A Phenomenological Study of Immigrant Parents of Adolescents with Delinquent Behavior in Israel

Scarce qualitative literature has focused on understanding the perspective of parents of adolescents involved in crime, and no prior literature has examined how the status of being a parent of an adolescent who is involved in delinquency intersects with being an immigrant parent. The current phenomenological study examined, through the eyes of immigrant parents, how they comprehend their children’s involvement in delinquent behavior. This study examined in-depth semistructured interviews conducted with fourteen immigrant parents (10 mothers and 4 fathers) from the former Soviet Union in Israel of children treated in rehabilitation facilities for delinquent youth. Data analysis revealed a gradual decline in children's behavior ascribed to the developmental stage of adolescence, the pressures of immigration, and cultural conflict. These three factors are interwoven together to create a fabric within which they see their children turning to crime. Parents' gradual loss of control is balanced by attempts to idealize the parent–child relationship and to minimize the severity of the offenses committed. They describe various differing and even contradictory experiences of themselves as parents and their struggles to piece together incohesive, alternating experiences of themselves as parents. Despite the critical role they can play in their children’s rehabilitation, as well as the distress that they themselves experience, parents of children involved in delinquent behavior have often been ignored in research. Acknowledging parents' perspectives and experiences can allow development of appropriate therapeutic strategies to support them and maximize their abilities to support their children.     

Children's hostile intent attributions and emotional distress: What do parents perceive?

Traditionally, assessments of social information processing and associated emotional distress have used children's self‐reports. We posit that additional informants, such as parents, may help illuminate the association between these variables and aggression. Our sample was composed of 222 dual‐parent families of fourth‐grade children (103 boys; 119 girls). Children responded to instrumental and relational provocations and their parents read the same scenarios and responded the way they believed their child would. Peer nominations provided aggression scores. We explored how means differed by provocation type (relational vs. instrumental), informant (mother, father, and child), and gender of child. The results also suggest that parent perceptions may effectively predict children's participation in relational and physical aggression, above and beyond the child's self‐reports.

     

Latin American immigrant parents and their children's teachers in U.S. early childhood education programmes

For many immigrants, their children's schools offer their first sustained interaction with the major societal institutions of their new countries, and so exploring the ways in which immigrant parents manage their children's educational experiences offers insight into how they adapt to new cultural norms, customs and expectations and how they are treated in return. This study delved into the involvement of Latin American immigrant parents in U.S. education, shifting the traditional focus down from elementary and secondary school to early childhood education. Statistical analysis of nationally representative data revealed that Latina immigrants had lower frequencies of most home‐ and community‐based involvement behaviours than U.S.‐born and foreign‐born parents of varying racial/ethnic backgrounds but higher frequencies of involvement behaviours requiring participation in early childhood education programmes. As a window into these national patterns, qualitative data from an early childhood programme in an immigration‐heavy state revealed that Latina immigrant mothers and their children's teachers often talked about each other as partners in supporting children's educational experiences but that their actual interactions tended to socialise mothers into being more passive recipients of teachers' directives.     

Racial‐ethnic Identity in Context: Examining Mediation of Neighborhood Factors on Children's Academic Adjustment

Research consistently shows that neighborhood socio‐demographic characteristics and residents’ neighborhood perceptions matter for youth well‐being, including a positive sense of racial‐ethnic identity. Although elementary‐school children are likely in the earlier phases of identity formation, the authors examined whether objective and subjective neighborhood characteristics are related to their racial‐ethnic identity and, in turn, their academic adjustment. A diverse sample (30.4% African American, 35.2% White, 12.3% Latino, & 22.0% Other) of 227 children in Grades 2 through 5 were surveyed in afterschool programs. Bivariate correlations showed that youth living in disadvantaged neighborhoods reported more barriers due to their race‐ethnicity, but these barriers were not related to their sense of academic efficacy. Residing in a disadvantaged neighborhood was unrelated to youth's academic self‐efficacy. However, path analyses showed that positive neighborhood perceptions were associated with a stronger sense of race‐ethnicity (i.e., affirmation and belonging), which was in turn related to greater academic efficacy. These results suggest that neighborhood connection provides a source of affirmation and value for young children, helping them to understand who they are as part of a racial‐ethnic group and helping to foster a sense of future achievement opportunities. This study provides additional evidence that along with other important proximal contexts (e.g., family, school), young children's neighborhood context is important for development. Results are discussed to highlight environmental influences on young children's awareness of race‐ethnicity and the implications of the combined impact of neighborhood and racial‐ethnic identity on psychosocial adjustment.     

