Childrearing Practices and Children’s Behaviours: A Correlational Study Considering Gender and School Age of Children

Abstract

In this work we attempted to describe and correlate specific parenting practices and child behavior of children differentiated by problem behavior, education and sex. Attended 155 mothers of children enrolled in public schools, attending preschool or elementary school of both sexes, who answered the instruments: CBCL, RE-HSE-P and QRSH-P (version for parents). Data were analyzed statistically using the Pearson correlation test. The results showed that there are differences in the childrearing practices of skillful mothers and repertoire when correlated to preschool and school children, especially if they are also differentiated by sex. The girls were the most skillful and the boys had more behavior problems.

Behavioral problems and their relationship to maternal depression, marital relationships, social skills and parenting

“…Some relationships were expected but not found, such as (a) scores concerning indicators of depression were not associated with negative parenting practices, which is contrary to what is reported in the literature (Pizeta et al, 2013;Trepat et al, 2014) and (b) positive parenting was not inversely related to behavioral problems (Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018). These divergences may be a result of the method used, such as the case control design, in which the group with indicators of depression had a counterpart that did not exhibit depression; the groups were composed of bi-parental families with homogeneous conditions, such as the instruments used to collect data and measure children's behaviors, marital relationships, and parenting practices.…”

“…Note, however, that the scores concerning the indicators of depression obtained by the sample of mothers with indicators of depression were not associated with the indicators of children's behaviors, which seems to disagree with the literature (Conners-Burrow et al, 2016;Pizeta et al, 2013;Silk et al, 2011;Trepat et al, 2014;Zalewski et al, 2017). In the total sample, maternal depression was inversely proportional to positive practices (Dow-Fleisner, 2018;Silk et al, 2011;Pizeta et al, 2013;Trepat et al, 2014;Vafaeenejad et al, 2018;Zalewski et al, 2017) and directly related to children's social skills Table 4 Simple linear regression analysis with only externalizing behavior problems as the dependent variable (n = 13, and nonclinical-n = 21) and the following independent variables: maternal depression, positive parenting practices, negative parenting practices, quality of marital relationship, children's social skills, and mothers' reports of problems Table 5 Simple linear regression analysis with internalizing and externalizing comorbidities as the dependent variable (n = 13, and non-clinical-n = 21) and the following independent variables: maternal depression, positive parenting practices, negative parenting practices, quality of marital relationship, children's social skills, and mothers' reports of problems (Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018), which in turn were inversely proportional to indicators of behavioral problems (Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018). Therefore, indicators of maternal depression indirectly influence parenting and child behavior.…”

“…Additionally, marital relationships and parenting were directly associated in the total sample (Kanoy et al, 2003;Krishnakumar & Buehler, 2000;Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018), while positive parenting was inversely proportional to the occurrence of maternal depression (Pizeta et al, 2013). Relationships between the mothers' different repertories are highlighted, in which positive practices were associated with positive marital relationships and negative practices with negative marital relationships, in addition to an inverse direction between positive and negative marital relationships and marital satisfaction, which seems to agree with the literature (Hameister et al, 2015;Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018). Depression, in turn, was inversely associated with positive marital relationships and directly associated with negative marital relationships, suggesting once again that maternal mental health influences marital relationships (Hsiao, 2017;Najman et al, 2014;Neves & Duarte, 2015).…”

“…Silk et al (2011) addressed a sample of mothers of preschool and school-aged children and also found that maternal depression was associated with negative parenting practices, which predicted internalizing problems among children. Rovaris and Bolsoni-Silva (2018) addressed a sample of 76 mothers of preschool-aged children, both sexes, and found the following correlations for the sample of preschool-aged children without behavior problems: (a) positive parental interactions were associated with the children's social skills and with positive marital interactions; (b) negative parental interactions were directly associated with behavioral problems and negative marital interactions; (c) social skills were inversely proportional to behavior problems among girls; and (d) children's social skills were also directly correlated to behavior problems, while positive parenting practices were directly associated with indicators of behavioral problems, which suggests that parenting practices are used inconsistently.…”

“…According to the analysis of reviews considering the relationship between maternal depression, parenting, marital relationship, and child behavior, we verify that (a) maternal depression has been associated with less competent child-rearing practices and an excessive use of negative practices (Dow-Fleisner, 2018;Silk et al, 2011;Pizeta et al, 2013;Trepat et al, 2014;Vafaeenejad et al, 2018;Zalewski et al, 2017), increasing the risk of children developing internalizing and externalizing behavioral problems (Conners-Burrow et al, 2016;Pizeta et al, 2013;Silk et al, 2011;Trepat et al, 2014;Zalewski et al, 2017); (b) mental health conditions such as parental stress and maternal depression may affect marital relationship and interaction with children (Vafaeenejad et al, 2018); (c) the literature diverges in regard to the relationship between maternal depression variables, marital relationships, and children's behaviors. Ahun et al (2017) reports that maternal depression predicted internalizing behavioral problems regardless of parenting variables, family functioning, or other sociodemographic variables of both parents and children, while the study by Kuckertz et al (2018) verified the mutual influence of maternal depression and internalizing symptoms, but only a mediating role for psychological aggression; (d) an inverse relationship was also found between depression and the use of substances in the pre-and postnatal period, due to an association with maladaptive parenting (Winsper et al, 2015); and (e) a relationship was also found between positive practices and children's social skills and behavior problems, with associations between positive practices and positive marital relationships and between negative practices, negative marital relationships, and behavior problems (Rovaris & Bolsoni-Silva, 2018).…”