Parenting Stress and Child Behavior Problems Among Clinic-Referred Youth: Cross-Cultural Differences Across the US and Korea

Abstract

Due to increased multiculturalism in the US and abroad, there is a need for increased understanding of the different ways in which parenting stress is related to child problems across cultures. In the present study, we investigated (a) differences in reported parenting stress and childhood problem behaviors across a Korean (n = 71) and US (n = 71) sample, as well as (b) differences in the ways in which parenting stress and childhood problems were related across Korean and US children based on mothers' reports. Results revealed that Korean mothers reported significantly higher parenting stress yet significantly lower childhood problem behaviors compared to US mothers. In addition, mother-based reports of child problems were significantly associated with parenting stress in the US sample, but not in the Korean sample. Clinical implications and culturally-relevant issues relevant to these findings are addressed, including a potential under-reporting bias of child problems among Asian parents.

Parenting Stress through the Lens of Different Clinical Groups: a Systematic Review & Meta-Analysis

“…Given the collection of several individual research studies linking parenting stress to child behavior problems (Anthony et al 2005; Baker et al 2002; Chung et al 2013; Hastings et al 2006), the goal of the current study was to systematically examine the extent to which parenting stress was associated with child externalizing and internalizing behavior problems and the overall levels of parenting stress across clinical groups. Our systematic review revealed that several studies have demonstrated a link between parenting stress and child behavior problems, with more studies examining child externalizing behavior than internalizing behavior.…”

“…Specifically, on the one hand, higher rates of parenting stress have been found among parents from racial and ethnic minority backgrounds (Franco et al 2010). For example, one study found that Korean mothers reported higher levels of parenting stress than US mothers (Chung et al 2013). On the other hand, some studies with low-income samples have found that there are no significant differences in parenting stress among mothers from different racial and ethnic minority backgrounds (Anderson 2008).…”

The social responsiveness scale in relation to DSM IV and DSM5 ASD in Korean children

“…In a multi‐cultural comparison study of the CBCL in preschool children, mean Total Problem Scores for Korean children ranked 4th from the bottom among 24 countries and lowest for DSM‐IV Oppositional Defiant Disorder [Rescorla et al, ]. Other studies have reported that Korean parents report fewer problems in their offspring on the CBCL‐internalizing and externalizing behavior scales than do parents from the US [Chung et al, ]or Australia [Oh, Shin, Moon, Hudson, & Rapee, ]. Since there is no evidence of prevalence differences between US and South Korea [Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network Surveillance Year 2010 Principal Investigators, ; Kim et al, ; Zablotsky, Black, Maenner, Schieve, & Blumberg, ], observed discrepancies in the SRS raw scores between Korean and US children may reflect cultural differences in US and Korean parental reporting of their children's behaviors [Crijnen, Achenbach, & Verhulst, ]; that is, Korean parents may underreport their children's social problems compared to the parents in the US.…”

Mexican‐Origin Parents’ Stress and Satisfaction: The Role of Emotional Support

“…Future studies would benefit from adding measures of children's behavior as they have been found to significantly influence parenting stress (Chung et al, 2013). While conceptually similar to subsets of items from established measures, our constructs were not measured with the same level of precision as would have been possible with the use of psychometrically validated measures.…”

“…Relatedly, because of the availability of measures, we were only able to rule out relevant factors from the parent domain (i.e., depressive symptoms) but not from the child domain (i.e., child factors such as behavioral problems) that might partially explain the association between emotional support with parental stress and satisfaction. Future studies would benefit from adding measures of children's behavior as they have been found to significantly influence parenting stress (Chung et al, 2013). Finally, data were from a single respondent, which may result in less objectivity.…”