Parents as Partners: A U.K. Trial of a U.S. Couples‐Based Parenting Intervention For At‐Risk Low‐Income Families

Despite the well‐established links between couple relationship quality and healthy family functioning, and burgeoning evidence from the international intervention field, there is little or no evidence of the efficacy of couples‐based interventions from the United Kingdom (U.K.). This study explored whether the Parents as Partners (PasP) program, a group‐based intervention developed in the United States, brought about the same benefits in the U.K. The evaluation is based on 97 couples with children from communities with high levels of need, recruited to PasP because they are at high risk for parent and child psychopathology. Both mothers and fathers completed self‐report questionnaires assessing parents’ psychological distress, parenting stress, couple relationship quality and conflict, fathers’ involvement in child care and, importantly, children's adjustment. Multilevel modeling analysis comparing parents’ responses pre‐ and postintervention not only showed substantial improvements for both parents on multiple measures of couple relationship quality, but also improvements in parent and child psychopathology. Analyses also indicated most substantial benefits for couples displaying poorest functioning at baseline. The findings provide initial evidence for the successful implementation of PasP, an American‐origin program, in the U.K., and add support for the concept of the couple relationship as a resource by which to strengthen families.     

Parenting and preschool child behaviour among Turkish immigrant,migrant and non-migrant families

When families migrate the new culture and culture of origin may conflict, with possible consequences for parenting and children's development. Turks form one of the largest immigrant groups in Western Europe, and there is also much movement within Turkey. This study compares three groups; Turkish immigrants to the UK (N = 142), migrants within Turkey (N = 229), and Turkish non-migrants (locals, N = 396). The children were 39–71 months old (M = 58 months, SD = 6.5), 392 were boys and 375 were girls. Parents supplied data on family characteristics and parenting, and teachers supplied data on children's behaviour. Using Baumrind's parenting model and allowing for background effects, compared to non-migrants and migrants, the immigrant parents were less permissive and more authoritarian. Children in immigrant families had more externalizing problems, internalizing problems and emotional dysregulation and less social competence than migrant and non-migrant children. Multilevel models and structural equation models both found that these effects upon child behaviour were evident after taking into account demographic factors and were not eliminated by taking into account parenting style differences, and thus suggest that immigration and migration are risk factors for child behaviour. Effects of immigrant and migrant status were partly direct and partly indirect via their effects on parenting.     

The Influence of Children on Their Parents’ Values

Many parents report that their values are influenced by their children. However, few studies provide direct evidence regarding child–parent value transmission. We review this evidence and propose five main processes of child influence: (i) Passive child influences, causing change in parental values by the mere presence or development of children; (ii) Active child influences, due to children directly attempting to influence their parents’ opinions or providing parents with relevant information; (iii) Differentiation, the emergence of a distinction between parents’ own personal values and their socialization values; (iv) Reciprocal influences; in which parents’ and children’ influences are intertwined; and (v) Counter‐influences, in which parental values change in a direction opposite to that of children's values. A study on child influence illustrates some of these processes. The roles of migration, aging, and parent and child characteristics in child‐to‐parent influences are discussed.     

