Exploring the Feasibility of Assessing Perceived Parental Rearing Styles in Spanish Children With Theembu

Abstract

Most of the available data on the dimensional structure underlying the EMBU--an originally Swedish measure designed to assess one's recollections concerning one's parents' rearing behaviour--has been obtained with adults or adolescents. In the present study, using exploratory factor analysis, an attempt was made to determine the EMBU factorial structure in a Spanish sample of children aged 7-12 years (N = 205). Four factors explaining only 24% and 25% of the total variance in the ratings of the fathers and those of the mothers, respectively, and being invariant across parental sex, were interpreted: Emotional Warmth, Rejection, Control Attempts, and Favouring Subject. Results with respect to the internal consistency reliability of the corresponding scales were satisfactory, as were homogeneity figures pertaining to each set of theoretically-related items. Higher-order analyses of the first-order dimensions (mothers and fathers jointly) revealed three factors explaining 85% of the total variance. Control Attempts, Care (Rejection vs. Emotional Warmth), and Favouring Subject. The factorially-derived (first-order) scales were uncorrelated with sex of the recipient. All scales (except Rejection) correlated sizeably, negatively, with age (medium effect size) pointing, as outlined, to the need to take into account the relevant normative, design and research implications in further investigation. Some similarities and differences with findings yielded previously with adults and adolescents are briefly pinpointed.

Predictors of Functional Impairment in Children and Adolescents

“…Educational style was evaluated with the EMBU (Early Memories of Parental Rearing ; Perris, Jacobson, Lindstro$ m, Knorring, & Perris, 1980, adapted by Castro, Toro, Van der Ende, & Arrindell, 1993). Children and parents answered questions on the four scales : rejection, overprotection, emotional warmth, and favoring subject.…”

Reading Processes and Parenting Styles

“…EMBU-C (Canavarro and Pereira 2007a;Castro et al 1993) assesses children's perception about PS using 32 items with 4 points Likert scales where 1 corresponds to "No, never" and 4 to "Yes, always". Factorial structure of the Portuguese version replicates the original version with three factors: (a) Emotional Support (14 items, verbal and physical emotional support from parents, parental acceptance and physical/psychological availability); (b) Rejection (17 items, hostility or verbal/physical aggression and non-acceptance by parents); and (c) Attempt to Control (11 items, intentions and actions to control children's behaviour).…”

Os estilos educativos parentais e a regulação emocional: Estratégias de regulação e elaboração emocional das crianças em idade escolar.

“…A correlação positiva entre o suporte emocional e tentativa de controlo, contudo, não significativa, poderá ser explicada em função do que o controlo significa em termos de proximidade e de preocupação por parte dos pais com as crianças, podendo, contudo, no limite, ser disfuncional. Esta associação positiva entre a perceção de comportamentos parentais de controlo e a perceção de suporte emocional, por parte dos progenitores, é específica do período da infância sendo que os comportamentos que, na adolescência e na fase adulta, são interpretados como intrusivos, poderão ser interpretados, na infância, como reveladores de envolvimento e atenção por parte dos pais (Castro, Toro, Van Der Ende, & Arrindell, 1993;Markus, Lindhout, Boer, Hoogendijk, & Arrindell, 2003). Igualmente relacionado com a dimensão Tentativa de Controlo, Castro et al (1993) chamam a atenção para a maior heterogeneidade de conteúdo desta dimensão, que inclui dimensões qualitativamente diferentes de comportamentos de controlo.…”