgets by children

The study aimed to examine the impact on parental strategies of regulating children’s digital gadgets from having a second child in the family. Ninety-three mothers took part in the survey. Twenty women had two children, one woman – three children, the others women – on one child. Parents evaluated the frequency of use of digital devices by each child and then filled out several checklists. The mathematical processing of data is represented by the analysis of сrosstabs (Cramer’s V Test and Somer’s D Test). The results of the study show that the use of digital devices is widespread among young children. At the same time, with the presence of senior siblings, the age of admission of the child to digital devices decreases. Thus, young children are exposed to digital technologies. Most parents seek to regulate the time and content children use. However, their rules were less stringent for the second child in the family. Parents should pay more attention to this.

Urban resources limit pair coordination over offspring provisioning

The amount of care parents provide to the offspring is complicated by an evolutionary conflict of interest (‘sexual conflict’) between the two parents. Recent theoretical models suggest that pair coordination of the provisioning may reduce this conflict and increase parent and offspring fitness. Despite empirical studies showing that pair coordination is common in avian species, it remains unclear how environmental and ecological conditions might promote or limit the ability of parents to coordinate care. We compared the level of pair coordination, measured as alternation and synchrony of the nest visits, of house wrens Troglodytes aedon pairs breeding in a rural (10 nests) and a suburban (9 nests) site and investigated how differences in parental behaviours were related to habitat composition, prey abundance and how they ultimately related to reproductive success. We found that parents alternated and synchronized their nest visits more in the rural site compared to the suburban one. The suburban site is characterized by a more fragmented habitat with more coniferous trees and less caterpillar availability. Offspring from the rural site were heavier at fledging than at the suburban site. Taken together, these results suggest that environmental conditions play an important role on the emergence of coordinated parental care and that considering environmental variables is pivotal to assess the fitness consequences of parental strategies.

“A Blessing and a Curse” Couples Dealing with Ambivalence Concerning Grandparental Involvement During the Transition to Parenthood—A Longitudinal Study

This contribution provides an investigation of first-time parents’ experiences and strategies in dealing with ambivalence—i.e., the simultaneous presence of contradictory emotions—regarding grandparental involvement during the transition to parenthood. The study is based on qualitative longitudinal case studies comprising in-depth individual interviews with 11 Austrian couples of first-time mothers and fathers prebirth, and six months and two years after childbirth ( n = 66 interviews). Parents reported ambivalent feelings toward grandparental involvement during all stages of the transition process. We identified three parental strategies for dealing with ambivalence: inclusion, delimitation, and exclusion. Intracouple dynamics are shown to be the key aspect in the variation of these strategies over time. These dynamics are captured in three longitudinal patterns: parallel, divergent, and convergent paths. Overall, the study points to the complexity and fluidity of intergenerational relationships and demonstrates the challenges of negotiating ambivalence within couples and families during the transition to first-time parenthood.