The relationship between Turkish children's perceptions of marital conflict and their internalizing and externalizing problems

The present study investigated the relationship between children's perceptions of marital conflict and children's internalizing and externalizing problems. Additionally, investigating gender and age differences in children's perceptions and the type of problems they exhibited were the other purposes of the study. The sample consisted of 9‐ to 12‐year‐old, nonclinical children from intact families (N = 232), one of their parents, and teachers. The data were gathered by administering the Child Behavior Checklist for Ages 4–18 and the Teacher's Report Form to adult participants and the Children's Perception of Interparental Conflict Scale and the Children's Depression Inventory to the child participants. Findings indicated that there was a significant relationship between children's perceptions of marital conflict and their internalizing and externalizing problems. More specifically, children's perceptions of conflict properties were associated with their internalizing problems in parents', teachers', and children's reports. Children's perceptions of threat were associated with child‐reported depression. Children's perceptions of self‐blame were associated with child‐reported depression, parent‐reported internalizing and externalizing problems, and teacher‐reported externalizing problems. Furthermore, it was found that there were gender and age differences in children's perceptions of marital conflict and their internalizing and externalizing problems. Findings indicated that boys have higher self‐blame scores and teacher‐reported externalizing problems than girls and that girls have more parent‐ and teacher‐reported internalizing problems than boys. Additionally, it was found that 9‐year‐old children have more teacher‐reported internalizing and externalizing problems than 12‐year‐old children. Also, 9‐year‐old boys have higher parent‐reported externalizing problems than 9‐year‐old girls and 9‐year‐old boys have higher parent‐reported externalizing problems than 12‐year‐old boys.     

Cultural differences in mothers' developmental goals and ethnotheories

The influence of ecocultural context on parents' image of the adaptive adult is explored via a comparison between the child‐rearing goals and ethnotheories of 20 immigrant mothers from the former Soviet Union and 20 Israeli‐born mothers. It is assumed that parents' socializing practices are premised on developmental ethnotheories reflecting societal child rearing models and expectations for children's development. The image of the “adaptive adult” in parents' country of origin is so fundamentally ingrained in their beliefs about child rearing that it is retained after immigration, and is integrated with aspects of the image of adaptive adulthood which prevails in the host culture. The current study explored (through semistructured interviews) mothers' developmental ethnotheories concerning the nature of development, how it can be influenced, and why it should be influenced, with regard to cognitive competence, autonomy, emotional regulation, and social understanding and behaviour of their 3–4‐year‐old children. It also explored their goals and expectations for their children as adults. Analysis of the interviews with Israeli‐born and immigrant mothers lends support to the main thesis of this study. Mothers of both groups would like their children to grow into intelligent, joyful, and independent adults, to be well educated and to hold prestigious occupations. All of the mothers assume, moreover, that much of child development should be promoted through the active involvement of parents. Israeli‐born mothers, however, place a greater emphasis on social competence, autonomy, and leadership, whereas the emphasis of the Soviet‐born mothers is on achievement, emotional control, efficiency, and organization. The differences and similarities between the two groups of mothers are discussed in the context of their respective ecocultural backgrounds. It is proposed that each group's ethnotheories, developmental goals, and aspirations for their children reflect their respective values, perceptions, and understanding of the reality in which they raise their children. These values and perceptions seem, in turn, related to the respective ecocultures in which they were raised, as well as the one in which they rear their own children.     

Migration patterns,family functioning,and life satisfaction among migrant children in China: A mediation model

There are three distinct patterns of migration among Chinese migrant children: whole‐family, single‐parent‐first, and both‐parents‐first migration. This study investigated the life satisfaction of children who migrated under the different migration patterns and examined the mediating role of family functioning in the relationship between the children's migration patterns and their life satisfaction. Participants consisted of migrant children (N = 703) from primary and junior middle schools in Chengdu, China. The results showed that (a) migrant children from the whole‐family and single‐parent‐first patterns of migration reported greater life satisfaction than did those from the both‐parents‐first pattern, and (b) family functioning partially mediated the association between migration patterns and life satisfaction. The present study highlights the importance of avoiding separation of children from both parents during migration and the need to develop interventions for migrant children's psychological adaptation by improving their families’ functioning.     

