PARENTING STYLES AND THEIR IMPACTS ON CHILD PROBLEM BEHAVIORS

Managing child problem behaviors as early as possible is crucial. Several studies have shown the impact of parenting on child problem behavior; however, the studies did not investigate the influence of paternal and maternal parenting on child behavior separately. This study aimed to test the effect of mothers’ and fathers’ authoritative and authoritarian parenting on child problem behavior. Furthermore, this study examined the influence of family adjustment on parenting styles. Participants were 105 pairs of parents (fathers and mothers). They completed a set of questionnaires assessing their parenting styles, child problem behavior, and family adjustment. Multiple regression analyses resulted in a significant effect of mothers’ authoritative parenting on child emotional problems, as well as significant effects of fathers’ authoritative and authoritarian parenting on child behavioral problems. Another key finding was that parental teamwork predicted the effectiveness of parenting.

Coparenting and Child Outcomes in Families of Children Previously Identified With Developmental Delay

The current study explored cross-sectional relations between coparenting quality and child problem behaviors, as measured by parent report and direct observation, in families of school-aged children previously identified with a developmental delay in early childhood. Parents' reports of difficulty with coparenting problems predicted child problem behaviors. For primary caregivers, parenting self-efficacy mediated the relation between coparenting quality and problem behaviors. Observed undermining behavior significantly positively predicted child appropriate behavior across specific tasks and observed partner support behavior significantly negatively predicted child appropriate behavior across specific tasks. Discussion focuses on the clinical significance of these findings and future research directions.

Fathering Through Change (FTC) intervention for single fathers: Preventing coercive parenting and child problem behaviors

Dishion and Patterson's work on the unique role of fathers in the coercive family process showed that fathers' coercion explained twice the variance of mothers' in predicting children's antisocial behavior and how treatment and prevention of coercion and promotion of prosocial parenting can mitigate children's problem behaviors. Using these ideas, we employed a sample of 426 divorced or separated fathers randomly assigned to Fathering Through Change (FTC), an interactive online behavioral parent training program or to a waitlist control. Participating fathers had been separated or divorced within the past 24 months with children ages 4 to 12 years. We tested an intent to treat (ITT) mediation hypothesis positing that intervention-induced changes in child problem behaviors would be mediated by changes in fathers' coercive parenting. We also tested complier average causal effects (CACE) models to estimate intervention effects, accounting for compliers and noncompliers in the treatment group and would-be compliers in the controls. Mediation was supported. ITT analyses showed the FTC obtained a small direct effect on father-reported pre–post changes in child adjustment problems (d = .20), a medium effect on pre–post changes in fathers' coercive parenting (d = .61), and a moderate indirect effect to changes in child adjustment (d = .30). Larger effects were observed in CACE analyses.