Poster #133 - Different Parental Responses and Cognitions in Hypothetical Power Bouts: Relation to Childrearing Styles

• In Event: 3-106 - Poster Session 11
  In Poster Session: PS 11 Section - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Integrative Statement

Baumrind’s (1967) general childrearing styles profoundly shaped parenting theory, but mechanisms to explain their impact in everyday interactions are still needed. One mechanism could be power bouts, extended sequences of parent-child interactions using various parenting strategies to manage different types of child noncompliance. Baumrind noted authoritative parents use verbal give and take, which could be construed as power bouts, but parents using other styles should engage in power bouts differently. For example, authoritarian parents might start with coercion whereas permissive parents might initially use offering alternatives similar to authoritative parents who then might shift to stronger strategies as the power bout ensues (see figure 1). To determine if particular power bout sequences are related to Baumrind’s styles of childrearing, this study explored reactions to common power bouts. It was hypothesized that authoritarian styles would be related to more coercive choices of actions generally, but authoritative individuals would shift to coercion after the first response.

Eighty-one mothers and 51 non-mothers completed a modified Childrearing Practices Report (Block, 1971) to assess warmth and control beliefs used to classify participants into four childrearing styles. They also responded to six hypothetical childrearing discipline episodes (e.g., procrastinating) with how they would respond as the parent and their next response if this did not work. These two questions were coded along a rating scale of increasing coercion where 0 was giving in, 1 no response, 2 reasoning or offering alternatives, 3 power assert verbal, 4 physical power assertion and 5 Punish (e.g., Timeout). Responses were averaged across scenarios to yield an average for the first response (R1) and second response (R2). A shift in response score was calculated for each subject by averaging the difference between R2 and R1, where positive scores indicate greater coercion while negative scores meant becoming less coercive. In addition, averages across the six scenarios were calculated for ratings of upset, confidence, and enjoyment with the child from 1 (not at all) to 5 (Extremely).

Participants were divided into Uninvolved, Permissive, Authoritative, and Authoritarian groups using median splits of warmth and control. The six dependent variables were submitted to a 2(Parental Status) x 4(Style Group) Manova yielding a significant effect for Style Group, F(13,363)=1.933, p=.013 (see Table 1). Univariate analyses revealed significant effects for R1, Upset, and Enjoy. Post-hoc analyses indicated that compared to those in the Authoritarian group, the Permissive group were less upset, less inclined to use coercive strategies as a first response, and more likely to enjoy the children in the scenarios. Similar results were found for repeated measure analyses.

The shift in the power bouts from first to second response was significantly positive (M=.77), indicating subjects increased coercion, but this shift did not distinguish between childrearing styles as hypothesized, perhaps due to the high unexpected shift in Permissive individuals. Instead, coerciveness at R1, upset, and enjoyment ratings were related to childrearing styles. Thus, further studies should focus on explaining how childrearing styles impact power bouts through initial parental behaviors and cognitions.

Author

• Kathy L. Ritchie, Indiana University at South Bend
  Presenting Author