Parent–Child Conflict Profiles in Chinese American Immigrant Families: Links to Sociocultural Factors and School‐Age Children's Psychological Adjustment

Research suggests that parent–child conflict is a salient family process in Asian immigrant families and often a stressful experience for Asian American youth due to value discrepancies between Asian and Western cultures. The present study examined ratings of parent–child conflict across conflict topics from parents' and children's perspectives in a sample of Chinese American immigrant families with school‐age children (N = 239; age = 7.5–11 years). Latent profile analyses identified three parent‐rated conflict profiles and four child‐rated conflict profiles. Parent and child conflict profiles were unrelated to each other and differentially related to family sociocultural factors and children's psychological adjustment. Parents' moderate conflict profile scored highest on parent‐rated child behavior problems and had the highest household density and lower parent Chinese orientation. Children's moderate‐specific and high conflict profiles scored higher on child‐reported behavior problems than the low conflict profile. These results highlight the need to assess family conflict from both parents' and children's perspectives and target parent–child conflict communication as a pathway to prevent or reduce behavioral problems in Chinese American children of immigrant families.     

Maternal Emotional Distress,Abuse Risk,and Children's Symptoms: Child Gender as a Moderator of Parent Sensitivity as a Mediator

Mothers' distress is a correlate of their children's elevated behaviour problems and symptoms. Parenting practices have been shown to mediate these associations, but few studies have observed parenting or focused on parents at risk of child abuse. In this study of 269 high‐risk mothers and their young children (M = 4.2 years), structural equation modelling was used to test associations between mothers' distress and child externalizing and internalizing symptoms. Associations were expected to be partly indirect via mothers' observed low sensitivity, and child gender was expected to moderate associations. Also, mothers' child abuse risk was examined as a unique correlate of sensitivity and children's symptoms, and a moderator of associations of distress with sensitivity and symptoms. Associations showed a pattern of gender‐moderated mediation with the link between mothers' distress and internalizing mostly direct for boys, and equally direct and indirect via sensitivity for girls. The association of mothers' distress with externalizing was mostly direct for boys and girls. Mothers' child abuse risk was not uniquely associated with sensitivity or symptoms and did not moderate any associations. There were no differences in model paths between mothers referred from child welfare/mental health compared with other sources or self‐referred. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Training parents to help their children read: A randomized control trial

Background . Low levels of literacy and high levels of behaviour problems in middle childhood often co‐occur. These persistent difficulties pose a risk to academic and social development, leading to social exclusion in adulthood. Although parent‐training programmes have been shown to be effective in enabling parents to support their children's development, very few parent interventions offer a combination of behavioural and literacy training. Aims . This paper (1) reports on a prevention programme which aimed to tackle behaviour and literacy problems in children at the beginning of school, and (2) presents the effects of the intervention on children's literacy. Sample . One hundred and four 5‐ and 6‐year‐old children selected from eight schools in an inner city disadvantaged community in London participated in the intervention. Methods . This is a randomized control trial with pre‐ and post‐measurements designed to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention. The behavioural intervention consisted of the ‘Incredible Years’ group parenting programme combined with a new programme designed to train parents to support their children's reading at home. Results . Analyses demonstrated a significant effect of the intervention on children's word reading and writing skills, as well as parents' use of reading strategies with their children. Conclusion . A structured multicomponent preventive package delivered with attention to fidelity can enable parents to support their children's reading at home and increase their literacy skills. Together with the improvement in child behaviour, these changes could improve the life chances of children in disadvantaged communities.     

Gendered Processes of Adaptation: Understanding Parent–Child Relations in Chinese Immigrant Families

Drawing on 5-year longitudinal interview data on 72 Chinese immigrant children and their parents in the U.S., this paper addresses the following research question: How does Chinese immigrant fathers’ and mothers’ adaptation after migration influence their relations with their children? Guided by grounded theory, data analyses show that parental adaptation difficulty, particularly among fathers, influences their physical and psychological presence in their children’s lives. This, combined with parents’ exceedingly high academic expectations, could result in estranged parent–child relations in families. This paper also illustrates how parental efforts to be good providers for their children and children’s hope for parents as a source of emotional support can lead to parent–child alienation in immigrant families.     

