Child-Invested Contingent Self-Esteem and Parenting: Exploring Differentiations by Child Successes or Failures and Ethnicity/Race

Child-invested contingent self-esteem (CSE), or the extent to which parents derive their self-esteem from their children’s accomplishments, has wide implications for parents and the parenting context. This study investigates links between CSE and parenting behaviors and beliefs and differentiates between CSE based on children’s success versus failure. It also examines whether associations vary across ethnicity/race. Recruited through Qualtrics, participants were 1077 parents (50% fathers; 65% White, 16% Latinx, 13% Black; 6% Asian American) of children (55% boys) in 6th–12th grade. Structural Equation Modeling shows that parents who based their self-esteem on their children’s failures tended to also practice negative parenting behaviors and hold negative parental beliefs. However, parents who based their self-esteem on children’s successes reported positive behaviors and beliefs. Interactions suggest that CSE-success counteracts negative associations between CSE-failure and parenting, at least for White and Black parents. Additional differences across ethnicity/race and related implications are discussed.

Gender beliefs and family responsibilities as predictors of conflict and enrichment in parents of children with disabilities

This study examined the contribution of parental beliefs, the scope of involvement in family responsibilities, and the sense of being burdened with these responsibilities in shaping the results of conflict and enrichment in the roles of parents of children with disabilities, while keeping the child’s functional status in mind. We analysed data from 168 respondents, including 99 mothers and 69 fathers of children with disabilities. Beliefs, sense of burden with household and family responsibilities, and the child’s functional status had an influence on family-work conflict. The parent’s gender, beliefs, the child’s functional status, sense of burden with responsibilities towards the child with a disability, and the scope of involvement in household and family responsibilities were important for enrichment.

‘They Are Kids, Let Them Eat’: A Qualitative Investigation into the Parental Beliefs and Practices of Providing a Healthy Diet for Young Children among a Culturally Diverse and Deprived Population in the UK

In the UK, ethnic minority children are at greater risk of obesity and weight-related ill health compared to the wider national population. The factors that influence the provision of a healthy diet among these populations remain less understood. An interpretive qualitative study with a phenomenological perspective comprised of 24 single sex semi-structured focus groups was conducted with 110 parents (63 mothers and 47 fathers) of young children (aged 0–5 years). The participants were recruited from deprived and ethnically diverse wards in Luton, UK and self-identified as being white British, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, black African–Caribbean or Polish. The findings highlighted a wide range of inter-relating psychological and sociocultural factors that underpin parental beliefs and practices in providing children with a healthy diet. Parents, whilst aware of the importance of providing children with a healthy diet, faced challenges such as lack of time and balancing competing responsibilities, which were clear barriers to providing children with a healthy diet. Access to and affordability of healthy food and the overexposure of cheap, convenient, and unhealthy processed foods made it increasingly difficult for parents to provide a healthy diet for their growing families. Household food practices were also found to be situated within the wider context of sociocultural and religious norms around cooking and eating, along with cultural identity and upbringing.

Shifting parental beliefs about child development to foster parental investments and improve school readiness outcomes

Socioeconomic gaps in child development open up early, with associated disparities in parental investments in children. Understanding the drivers of these disparities is key to designing effective policies. We first show that parental beliefs about the impact of early parental investments differ across socioeconomic status (SES), with parents of higher SES being more likely to believe that parental investments impact child development. We then use two randomized controlled trials to explore the mutability of such beliefs and their link to parental investments and child development, our three primary outcomes. In the first trial (NCT02812017 on clinicaltrials.gov), parents in the treatment group were asked to watch a short educational video during four well-child visits with their pediatrician while in the second trial (NCT03076268), parents in the treatment group received twelve home visits with feedback based on their daily interactions with their child. In both cases, we find that parental beliefs about child development are malleable. The first program changes parental beliefs but fails to lastingly increase parental investments and child outcomes. By contrast, in the more intensive program, all pre-specified endpoints are improved: the augmented beliefs are associated with enriched parent-child interactions and higher vocabulary, math, and social-emotional skills for the children.

Individual Differences in Parental Support for Numeracy and Literacy in Early Childhood

Past research has examined parental support for children’s math and reading skills in the early years through parents’ reports of their activities with their children in somewhat inconsistent ways. In this study, we use data from a large sample of parents (n = 259; 103 males) collected through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk to examine dimensions of parental enrichment in both support for literacy and numeracy skills at home. Additionally, we examine how socioeconomic resources as well as parental beliefs relate to these dimensions of the home literacy and home numeracy environment. Factor analyses revealed two dimensions of literacy activities (i.e., passive and active literacy activities) and three dimensions of numeracy activities (i.e., numeracy applications, basic numeracy, and written numeracy activities). Income was positively associated with active literacy activities, whereas parents’ educational attainment was negatively associated with active literacy activities and written numeracy activities. Additionally, parental beliefs, including their beliefs about the importance of literacy and math skills as well as their perceived responsibility for teaching their children reading, math, and language skills, related to home literacy and numeracy activities in distinctive ways. These results suggest that future research should explore parental enrichment practices with greater nuance, particularly when examining associations with socioeconomic status.