Basic Psychological Needs and Coparenting: Similar or Distinct Constructs?

• In Event: Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Topic - Family Context & Processes

Abstract

The transition to parenthood is a salient period characterized by the emergence of the coparenting relationship, as parents renegotiate their roles and parenting responsibilities to ensure the well-being of their child and family (Feinberg et al., 2012). The theoretical framework of self-determination theory (SDT) may provide a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that underlie coparenting by considering the quality of the relationship in the perspective of satisfaction and/or thwarting of the basic psychological needs: competence, relatedness and autonomy (Ryan & Deci, 2017). Satisfying these needs in a relationship is associated with personal well-being, superior relationship quality, effective conflict management, and a better relationship perception (Ryan & Deci, 2017).

Although need-supportive and need-thwarting interpersonal behaviours have been investigated in various dyadic context, to our knowledge, no study has yet examined their associations with the quality of the coparenting relationship. It seems, however, that the satisfaction of a coparent’s basic psychological needs may influence their perception of the quality of their coparenting relationship. In addition, although some dimensions of these two constructs appear to overlap (e.g., autonomy support and coparenting support; relatedness thwarting and coparenting closeness), the theoretical distinction remains indefinite. Therefore, this study’s objective was to determine whether there is conceptual overlap between the satisfaction and/or the thwarting of the three basic needs according to SDT and the coparenting relationship during the transition to parenthood.

When children were about 6 months old, 264 childbearing mothers and 169 non-bearing parent (mostly fathers) in two-parent families in which one of the partners benefited from parental leave under the Québec Parental Insurance Plan (QPIP) completed an online questionnaire that included the Interpersonal Behaviors Questionnaire (IBQ-Other, Rocchi et al., 2017) and the Coparenting Relationship Scale (CRS, Feinberg et al., 2012).

Results from correlational analyses between the 7 CRS subscales, the total coparenting score and the 6 IBQ-Other subscales indicated that the three basic psychological needs are distinct from the following coparenting subscales, as their correlations ranged from small to moderate:
coparenting agreement (childbearing: r=.29–.53, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.30–.41, p<.000), coparenting closeness (childbearing: r=.33–.51, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.40–.60, p<.000), exposure to conflict (childbearing: r=.37–.53, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.27–.53, p<.000), coparenting undermining (childbearing: r=.30–.52, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.27–.51, p<.000), endorse partner parenting (childbearing: r=.33–.59, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.34–.42, p<.000), and division of labor (childbearing: r=.32–.43, p<.000). No significant associations were found between the IBQ-Other subscales and division of labor for non-bearing parents. The results also indicated a lack of distinction between the IBQ-Other subscales and coparenting support (childbearing: r=.47–.70, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.50–.71, p<.000) and the total coparenting score (childbearing: r=.43–.68, p<.000; non-bearing: r=.42–.61, p<.000), as their correlations were very high.

These results suggest that the quality of the coparenting relationship is associated with the perceptions of their partner’s need-supportive and need-thwarting interpersonal behaviours during the transition to parenthood. They also suggest an innovative perspective in the investigation of the mechanisms that may explain the variability in parents’ perception of their coparenting relationship.

Authors

• Rachel Perrier, Université de Montréal (UdeM)
  Presenting Author

• Julie C. Laurin
  Non-Presenting Author