De relatie tussen de sekse van het kind en negatieve disciplinering, en de rol van ouderlijke attributies

Abstract

Background: Recent studies have shown that children from parents who use negative and harsh discipline could develop behavioral problems. In terms of parenting support programs it is important to understand the underlying processes of parent’s negative disciplinary responses to unwanted behavior from young children. Aim: To examine the relations between the child’s gender, parental attributions and negative discipline parenting strategies, and whether parental attributions mediate the relation between the child’s gender and negative discipline. Method: 102 parents of children (52.9 % girls, 47,1 % boys, aged 2-4) filled out the Parenting Cognition Scale and Comprehensive Early Childhood Parenting Questionnaire as a measure of parental attributions and negative disciplinary parenting, respectively. Parental attributions were divided into child-responsible attributions (beliefs about causes related to the child) and parent-causal attributions (beliefs about causes related to the parent). To examine the relations between the gender of the child, parental attributions and negative disciplinary, multiple regression analyses were performed separately for mothers and fathers. Results: A significant negative relationship has been found for mothers child-responsible and negative discipline, as well as parent-causal attributions and negative discipline of mothers. Conclusion: The more child-responsible attributions mothers had, the less the negative discipline was applied; but also, the more parent-causal attributions mothers had the less negative discipline was applied. Parenting support programs should focus on parental attributions to unwanted behavior from their children and negative discipline.