Sensitive parenting as a cross-cultural ideal: sensitivity beliefs of Dutch, Moroccan, and Turkish mothers in the Netherlands

Beliefs about sensitive parenting among mothers of children with disabilities

The relevance of the quality of parent-child interactions for child development has long been established. Nevertheless, research on beliefs about maternal sensitivity is still scarce, to an even greater extent in the context of child disability. This inquiry aimed to describe beliefs about sensitive parenting among mothers of children with developmental disabilities and to examine how those beliefs relate to sociodemographic factors and perceived stress. Participants included 40 mothers with a child up to 7 years of age with a developmental disability. Mothers reported on sociodemographic factors and daily hassles and sorted an adapted version of the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort. Results revealed a strong convergence between maternal beliefs about the ideal mother and the attachment theory's concept of sensitivity. Daily hassles predicted beliefs about the ideal mother. These results underline the importance of implementing interventions in the context of child disability aimed at reducing parental stress.

Climbing Mountains and Avoiding Slippery Slopes: Challenges in Constructing Measures of Children's Environments

ABSTRACT

Constructing valid, useful measures of children's environments is critical for advancing knowledge about relations between environmental conditions and child well-being. The approach to constructing useful measures of children's environments varies somewhat from the approach needed to construct valid, useful measures of children's personal characteristics. The commentary includes a review of literature on the distinction between reflective indicators and causal/formative indicators because it applies to the construction of measures of human environments. It also offers suggestions on how to select indicators for inclusion in measures of the environment and how to select assessments of child outcomes for validating measures of children's environments.

Dynamic interaction patterns of monolingual and bilingual infants with their parents

Bilingual children show a number of advantages in the domain of communication. The aim of the current study was to investigate whether differences in interactions are present before productive language skills emerge. For a duration of 5 minutes, 64 parents and their 14-month-old infants explored a decorated room together. The coordination of their behaviors in the modalities of action, language, and gesture was coded. The results showed no differences in interactions across different language statuses. In two additional analyses, we first compared monolinguals and bilinguals with caregivers who shared the same language and culture. Results showed the same pattern of non-difference. Second, we compared bilinguals with caregivers from different cultures. The rate and duration of coordination differed across infants with different cultural backgrounds. The findings suggest that exposure to two languages is not sufficient to explain the previously identified beneficial effects in the communicative interactions of bilingual children.

Developmental Trajectories of Maternal Sensitivity across the First Year of Life: Relations among Emotion Competence and Dyadic Reciprocity

OBJECTIVE

Maternal sensitivity is a commonly used construct to capture the quality of mother-child interactions, but inconsistencies in conceptualizing and defining maternal sensitivity limit understanding of how sensitive caregiving may be associated with child development. The purposes of this study are to (1) examine and compare the developmental trajectories of individual maternal sensitivity behaviors to that of a global index of sensitivity across the first year of infant life and (2) determine whether differences in trajectories of sensitivity are meaningful for infant emotion competence and dyadic reciprocity at 12 months.

DESIGN

A total of 322 low-income, Mexican American mothers and infants were observed during a free play task at 3, 4.5, 6, and 12 months. Observations were coded for 11 distinct behaviors known to compose maternal sensitivity. At 12 months, mother-infant interactions were also coded for dyadic reciprocity, and mothers reported on infant emotion competence.

RESULTS

Latent growth models indicated that individual sensitivity behaviors differed from the global index of sensitivity with respect to initial levels and slopes, with increasing (e.g., vocal appropriateness), decreasing (e.g., touch), and stable (e.g., elaboration) trajectories. The individual and global indices of sensitivity differed in prediction of emotion competence and dyadic reciprocity. Trajectories of global and individual indices of maternal sensitivity operated similarly in predicting dyadic reciprocity, with the exception of consistency of style. In contrast, the global index of sensitivity was unrelated to emotion competence, and only initial levels of positive affect emerged as significant predictors of emotion competence.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings offer a more nuanced understanding of maternal sensitivity and suggest that component aspects of maternal sensitivity uniquely contribute to child and family competencies.

