Poster #52 - A Smartphone-Based Parenting Measure: Assessing Positive and Negative Parental Consistency in Relation to Child ADHD

• In Event: 1-169 - Poster Session 04
  In Poster Session: PS 04 Section - Developmental Psychopathology

Integrative Statement

Introduction
Parents of children with ADHD exhibit more negative parenting behaviors compared to children without ADHD symptoms (Demmer et al., 2017). While parental inconsistent discipline is a well-established risk factor for child ADHD (Cussen et al., 2012), few studies have examined whether inconsistent positive parental behaviors (e.g., warmth, positive reinforcement) are also associated with child ADHD. Further, we were interested in the role of the child’s sex as a potential moderator of the association between parental consistency and ADHD, given that boys with ADHD tend to exhibit more externalizing behaviors compared to girls with ADHD (Gaub & Carlson, 1997). This study employed a daily smartphone-based ecological momentary assessment (EMA) to examine associations between consistency of positive and negative parenting and child ADHD symptoms. It was hypothesized that parents would exhibit greater inconsistency in both negative and positive behaviors with male children compared to female children in connection with child ADHD symptoms.

Method
Data were collected from 201 kindergarteners (M=6.04, SD=.42) and their parents. Of the child participants, 55.2% were male and 81.6% were Caucasian. Consistency of positive and negative parenting was measured from the Mobile Survey of Parent-Child Dynamics (Li & Lansford, 2018), a daily EMA survey delivered to parents’ smartphones each day for one week. This survey consisted of questions that asked about different aspects of positive and negative parenting practices including different methods of responding to the child’s misbehaviors and reporting various positive and negative interactions with the child. Inconsistent discipline was also measured using the parent-reported Alabama Parenting Questionnaire (APQ). ADHD symptoms were measured using parenting ratings from the attention problems subscale of the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL).

Results
Controlling for income, child ethnicity, and oppositional defiant disorder symptoms, an interaction was detected between child sex and positive parental inconsistency as measured using the smartphone EMA in predicting child ADHD symptoms, (B=.21, SE=.09, p= 02). This interaction was replicated when we examined interactions between child sex and inconsistent discipline as measured from the APQ. Specifically, positive (but not negative) parental inconsistency from the EMA was associated with ADHD symptoms for males only (B=.12, SE=.06, p=.03), but not for females (B=-.06, SE=.08, p=.46). Once again, this pattern of association was replicated with data from the APQ.

Discussion
We used a novel smartphone-based measure of parental consistency to examine the role of child sex on the association between consistency of parenting behaviors and child ADHD. Parents who were more inconsistent in their expressions of warmth and positive reinforcement in response to their child’s behaviors exacerbated their child’s ADHD symptoms, but only among boys. One interpretation of these findings is that parents of boys may simply notice and acknowledge boys’ ADHD symptoms more than girls,’ which in turn, might cause them to engage in less consistent positive parenting practices. However, longitudinal (i.e., mediation) analyses are needed to examine whether these associations are causal. Nonetheless, parent-child interventions for ADHD should focus on encouraging greater consistency of adaptive parenting behaviors, and not just on reducing negative parenting behaviors

Authors

• Jennifer Alpert, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Presenting Author

• James J. Li, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Non-Presenting Author