Higher Parental Stress Leads to Interruptions in Parent-Child Interactions due to Parents’ Own Technology Use

• In Event: Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Topic - Technology, Media & Child Development

Abstract

Parents’ use of mobile devices around their children is associated with less responsive parental behaviors and more interruptions in parent-child interactions (Radesky et al., 2015; Hiniker et al., 2015). The frequency of these interruptions predicts children’s concurrent and later internalizing (e.g., withdrawal) and externalizing problems (e.g., temper tantrums) (McDaniel & Radesky, 2018a, b). These studies further show that parenting stress and parents’ problematic use of mobile technology (e.g., feeling an urge to check new messages) are associated with the frequency of technology-based interruptions in parent-child interactions. We suggest that parental stress may lead to more frequent technology-based interruptions via two different routes. More stressed parents (i) may display more problematic use of technology or (ii) may allow their children, as well as themselves, to use media for longer periods of time. Here we test which of these explanations is more likely to explain the source of technology-based interruptions in interactions between parents and children.

For this purpose, we collected data from 721 parents (649 mothers) of young children under age 6 (358 girls) via an online survey. Parents reported on the frequency of parent-child interactions being interrupted due to the incoming messages and notifications to their smartphones on a 5-point scale ranging from 0 (never) to 4 (always). To compute children’s and parents’ average daily screen time, we asked parents about how much time they and their children spend with TV, smartphones, tablet computers, computers, and video game consoles on weekdays and weekends. We assessed parental problematic use of mobile devices via three items (e.g., having trouble to suppress the urge to check their phone) on a 5-point scale ranging from 0 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree). Parents rated their level of stress on issues related to their work, health, partner, material resources, and shortage of time on a 4-point scale ranging from 0 (not at all stressed) to 3 (highly stressed). An average value for stress was computed via averaging across different domains (e.g., health, partner).

Table 1 shows descriptive information and the correlation between variables. Mediation analyses (see Figure 1) showed that parents’ problematic use of mobile technology was a significant mediator such that higher parental stress was associated with more interruptions in parent-child interactions via parents’ more problematic use of mobile technology, F(2,718)=90.2, R2=.20, p<.001. Similarly, parents’ screen time mediated the relationship between parental stress and interruptions such that higher parental stress was associated with more screen time for parents and resulted in more interruptions in parent-child interactions, F(2,718)=31.3, R2=.08, p<.001. On the other hand, children’s screen time was not a significant mediator.

In sum, higher parental stress was associated with more interruptions in parent-child interactions via higher parental screen time and parents’ problematic use of mobile technology, and not via children’s screen time. Our results indicate that digital technology may serve as an outlet for stressed parents and cause disruptions in the flow of parent-child interactions.

Authors

• Berna A. Uzundag, Kadir Has University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Cansu Oranc, Koç Üniversitesi
  Non-Presenting Author

• Dilara Kessafoglu, Koç Üniversitesi
  Presenting Author

• Merve Nur Altundal, Özyeğin University
  Non-Presenting Author