Poster #38 - Socioeconomic Status, Parenting, and Inhibitory Control at age 2 Predict Later Child Prosocial Behaviors.

• In Event: Poster Session 15

Abstract

Prosocial behavior is associated with higher levels of subjective well-being (Eisenberg et al., 2006) and greater academic achievement across childhood (Blake et al., 2015). Understanding the factors that increase prosocial behaviors in early childhood is important in studying pathways to competence and well-being. Children’s developing self-regulation could help promote prosocial behaviors, as inhibitory control has been linked to prosocial behavior in childhood (Yavuz et al., 2022). Parents also play a key role in children’s development of prosocial behavior in infancy and childhood (Brownell, 2016). At the family level, higher socioeconomic status (SES) has been linked to greater prosocial behavior (Berthelsen & Williams, 2013), while lower SES may indicate fewer resources and have downstream effects on parental stress, parenting, and children’s competencies (Conger et al., 2010), including cognitive control (Farah et al., 2006) and prosocial behavior (Flouri & Sarmadi, 2016). Interestingly, maternal sensitivity was found to moderate the link between SES and prosocial behavior in adolescents (Yao & Enright, 2022), but it is unknown whether authoritative parenting buffers the effect of lower SES or lower inhibitory control at younger ages. This project examined the moderating effect of parenting style (i.e., authoritative, authoritarian, and permissive parenting) and inhibitory control at age 2 on the link between SES at age 2 and prosocial behaviors in kindergarten.

Children (N = 196, 48.4% female, Mage = 24.64 months) were recruited as part of a longitudinal study on child temperament. SES was calculated using parent-reported education and occupation (Hollingshead, 1975) at age 2. Parents also reported their parenting styles (Parenting Practices Questionnaire; Robinson et al., 1995; alpha = .82) and children’s inhibitory control (Toddler Behavior Assessment Questionnaire; Goldsmith, 1996; alpha = .82) at age 2, and children’s prosocial behaviors at age 5 (McArthur Health Behavior Questionnaire; Armstrong et al., 2003; alpha = .87).

The authoritative parenting path analytic model fit well, chi-square = 8.07, p = .92, CFI = 1.00, TLI = 1.29, RMSEA = 0.00, SRMR = .05, and explained significant variance in child prosocial behavior at age 5 (28%). There was a significant three-way interaction between SES, authoritative parenting, and inhibitory control in predicting children’s later prosocial behaviors (see Figure 1). When inhibitory control was lower, there was only a positive association between authoritative parenting and child prosocial behavior when SES was higher. When inhibitory control was higher, authoritative parenting was positively related to prosocial behavior only when SES was lower. For the authoritarian and permissive parenting models, only the main effect of early inhibitory control on later child prosocial behavior was significant.

The findings suggest that in toddlerhood, parenting involving warmth and control in the presence of lower child self-regulation or fewer family resources might support the development of prosocial behaviors. These results also indicate the importance of inhibitory control, supporting prior work on the role of self-regulation in the development of prosocial behavior (Berthelsen & Williams, 2013). Moving beyond global measures like SES, further research is needed to understand how neighborhood resources and authoritative parenting might support the development of prosocial behavior.

Authors

• Kathryn N. Gray, Pennsylvania State University, University Park
  Presenting Author

• Frances M. Lobo, University of Texas at Austin

• Kristin A. Buss, Pennsylvania State University, University Park