Parents’ and Children’s Religiosity and Child Behavioral Adjustment Among Maltreated and Nonmaltreated Children

Abstract

We investigated the role of parents' and children's religiosity in behavioral adjustment among maltreated and nonmaltreated children. Data were collected on 170 maltreated and 159 nonmaltreated children from low-income families (mean age = 10 years). We performed dyadic data analyses to examine unique contributions of parents' and children's religiosity and their interaction to predicting child internalizing and externalizing symptomatology. A four group structural equation modeling was used to test whether the structural relations among religiosity predictors and child outcomes differed by child maltreatment status and child gender. We found evidence of parent-child religiosity interaction suggesting that (1) parents' frequent church attendance was related to lower levels of internalizing symptomatology among nonmaltreated children with low church attendance and (2) parents' importance of faith was associated with lower levels of internalizing and externalizing symptomatology among nonmaltreated children with low faith. The results suggest that independent effects of parents' religiosity varied depending on children's religiosity and parent-child relationship.

Association of Parent and Offspring Religiosity With Offspring Suicide Ideation and Attempts

“…These findings suggest that parent's belief in the importance of religion may be a more robust factor than a parent's attendance at religious services and makes one wonder whether religious importance might be more strongly associated with teaching and beliefs about suicide within the home than is service attendance, or whether some other mechanism might be responsible. Our results show that interdependence between parents' and offspring's religiosity was considerably stronger for frequency of attendance than for importance of belief, consistent with our own studies of previous generations, 20 as well as studies of others 17 as reflected in the high correlations found between parents' and offspring's religious attendance compared with religious importance.…”

“…Prior studies have demonstrated positive associations of parent religiosity on children's physical and mental outcomes. [16][17][18][19] They have also found that the effect of a parent's religiosity may vary by the sex of an offspring and that congruence in parent/offspring religiosity is also important. 20 Drawing on a sample of multiple generations of families at high and low risk for depression, our objective was 3-fold: (1) to attempt to replicate in this sample the association between the offspring's own religiosity and offspring's suicidal behavior, (2) to examine the association between parents' religiosity and offspring suicidal behavior, and (3) to examine the simultaneous association of parent and offspring religiosity on offspring's suicidal behavior.…”

Parent-Adolescent Relationship Quality as a Moderator for the Influences of Parents’ Religiousness on Adolescents’ Religiousness and Adjustment

“…Although relatively little is known regarding the role of parents’ religiousness in adolescent development, some available studies show that parents’ religiousness is related inversely to delinquency and internalizing symptoms among children and adolescents (Bartkowski, Xu, & Levin, 2008; Kim, McCullough, & Cicchetti, 2009). However, we do not have a clear understanding of whether the strength of the association between parents’ religiousness and adolescent internalizing and externalizing symptoms, either directly or indirectly through the intergenerational transmission of religiousness, varies as a function of parent-adolescent attachment.…”

Spiritual education programme for primary caregiver parents to build resilience in children with acute anxiety symptoms: A multicity study

“…Spiritual education has the potential to influence the mental health of primary caregiver parents by shaping their fundamental beliefs and behaviours that in turn influence psychological adjustment of young children (van der Jagt‐Jelsma et al, ). Parental spirituality has been cited consistently as playing a determining role in the development of child spirituality (Desrosiers, Kelley, & Miller, ; Hardy, White, Zhang, & Ruchty, ; Heaven, Ciarrochi, & Leeson, ; Kim, McCullough, & Cicchetti, ; Landor, Simons, Simons, Brody, & Gibbons, ; Schottenbauer, Spernak, & Hellstrom, ). Similarly, parental engagement with spiritual practices such as spiritual education would also impact child development.…”