Harsh parenting, child behavior problems, and the dynamic coupling of parents’ and children’s positive behaviors.

Abstract

We examined self-reported maternal and paternal harsh parenting (HP) and its effect on the moment-to-moment dynamic coupling of maternal autonomy support and children’s positive, autonomous behavior. This positive behavior coupling was measured via hidden Markov models as the likelihood of transitions into specific positive dyadic states in real time. We also examined whether positive behavior coupling, in turn, predicted later HP and child behavior problems. Children (N=96; age 3½ years at Time 1) and mothers completed structured clean-up and puzzle tasks in the laboratory. Mothers’ and fathers’ HP was associated with children being less likely to respond positively to maternal autonomy support; mothers’ HP was also associated with mothers being less likely to respond positively to children’s autonomous behavior. When mothers responded to children’s autonomous behavior with greater autonomy support, children showed fewer externalizing and internalizing problems over time and mothers showed less HP over time. These results were unique to the dynamic coupling of maternal autonomy support and children’s autonomous behavior: the overall amount of these positive behaviors did not similarly predict reduced problems. Findings suggest that HP in the family system compromises the coregulation of positive behavior between mother and child and that improving mothers’ and children’s abilities to respond optimally to one another’s autonomy-supportive behaviors may reduce HP and child behavior problems over time.

The relationships among parental psychological control/autonomy support, self‐trouble, and internalizing problems across adolescent genders

“…This protects them from getting into internalizing problems. A recent study also found that maternal autonomy support at time 1 predicted fewer internalizing problems for children at time 2 (Lunkenheimer, Ram, Skowron & Yin, ).…”

Maternal responses to negative emotions and child externalizing behavior: Different relations for 5‐, 6‐, and 7‐year‐olds

“…Relations between negative parenting responses and child internalizing symptoms have also been demonstrated. Greater maternal negative affectivity (Fang & Gagne, ), and less autonomy support (Lunkenheimer, Ram, Skowron, Peifeng, & Yin, ) and sensitivity (Kok et al, ) have been associated with more internalizing symptoms among preschoolers. However, these effects tend to be small (McLeod, Weisz, & Wood, ), are not consistent across studies (Kopala‐Sibley et al, ), and provide little support for child effects (Hipwell et al, ).…”

Family Connectedness in Families Dealing With Adolescents in Conflict With the Law

“…The highly emotional reaction of parents and their threats of harsh punishment limits the adolescents' management of their own behaviour, echoes ineffective role modelling of the part of the parent, and raises the possibility of engagement in delinquent behaviour (Lunkenheimer, Ram, Skowron & Yin, 2017;Ross & Howe, 2009). It is noted that the emotional feelings of the adolescent are linked to the nature of the parent-adolescent relationship, the family environment and delinquent behaviour of the adolescent (Soloski & Berryhill, 2015).…”