Theory‐of‐Mind development and early sibling relationships after the birth of a sibling: Parental discipline matters

This study investigated relations among children's Theory‐of‐Mind (ToM) development, early sibling interactions, and parental discipline strategies during the transition to siblinghood. Using a sample of firstborn children and their parents (N = 208), we assessed children's ToM before the birth of a sibling and 12 months after the birth, and sibling interactions (i.e., positive engagement and antagonism) and parental discipline strategies (i.e., child‐centred and parent‐centred discipline) at 4 and 8 months in the first year of siblinghood. Structural equation modelling analyses revealed that children's ToM before the birth of the sibling predicted children's positive engagement with the infant sibling, whereas children's antagonistic behaviours towards the infant sibling negatively predicted children's ToM at 12 months, but only when mothers used low levels of child‐centred discipline. These findings emphasize the role of parents in the development of young children's social‐cognitive understanding in the context of early sibling interactions.

Highlights

• This study investigated relations among firstborns' Theory‐of‐Mind (ToM), early sibling relationships, and parental discipline during the first year of siblinghood.
• Multigroup analyses showed that ToM predicted higher sibling positive engagement, and early sibling antagonism predicted poorer ToM when mothers used low child‐centred discipline.
• Parental discipline plays an important role in the development of young children's social understanding and sibling relationships as early as the first year of siblinghood.

     

To Play or Not to Play: Diverse Motives for Latino and Euro‐American Parent–Child Play in a Children's Museum

A popular social discourse in the United States is that play is important for children's learning and that parental involvement maximizes play's learning potential. Past research has concluded that parents who hold this view of play are more likely to play with their children than those who do not. This study investigated the prevalence of this view among Euro‐American and immigrant Latino parents of young children in order to illuminate the extent to which it uniquely and uniformly motivates parent–child play. Parents' models of play were assessed through interviews and naturalistic observations in a children's museum. Analysis revealed ethnic group differences in parent–child play that corresponded with parental beliefs about play. Within‐group analysis, however, revealed diversity in the ways that these play behaviours and beliefs came together to comprise parents' models of play. Discussion focuses on the social nature of play, the dynamic nature of culture, and the issue of individual subject validity. Implications for the interpretation of parent–child play in early childhood settings are considered. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Longitudinal relations among school context,school-based parent involvement,and academic achievement of Chinese American children in immigrant families

Immigrant families face multiple barriers to engaging with children's schools. Yet, school-based parent involvement has been associated with academic and behavioral benefits for children of immigrant families. Although past research has examined links between family contextual factors and parent involvement, less is known about the links between school contextual factors and parent involvement in immigrant families. Identifying socio-cultural barriers to parent involvement across home and school contexts can inform culturally competent family engagement interventions serving immigrant families. In a two-wave (1.5 years apart) longitudinal study of a community-based sample of Chinese American children (N = 210, beginning age = 5.8–9.1 years) attending over 80 schools in a metropolitan area, we assessed school-based parent involvement behaviors and parent involvement-related psychological processes (i.e., parent-teacher relationship quality, parents' endorsement of schools, teachers' perceptions of parents) using parent and teacher report. First, results indicated that significant positive associations were found between school-based parent involvement behaviors and parent involvement-related psychological processes (rs = 0.36–0.53). Next, multi-level modeling was conducted to test concurrent relations of Wave 1 school contextual factors to all four parent involvement constructs (controlling for family-level factors), as well as testing the prospective relations of parent involvement at Wave 1 to children's academic achievement at Wave 2. Student body diversity of schools was negatively associated with school-based parent involvement (rs = −0.18, −0.17), parent-rated parent-teacher relationship quality (r = −0.18), and parents' endorsement of schools (r = −0.36). The concentration of Asian students at schools and schoolwide achievement were negatively associated with teachers' perceptions of parents (rs = −0.18, −0.20). However, neither school contextual factors nor school-based parent involvement at Wave 1 uniquely predicted children's academic achievement at Wave 2. Implications of findings for understanding and addressing barriers to engaging Chinese American immigrant families in their children's schools are discussed.     

