Parents' gender-based attitudes toward marital roles and child rearing: Development and validation of new measures

Factor analysis of 18 Likert-type items dealing with gender stereotypes about family roles was conducted and yielded two measures: one focused on marital roles and one focussed on child rearing. Respondents were parents of children in the third and fourth grades of a large industrialized city in the Midwest. The sample included 364 families equally divided between middle and lower class with 23% African American and 77% European American. For both scales, more stereotyped scores were obtained by parents who were lower in social status, less educated, full-time homemakers, African Americans, and fathers. Parents' scores related to a separate measure of children's stereotypes and the marital-role attitudes related to actual roles reported by family members. Daughters whose parents obtained less stereotyped scores had a more internal locus of control, showed a trend toward more independent coping skills, and—in the middle class—obtained higher scores on achievement tests.This research was supported by Grant No. 91-1437-91 from the William T. Grant Foundation.     

A scale to measure attitudes toward working

The purpose of this study was to develop a scale that could measure attitude toward work and be used to determine the relation between length of unemployment time and work attitudes. Standardization of the Employment Readiness Scale was completed through its administration to three independent groups (N = 430): (1) employed workers: employees who worked in unskilled, semiskilled, and occasionally skilled job classifications; (2) unemployed individuals who were actively looking for regular employment at the Tennessee State Employment Service; and (3) the chronically unemployed: individuals, who, for the most part, were not looking for regular employment and who were seeking night lodging and meals at the Salvation Army or the Knoxville Union Rescue Mission. Through item analysis, it was determined that 43 of the 45-scale items were significant at or beyond the .01 level. It was further established that a relationship existed between work attitudes and length of unemployment. The longer an individual was unemployed, the less positive was his attitude toward work.     

Perinatal loss and maternal attitudes toward the subsequent child

Twenty-five mothers who had experienced a previous perinatal loss and a comparison group of 30 nonloss mothers completed the Maternal Attitude Questionnaire (MAQ) and the Maternal Separation Anxiety Scale (MSAS) when their children were 16 months old. The purposes of the study were to describe and evaluate the development of a new measure (the MAQ) and to examine the hypothesis that mothers who experienced a perinatal loss would express (a) more concern about the subsequent child's health, (b) more investment in the child, and (c) heightened concern about maternal-child differentiation/separation in comparison to nonloss mothers. The results showed that the MAQ had good internal consistency. None of the three factors of the MSAS differentiated between the two groups of mothers while two subscales of the MAQ did: (1) Maternal Concern with Child's Health and (2) Maternal Concern with Differentiation. Mothers who had experienced a perinatal loss thus expressed more concerns about their children's physical well-being and more concerns about differentiating from their child than mothers who had not had a perinatal loss.     

Differences in child rearing attitudes between immigrant Chinese mothers and Anglo-American mothers

In order to explore cultural differences in child rearing attitudes, we studied 30 Anglo-American mothers and 30 immigrant Chinese mothers in the US, together with their preschool children and the children's teachers. Mothers completed a measure of child rearing attitudes, children were assessed for perceived competence, and teachers rated children's competence. Results showed that immigrant Chinese mothers were more authoritarian overall, as expected from previous research, but that they also were more likely to encourage independence and demand maturity from their children. Chinese-American children scored higher than Anglo-American children on cognitive competence, and their cognitive competence was related to authoritarian child rearing. The results are discussed in the context of Confucian and American cultural values. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cross-cultural similarity in the love attitudes scale: short form.

Recently, Hendrick, Hendrick, and Dicke presented two short forms of the Love Attitudes Scale, the first using 24 items with 4 items for each subscale and the second using 18 items with 3 items for each subscale. Their data indicated that the two short versions have even stronger psychometric properties than the original scale. This study reports an 18-item short form of the scale developed independently in Taiwan using 460 graduate and undergraduate students in the fall semester of 1997. The results demonstrated a remarkable cross-cultural similarity in the development and response to the short form of the scale and its applicability to a broader cultural setting.     

Development and validation of a short form aggressive beliefs and attitudes scale

This research outlines six studies (total N = 3867) that develop and validate an Aggressive Beliefs and Attitudes — Short Form scale for use within the normal nonclinical adult population (e.g., organizational psychology). In the first two samples, exploratory factor analysis reduced the original 30 item scale to a shorter, more parsimonious, eight item measure. In the third sample, confirmatory factor analysis found that the proposed model and items fit the data extremely well. Examination of the nomological network underlying the new measure in Samples 3–4 displayed relationships with positive affect, negative affect, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism ranging from r = .23 to − .23, while relationships with anger, hostility, physical aggression, and verbal aggression ranged from r = .49 to .30. Finally, in two criterion-related validity studies the relationships between the aggressive beliefs and attitudes scales, both original and short forms, and workplace deviance were examined with independent samples of employed adults. The short form scale was significantly related to workplace deviance in both samples (r = .37 and .43). Furthermore, these relationships were of identical magnitude to the full 30 item measure, suggesting that the short form scale comparably captures aggression-related behaviors with a greatly reduced number of items.     

A three-factor scale of attitudes toward guns

Guns figure prominently in American culture. There is, however, considerable variability in attitudes toward guns. The beliefs and feelings that comprise attitudes toward guns may well be important moderators of numerous social behaviors. For this reason, a three-dimensional attitudes scale was constructed. The first factor consists of an abstract set of beliefs concerning the right of the American public to own or not own guns. The second and third factors tap more concrete beliefs about the consequences of gun ownership. Specifically, the second factor assesses the degree to which people believe gun ownership affords protection against crime. The third factor measures the degree to which people believe guns stimulate crime. Discriminant validity of the subscales is shown by the pattern of correlations obtained with the three dimensions and various other social and personality measures. Regression analyses indicate that the subscales are uniquely predicted by different social variables. Discussion centers on the usefulness of such a measure for future research on aggression, social policy, and attitude change.     

A functional approach to understanding attitudes toward AIDS victims.

Attitudes toward victims of AIDS were conceptualized as serving three possible functions: a value-expressive function (e.g., stigmatization), an ego-defensive function (e.g., homosexual prejudice), or a knowledge function (e.g., victim derogation). These functions were evaluated by having a sample of U.S. undergraduates respond to a victim who had contracted AIDS by one of three different means: a blood transfusion, a sexual encounter of a homosexual nature, or intravenous drug use. Subjects then indicated their beliefs about the victim's responsibility for the disease, feelings toward the victim, and likely behavioral interactions with the victim. The findings provided most support for the knowledge function of attitudes toward AIDS victims.     

Parents' perfectionism and its relation to child rearing behaviors

The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between parents' perfectionism and self‐reported parenting behaviors. The study included 786 parents (417 mothers and 369 fathers) of high school students. Results showed that parents' positive and negative perfectionism were differently related to specific forms of child rearing practices. Namely, positive perfectionism was positively, while negative perfectionism was negatively related to parental acceptance for both mothers and fathers. Mothers' and fathers' negative perfectionism was positively related to parental criticism and permissiveness. In addition, fathers' positive perfectionism was negatively associated with permissive child rearing practices. After controlling for background variables, parents' positive and negative perfectionism explained significant amounts of variance in all self‐reported parenting dimensions for fathers and significantly accounted for the variance of parental acceptance and criticism for mothers. According to our findings, parents' perfectionism might have an important role in shaping parenting behaviors.