COVID-19 Pandemic-Related Risks to Parenting Processes for Mothers and Fathers of Young Children

• In Event: Poster Session 07
  In Poster Session: PS 07 Topic - Family Context & Processes

Abstract

COVID-19 is affecting families with young children in unprecedented ways. In addition to economic strain, a known risk to parenting (Masarik & Conger, 2017), the pandemic includes unique stressors such as those related directly to the virus itself (e.g., illness, infection risks). Child care disruptions are a common burden for parents with young children (Patrick et al., 2020). Each of these stressors may contribute to poor parental functioning, including parenting cognitions like parenting stress, and behaviors like harsh parenting (Brown et al., 2020). Research is only emerging to identify which of these stressors may be most likely to jeopardize children by compromising parenting. Further, these stressors, may be experienced differently for mothers and fathers (Craig & Churchill, 2020).

Hypotheses:

1. Three types of COVID-related risks (economic strain, infection stress, and child care disruptions) will be independently positively associated with parenting stress and harsh parenting.
2.These patterns will be similar for mothers and fathers, except child care disruptions are predicted to be a greater risk for mothers’ parenting in comparison to fathers.

Method
Data are from a short-term longitudinal online study of parents ( N=112 mothers and N=38 fathers) in the US who live with their 2-4-year-old child. Wave 1 data collection is complete. Wave 2 (2-month follow-up) will be complete in October. See Table 1 for descriptives. Analyses will be complete by March. One parent per family responded to a series of questions about COVID, relationships, wellbeing and child development.

Parenting Stress (W1 and W2) was measured with the 18-item Parental Stress Scale
(Berry & Jones, 1995). Harsh parenting (W1 and W2) consisted of the 5-item punitive parenting scale from the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire-Preschool Revision (Clerkin et al., 2007). Economic strain (averaged across W1 and W2) was measured with 5-items adapted from the economic strain questionnaire (Conger & Elder, 1994). Infection Stress (sum W1 and W2) consisted of the sum of yes/no responses to seven possible experiences related to the virus (e.g., parent or family member infected, family member hospitalized, COVID risk-factors). Child care disruptions (sum W1 and W2) is the sum of yes/no responses to 8-items (e.g., provider loss, changed work schedule to care for child). Alternatively, if the psychometrics are sound, we will use an original 6-item measure asking parents to rate how stressful child care experiences have been during the pandemic.

Planned Analysis & Conclusions
Hierarchical multiple regression analyses will be computed to test the hypotheses with identical variables in models predicting W2 parenting stress and W2 harsh parenting Covariates include child age, child sex, and W1 parenting.
H1: The main effects of the three stressors will be included in the regression equation, controlling for parent sex.
H2: Regression coefficients representing interactions between parent sex and each of the 3 stressors will be included to test for moderation by parent sex. Significant interactions will be probed to plot simple slopes (Hayes, 2018).

The results may highlight critical areas in which to support mothers, fathers, or both parents to buffer families from the increasingly chronic pandemic stressors.

Authors

• Melissa A. Barnett, University of Arizona
  Presenting Author

• Maria Belinda Vasquez, University of Arizona
  Non-Presenting Author

• Xiaomin Li, University of Arizona
  Non-Presenting Author

• Victoria Cooper, University of Arizona
  Non-Presenting Author