Anxious cognitions in children: An exploration of associations and mediators

To investigate sources of influences connecting mothers' and their children's anxious cognitions, 65 children (aged 10 to 11 years) completed self‐report measures of anxiety. Children and mothers responded to an ambiguous scenario questionnaire and measures of parenting style and life events. Mothers also reported expectations about their child's reaction to ambiguous situations. Mothers' and children's threat cognitions were significantly correlated (r = .31), and partially mediated by mothers' expectations about their child. Mothers' anticipated distress was associated with expectations for their child's distress, which was associated with the child's own anticipated distress. Parenting and life events were significantly associated with children's interpretative bias, but did not mediate the intergenerational association in interpretative bias. The results suggest influences on children's ‘anxious cognitive style’ and potential targets for preventing and reducing maladaptive cognitions in children.     

PARENTAL CHILDHOOD ADVERSITY,DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS,AND PARENTING QUALITY: EFFECTS ON TODDLER SELF‐REGULATION IN CHILD WELFARE SERVICES INVOLVED FAMILIES

Parents who are involved with child welfare services (CWSI) often have a history of childhood adversity and depressive symptoms. Both affect parenting quality, which in turn influences child adaptive functioning. We tested a model of the relations between parental depression and child regulatory outcomes first proposed by K. Lyons‐Ruth, R. Wolfe, A. Lyubchik, and R. Steingard (2002). We hypothesized that both parental depression and parenting quality mediate the effects of parental early adversity on offspring regulatory outcomes. Participants were 123 CWSI parents and their toddlers assessed three times over a period of 6 months. At Time 1, parents reported on their childhood adversity and current depressive symptoms. At Time 2, parents’ sensitivity to their child's distress and nondistress cues was rated from a videotaped teaching task. At Time 3, observers rated children's emotional regulation, orientation/engagement, and secure base behavior. The results of a path model partly supported the hypotheses. Parent childhood adversity was associated with current depressive symptoms, which in turn related to parent sensitivity to child distress, but not nondistress. Sensitivity to distress also predicted secure base behavior. Depression directly predicted orientation/engagement, also predicted by sensitivity to nondistress. Sensitivity to distress predicted emotion regulation and orientation/engagement. Results are discussed in terms of intervention approaches for CWSI families.     

Parents’ postnatal depressive symptoms and their children's academic attainment at 16 years: Pathways of risk transmission

The aim of the study was to examine whether parents’ increased postnatal depressive symptoms predicted children's academic attainment over time and whether the parent–child relationship, children's prior academic attainment, and mental health mediated this association. We conducted secondary analyses on the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children data (12,607 mothers, 9,456 fathers). Each parent completed the Edinburgh-Postnatal Depression Scale at 8 weeks after the child's birth (predictor) and a questionnaire about the mother–child and father–child relationship at 7 years and 1 month (mediator). The children's mental health problems were assessed with the teacher version of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire at 10–11 years (mediator). We used data on the children's academic attainment on UK Key Stage 1 (5–7 years; mediator) and Key Stage 4 (General Certificate of Secondary Education 16 years) (outcome). We adjusted for the parents’ education, and child gender and cognitive ability. The results revealed that parents’ depressive symptoms at 8 weeks predicted lower academic performance in children at 16 years. Mothers’ postnatal depressive symptoms had an indirect effect through children's mental health problems on academic outcomes at 16 years via negative mother–child relationship, and prior academic attainment. There was a significant negative indirect effect of fathers’ postnatal depressive symptoms on academic attainment at 16 years via negative father–child relationship on child mental health. The findings suggest that the family environment (parental mental health and parent–child relationship) and children's mental health should be potential targets for support programmes for children of depressed parents.