Mediating Effect of Fathers’ Parenting Behavior on the Relationship Between Young Children’s Temperament and Peer Play Behavior

Objectives: Understanding peer play behaviors in young children is crucial because children's personal characteristics influence their peer play behaviors. In this study, we investigated the relationship between children’s temperament (4 years old), fathers’ parenting behavior (5 years old), and peer play behavior (6 years old) using longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Korean Children (PSKC). In addition, the mediating effect of fathers’ parenting behavior on the relationship between children’s temperament and peer play behavior was investigated.Methods: A total of 1,070 children and their fathers were extracted for analysis from the Korean Children's Panel Study (PSKC) 2012 (Year 5) to 2014 (Year 7). The correlations between the relevant variables and the mediating effects of fathers’ parenting behavior were analyzed using SPSS 25.0 and AMOS 25.0.Results: Correlation analysis showed that children’s emotionality and sociability were associated with fathers’ parenting behavior, whereas their sociality and activity were associated with their play disturbance. Next, there was no mediating effect of fathers’ warmth on the relationship between children’s temperament and children’s peer play interactions. The full mediating effects of the fathers’ control on the relationship between the child’s temperament (emotionality and sociability) and peer play behaviors such as disruption and disconnection were confirmed. Children’s activity had a direct effect on their peer play interaction and disruption.Conclusion: Peer play behavior revealed the importance of fathers’ controlling parenting behaviors and children’s temperament, especially in peer play disruption and disconnection. In particular, we confirmed the influence of father’s controlling parenting behavior on children’s sociability and emotionality temperament.

Bidirectional Longitudinal Relationships between Maternal Psychological Control and Bullying/Victimization among Father-Absent Left-behind Children in China

The topic of school bullying has become an important issue over the world. Being in disadvantaged situations of fathers’ absence, prior research suggested that left-behind children (LBC) with absent fathers in China are more vulnerable to get involved in school bullying (bullying or being bullied). In addition, fathers’ absence brings much pressure to single stay-at-home mothers, leading to more maternal psychologically controlling parenting. Following a three-wave longitudinal design, this study aimed to examine the developmental relationship between maternal psychological control and father-absent LBC’s bullying/victimization as well as its mechanism. A total of 348 father-absent LBC aged 7–11 years in China completed a battery of questionnaires at three-time points. The results indicated that there are reciprocal effects between maternal psychological control and father-absent LBC’s bullying/victimization. Specifically, maternal psychological control at T1 predicted father-absent LBC’s victimization at T2; children’s victimization at T2 predicted maternal psychological control at T3; maternal psychological control predicted later children’s bullying perpetration stably from T1 to T2 and from T2 to T3; children’s bullying at T2 predicted maternal psychological control at T3. Two vicious circles happened in the above relationships. Current findings highlight the stronger effects of mothers’ negative parenting on children’s school bullying, which bring inspiration for future family education and school intervention.

Parenting Children With Cerebral Palsy: A Longitudinal Examination of the Role of Child and Parent Factors

Because parents of children with cerebral palsy encounter many challenges, the quality of their parenting varies substantially across time. To understand how and why their parenting behaviors change across time, we examined the contributions of child behavior and parents’ psychological needs to explanations of yearly variation in responsive, autonomy-supportive, and psychologically controlling parenting. We also explored whether parents’ motivation to take care of their child explained why some parents engage in better-quality parenting than others. Parents ( N = 117) of children with cerebral palsy ( Mage = 10.98 years) participated in a three-wave longitudinal study. Multilevel analyses indicated that yearly variations in parents’ need satisfaction and frustration related to yearly fluctuations in, respectively, autonomy-supportive and psychologically controlling parenting. Child behaviors had few unique effects on parenting. Parents’ autonomous motivation was associated with better overall quality of parenting. We discuss implications for practice and directions for future research.

Do you see what I mean?: Using mobile eye tracking to capture parent–child dynamics in the context of anxiety risk

Temperamental behavioral inhibition (BI) is a robust endophenotype for anxiety characterized by increased sensitivity to novelty. Controlling parenting can reinforce children's wariness by rewarding signs of distress. Fine-grained, dynamic measures are needed to better understand both how children perceive their parent's behaviors and the mechanisms supporting evident relations between parenting and socioemotional functioning. The current study examined dyadic attractor patterns (average mean durations) with state space grids, using children's attention patterns (captured via mobile eye tracking) and parental behavior (positive reinforcement, teaching, directives, intrusion), as functions of child BI and parent anxiety. Forty 5- to 7-year-old children and their primary caregivers completed a set of challenging puzzles, during which the child wore a head-mounted eye tracker. Child BI was positively correlated with proportion of parent's time spent teaching. Child age was negatively related, and parent anxiety level was positively related, to parent-focused/controlling parenting attractor strength. There was a significant interaction between parent anxiety level and child age predicting parent-focused/controlling parenting attractor strength. This study is a first step to examining the co-occurrence of parenting behavior and child attention in the context of child BI and parental anxiety levels.