Mediating roles of character traits and parenting in the relationship between maternal effortful control and children’s conduct problems

PeerJ

article

Maor Yeshua¹  Ada H. Zohar²  Andrea Berger¹ 

[1] Department of Psychology, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev;Department of Behavioral Sciences, Ruppin Academic Center;Graduate Program in Clinical Psychology, Ruppin Academic Center;Graduate Program in Gerontological Clinical Psychology, Ruppin Academic Center;School of Brain Sciences and Cognition, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

关键词: Effortful control;    Conduct problems;    Parenting;    Big-five;    TCI;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.15211

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

Background Parenting practices are crucial to children’s development and are important predictors of children’s conduct problems. The aim of the current study was to test the mediating role of mothers’ character traits on the relationship between their temperamental self-regulation and their parenting practices, and on their children’s conduct problems. Method A representative sample of 387 Israeli mothers of kindergarten children was recruited online. They completed questionnaires about their own effortful control (adult temperament questionnaire; ATQ), character traits (temperament and character inventory-revised (TCI-R), big five inventory (BFI)), and parenting practices (coping with children’s negative emotions scale; CCNES), as well as conduct problems of their children (strengths and difficulties questionnaire; SDQ). Structural equation models were fitted, testing for direct and indirect connections, once with character traits drawn from the TCI and once with BFI traits. Results In both analyses, the first model presented a significant direct effect between mothers’ effortful control and children’s conduct problems. When including mother’s parenting and character (based on the TCI or on the BFI) in the model, the direct path became insignificant and significant mediation effects were found; specifically, the indirect path through the parenting practices, as well as the mediated mediation path through the parenting practices and character. Moreover, mediation effects were found between mothers’ effortful control and parenting practices through some character traits. The selected models showed a good fit (e.g., NFI = 0.985; CFI = 0.997; RMSEA = 0.038). Discussion Our findings emphasize the importance of the mother’s mature personality characteristics, the mother’s actual parental practices, and the crucial value of this path for predicting child behavior outcomes.

【 授权许可】

CC BY