Parental bonding: can obsessive symptoms and general distress be predicted by perceived rearing practices?

Abstract

We investigated the relationship between obsessivity and reported parental rearing style (care and protection) in non-clinical subjects, controlling for anxiety and depression. One hundred and seventy subjects filled in four inventories: the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI), the Padua Inventory Revised (PI-R), the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Results showed a relationship between the STAI and the PBI, with high anxiety scores corresponding to low care and high protection. The same pattern was found for the BDI, with high depression scores corresponding to low care and overprotection. Concerning the PI-R, we observed the absence of a significant relationship between parental care and protection and total obsessivity scores. A significant correlation was found for the 'rumination' subscale of the PI-R, with high rumination scores corresponding to maternal overprotection and low parental care. Multiple regression analyses showed that there was no significant portion of variance unique to obsessive symptoms explained by parental rearing style. These results suggest that obsessivity is not linked to a specific parental rearing style, and that a poor parental bonding, especially regarding care, could constitute a general factor for emotional distress in adulthood, rather than acting as a precursor to a specific disorder.

Perceived Parental Functioning, Self-Esteem, and Psychological Distress in Adults Whose Parents are Separated/Divorced

“…Comfortable bonding with caregivers is assumed to provide the psychological foundation for healthy functioning in adulthood. Many studies have found associations of parental care and overprotection with domains of adult functioning (Ingram et al, 2001; Wark et al, 2003) and with development of psychiatric disorders (Mancini et al, 2000; Enns et al, 2002). Living with competent parents is a protective factor associated with positive outcome in children (Heatherington and Stanley-Hagan, 1999; Kelly and Emery, 2003; Verrocchio et al, 2013).…”

Recollections of parent–child relationships in patients with obsessive‐compulsive disorder and panic disorder with agoraphobia

“…Mancini et al. (27) investigated the relationship between obsessional symptoms, measured with the Padua Inventory Revised (PI‐R), and reported parental practices in 170 non‐clinical subjects who completed the EMBU and the PBI. The results showed a significant correlation between the rumination subscale of the PI‐R and maternal overprotection and low parental care.…”

Perceived parental bonding, fear of failure and stress during class presentations

“…With regard to the presence of depression, one of the study's outcomes, perceived parental bonding has been implicated as a cause (e.g., Myhr, Sookman, & Pinard, 2004;Uehara, Sato, Sakado, & Someya, 1998) or the cause for maladaptive parenting based on the early bonding experiences. Strong positive relations are often reported between depression and overprotective parenting (Carter et al, 2001;Mancini, D'Olimpio, Prunetti, Didonna, & Del Genio, 2000) and the opposite is true regarding caring parenting (Kraaij & Garnefski, 2002;Martin, Bergen, Roeger, & Allison, 2004;Sato, Uehara, Narita, Sakado, & Fujii, 2000).…”