The Association of a Parenting by Lying Attachment Subscale with Parental and Peer Attachment

• In Event: Negative parenting

Abstract

Although parents all over the world believe honesty to be an important virtue, they sometimes lie to their children in the course of parenting. This form of lying is called parenting by lying, which is a relatively newly studied parenting phenomenon (Heyman et al., 2009). Recent studies have revealed that parental lies likely have long-term negative mental health consequences (Jackson et al., 2021; Setoh et al., 2022). Research in the field of attachment has been extensive, and has revealed the crucial role of parental involvement and the quality of parent communication in shape their children’s attachment to parents and peers (Armsden & Greenberg, 1987; Gorrese & Ruggieri, 2012). Within the 20-item Parenting by Lying measure, there are 4 items which can form a Parenting by Lying Attachment Subscale (e.g., “If you don't want to come with me, I will leave you here by yourself.”; Setoh et al., 2022). In this study, we examined the intriguing possibility that attachment-related parenting lies are related to children’s attachment to parents and peers. Unlike previous studies on parental lies which used adults’ retrospective recall of parental lies (Santos et al., 2017; Setoh et al., 2020), we asked children to report the parenting lies they hear and their beliefs about whether the lies are truthful, and link their reports to their current attachment to parents and peers.
Singaporean children aged 11 to 12 years (N = 342) responded to items on the Parenting by Lying Attachment Subscale, their belief in the lies (“How true did you think the statement was when you heard your parents say it?”), and parent and peer attachment (IPPA-R; Gullone & Robinson, 2005). Our findings indicate that greater exposure to attachment-related parental lies was associated with poorer parent attachment (β = -.190, p < .001), but not peer attachment (β = -.063, p = n.s.). Conversely, belief in attachment-related parental lies was associated with better parent attachment (β = .122, p < .05), but not peer attachment (β = .003, p = n.s.). There was a marginally significant interaction between belief and exposure such that the negative association between parental lies and parental attachment was only seen when belief in parental lies was low or moderate (Figure 1). Similarly, there was a significant indirect negative association of exposure to parental lies on peer attachment through parent attachment when belief was low or moderate (Figure 2).
This research presents an exciting new link between two research areas – parenting by lying and children’s attachment to parents and peers. Our results taken together show that attachment-related parental lies are negatively associated with parent attachment when children do not believe those lies, and exposure to attachment-related parental lies shapes peer attachment through parent attachment. They suggest that although lying is a common strategy that parents use to gain children’s behavioral compliance, lies related to a child’s feelings of safety and security may be particularly important for their attachment relationships and there may be potential negative consequences if parents use such lies.

Authors

• Petrina Hui Xian Low, Nanyang Technological University
  Presenting Author

• Anne Elise Rifkin-Graboi, National Institute of Education

• Kang Lee, University of Toronto

• Peipei Setoh, Nanyang Technological University