Beliefs About Sensitive Parenting Among Chinese Cross-Generational Caregivers: The Mediating Role of Education

This study investigated beliefs about sensitive parenting of cross-generational caregivers from urban and rural areas of China. A total sample of 135 urban and rural mothers and grandmothers sorted the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort to indicate their view of the ideal mother. These sorts were compared with the expert sort reflecting the highly sensitive mother as defined in attachment theory. Generally, the caregivers from both generations and both urban and rural residence showed beliefs convergent with the notion of sensitivity. The variation in their sensitivity beliefs could be predicted by the caregivers' generation and this relation was mediated by the caregivers' education levels. The mothers' higher educational level predicted views that were more in line with the experts' view of sensitivity. Caregivers' education levels also mediated between their urban or rural residence and sensitivity beliefs. The possible implications for differences in parental care and grandparental care in the Chinese cultural context are discussed.

Evaluating Caregiver Sensitivity to Infants: Measures Matter

The significance of caregiver sensitivity for child development has been debated among scholars, not least due to sensitivity's inconsistent predictive value over time and across contexts. A lack of uniformity in the definition of sensitivity contributes to this debate, but shortfalls of inter-tool concordance and construct validity in the instruments used to assess sensitivity may also be at issue. This study examines correspondences among four established standardized measures of caregiver sensitivity in independent classifications of the same sample of mothers of infants. 50 European American mother- infant dyads of diverse SES were independently assessed with three observational caregiver sensitivity measures: the Emotional Availability Scales (EAS; Biringen, 2008), the Parent Child Interaction - Nursing Child Assessment Feeding Scale (PCI-NCAFS; Oxford & Findlay, 2015), and the Maternal Behaviour Q-Sort (MBQS; Moran, Pederson & Bento, 2009). Ratings were juxtaposed with classifications of the same sample based on the original Ainsworth Maternal Sensitivity Scales (AMSS; Ainsworth, 1969). The EAS, NCAFS, and MBQS related to the AMSS, but large proportions of variance were unshared. Researchers and clinicians should be cautious when assuming that popular observational assessment instruments, commonly believed to measure a generic construct of caregiver sensitivity, are interchangeable, as these measures may evaluate different features of sensitivity to infants.

'Mixed blessings': parental religiousness, parenting, and child adjustment in global perspective

BACKGROUND

Most studies of the effects of parental religiousness on parenting and child development focus on a particular religion or cultural group, which limits generalizations that can be made about the effects of parental religiousness on family life.

METHODS

We assessed the associations among parental religiousness, parenting, and children's adjustment in a 3-year longitudinal investigation of 1,198 families from nine countries. We included four religions (Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, and Islam) plus unaffiliated parents, two positive (efficacy and warmth) and two negative (control and rejection) parenting practices, and two positive (social competence and school performance) and two negative (internalizing and externalizing) child outcomes. Parents and children were informants.

RESULTS

Greater parent religiousness had both positive and negative associations with parenting and child adjustment. Greater parent religiousness when children were age 8 was associated with higher parental efficacy at age 9 and, in turn, children's better social competence and school performance and fewer child internalizing and externalizing problems at age 10. However, greater parent religiousness at age 8 was also associated with more parental control at age 9, which in turn was associated with more child internalizing and externalizing problems at age 10. Parental warmth and rejection had inconsistent relations with parental religiousness and child outcomes depending on the informant. With a few exceptions, similar patterns of results held for all four religions and the unaffiliated, nine sites, mothers and fathers, girls and boys, and controlling for demographic covariates.

CONCLUSIONS

Parents and children agree that parental religiousness is associated with more controlling parenting and, in turn, increased child problem behaviors. However, children see religiousness as related to parental rejection, whereas parents see religiousness as related to parental efficacy and warmth, which have different associations with child functioning. Studying both parent and child views of religiousness and parenting are important to understand the effects of parental religiousness on parents and children.

