Understanding Parental Control and Structure in Anxious and Non-Anxious Children: An Observational Study

• In Event: Poster Session 03
  In Poster Session: PS 03 Topic - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Abstract

Anxiety is one of the most commonly experienced psychological difficulties in school-aged children (Costello et al., 2003). Studies have shown that controlling parenting, defined as pressuring children towards specific outcomes, is associated with higher child anxiety, and parents of anxious children are more controlling in interactions (Grolnick et al.,1997). Less is currently known about how the context in which parents and children are interacting plays a role, and how other parenting dimensions come into play.

The first goal of this study is to examine parents’ controlling behavior in parent-child interactions in a sample of parents and children with and without a diagnosed anxiety disorder. The next goal is to determine in which types of interactive tasks parents may be more vulnerable to controlling behavior, and how parental controllingness is associated with children’s behavior. The final goal is to examine the less studied role of parental structure (providing consistent rules and regulations) in parent-child interactions for anxious and non-anxious children. Parenting constructs will be examined using a Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2017) framework.

Children ages 7-17 and their parent will be screened for a child anxiety disorder using the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule for DSM-IV: Child and Parent Version (ADIS-C/P). Twenty-five children with and 25 children without a clinical anxiety disorder will interact with their parent on three 5-minute tasks (anxiety task, conflict task, speech preparation task). Raters will code each video in pairs and discuss disagreements until a consensus rating is reached. Parent behavior will be coded for controllingness versus autonomy support and provision of structure. Child behavior will be coded for task engagement and positive versus negative affect.

The study hypotheses are: 1) Parents of children in the anxious group will be rated as more controlling across task than parents of children in the non-anxious group; 2) Higher ratings of parental structure across task will be associated with children’s greater engagement and more positive affect; 3) Parents will be more controlling when the task is high stress, and this will be especially true for parents of anxious children; 4) When parents are more controlling, children will be less engaged/express less positive affect across task, and this will be especially true for the anxious children in high stress tasks.

Repeated measures ANOVAs will be run in order to examine whether there are differences in parenting (controllingness; structure) by child anxiety status (anxious versus non-anxious), task, and the interaction between anxiety status and task. To test whether child anxiety status and type of task moderates the relation between parental control and child engagement/affect, multiple linear regressions will be conducted.

The ultimate goal of this research is to identify situations that make parents more vulnerable to maladaptive parenting practices and situations in which children can benefit most from facilitative parenting practices in order to intervene more specifically and appropriately for both anxious and non-anxious children.

Data collection has been fully completed and data analysis is in process. Analyses will be completed prior to the 2021 meeting.

Authors

• Madeline Levitt, Clark University
  Presenting Author

• Wendy S Grolnick, Clark University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jacquelyn Raftery-Helmer, Worcester State University
  Non-Presenting Author