Predictors of Mother-Child Relationship Quality When Expecting a Second Child

• In Event: Mother-Child Relationships and Early Child Development in Different Cultures

Abstract

Mother-child relationship quality has been widely investigated as a key influence on children’s development. The current study aims to understand the predictors of mother-first-born-child relationship quality when the mother is expecting a second child. Based on Belsky’s determinants of parenting theory and ecological model, we suggested three domains to predict mother child relationship quality, maternal personal resources (well-being, effortful control), contextual factors (chaos, social support, marital satisfaction) and child characteristics (effortful control, behavior problems).
Mothers and their typically developing children were invited to participate in the third trimester of pregnancy (M= 33.43 weeks; SD = 4.45). Forty-six mothers (Mage= 34.78 years; SDage = 3.86 years) and their typically developing first-born children (Mchild age=32.26 months; SDage = 6.27) were recruited by nurseries and via social media (facebook groups) in the south of England, Sussex, UK. They were visited at home, where mothers completed questionnaires and mother-child interactions were videotaped. Relationship quality was measured by using the relationship quality (RQ) observational code from the fifth edition of IOWA Family Interaction Rating Scales (Melby et al., 1998). Child effortful control was rated by the home-visit researchers; by using The Early Childhood Behaviour Questionnaire (ECBQ) very short form (Putnam et al., 2006) all other measures were maternal self-reports.
Results demonstrated that better child effortful control skills, less maternal symptoms of depression, anxiety and stress, less household chaos and more social support were related to better mother-child relationship quality (see Table 1). A multiple regression analysis was conducted with the variables showing significant bivariate associations as predictors. The overall model was significant F (4, 40) = 4.89, p < .01 and 26% of the variance in relationship quality was explained. Child’s effortful control (B = .32, p < .05) and household chaos (B = -2.16 p < .05) provided independent prediction, whereas neither social support nor maternal were significant (see Table 2).
The better child’s effortful control skills and less household chaos predicted better mother-child relationship quality. These results contributed to the literature on expecting a second child, and promise several implications. Simple concrete interventions to reduce amount of chaos at home, such as turning the TV off, have a regular child bed routine might help in improving mom-child relationship.

Authors

• Sumeyra Yalcintas, University of Sussex
  Presenting Author

• Alison Pike, University of Sussex
  Non-Presenting Author

• Rengim Kilavuz, Koc University
  Non-Presenting Author