Fostering secure attachment in low- and middle-income countries: Suggestions for evidence-based interventions

Children struggling with the effects of trauma in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) face a substantial mental health resource gap that limits their opportunities for positive psychosocial development. Multidisciplinary interventions working to close this gap may benefit from incorporating an empirically supported treatment (EST) into their approach that targets a universal mechanism implicated in resilience, like attachment. ESTs should be selected based on their level of empirical support and cultural adaptability, and then modified on the basis of qualitative evaluations conducted with the local population and stakeholders. This paper will provide an overview of attachment as a mechanism of resilience, a critical analysis of existing attachment-based ESTs, and recommendations for overcoming EST implementation barriers in LMIC.

Predicting Zambian Grandmothers' Sensitivity Toward Their Grandchildren

Whereas child care by grandmothers is widespread in the African cultural context, few studies have examined predictors of the quality of grandmaternal care in Africa. In the current study, we collected observational data to investigate predictors of the quality of grandmother-grandchild interactions in Zambia. Data were collected from 46 grandmothers and their 12 to 27-month-old infant grandchildren. The results revealed that grandmothers with fewer children and those who enjoyed the grandparenting tasks more were more sensitive in their interactions with their grandchildren. Unexpectedly, parenting beliefs favoring sensitive parenting predicted lower observed sensitivity in grandmothers. Further, grandmothers with a more individualistic cultural orientation were more intrusive toward their grandchildren. The results underscore the importance of time and emotional resources as predictors of sensitive parenting among grandmothers.

Is the ideal mother a sensitive mother? Beliefs about early childhood parenting in mothers across the globe

In this article, we test the hypothesis that beliefs about the ideal mother are convergent across cultures and that these beliefs overlap considerably with attachment theory’s notion of the sensitive mother. In a sample including 26 cultural groups from 15 countries around the globe, 751 mothers sorted the Maternal Behavior Q-Set to reflect their ideas about the ideal mother. The results show strong convergence between maternal beliefs about the ideal mother and attachment theory’s description of the sensitive mother across groups. Cultural group membership significantly predicted variations in maternal sensitivity belief scores, but this effect was substantially accounted for by group variations in socio-demographic factors. Mothers living in rural versus urban areas, with a low family income, and with more children, were less likely to describe the ideal mother as highly sensitive. Cultural group membership did remain a significant predictor of variations in maternal sensitivity belief scores above and beyond socio-demographic predictors. The findings are discussed in terms of the universal and culture-specific aspects of the sensitivity construct.

Constructing and Adapting Causal and Formative Measures of Family Settings: The HOME Inventory as Illustration

Measures of the home environment are frequently used in studies of children's development. This review provides information on indices composed of causal and formative indicators (the kind of indicators often used to capture salient aspects of family environments) and to suggest approaches that may be useful in constructing such measures for diverse populations. The HOME Inventory is used to illustrate challenges scholars face in determining what to include in useful measures of family settings. To that end, a cross-cultural review of research on relations among HOME, family context, and child outcomes is presented. The end of the review offers a plan for how best to further research on relations between the home environment and child development for diverse populations.

Video-feedback intervention increases sensitive parenting in ethnic minority mothers: a randomized control trial

Using a randomized control trial design we tested the effectiveness of a culturally sensitive adaptation of the Video-feedback Intervention to promote Positive Parenting and Sensitive Discipline (VIPP-SD) in a sample of 76 Turkish minority families in the Netherlands. The VIPP-SD was adapted based on a pilot with feedback of the target mothers, resulting in the VIPP-TM (VIPP-Turkish Minorities). The sample included families with 20-47-month-old children with high levels of externalizing problems. Maternal sensitivity, nonintrusiveness, and discipline strategies were observed during pretest and posttest home visits. The VIPP-TM was effective in increasing maternal sensitivity and nonintrusiveness, but not in enhancing discipline strategies. Applying newly learned sensitivity skills in discipline situations may take more time, especially in a cultural context that favors more authoritarian strategies. We conclude that the VIPP-SD program and its video-feedback approach can be successfully applied in immigrant families with a non-Western cultural background, with demonstrated effects on parenting sensitivity and nonintrusiveness.