Parenting Styles and Students' Affective-Behavioral ...

Asian Research Consortium Asian Journal of Research in Social Sciences and Humanities Vol. 4, No. 7, July 2014, Special Issue, pp. 7-12. ISSN 2249-7315

Asian Journal of Research in Social Sciences and Humanities

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Parenting Styles and Students' Affective-Behavioral Disorders Fatimah Nosrati, Bagher Ghobari Bonab, Ali Khanzadeh, Abbas Abdollahi Assistant professor of psychology and education of exceptional children at Tehran University, Iran Associate professor of psychology and education of exceptional children at Tehran University, Iran Professor of psychology in Azad University, Iran MA in psychology and education of exceptional children

Abstract: The first social institution in which a child enters and begins to live is family. Parenting may be supposed to be the second constituent of humans' behavior and personality after heredity. In recent years, a more assiduous attention has been excited for role of family in socialization and education of children. The present study aims at examining the relationship between affective-behavioral disorders of students and mothers' parenting styles. Methodology: The population consists of all students in elementary schools of 9 th district of Tehran's education department. We selected 120 boys from first to fifth grade through multistage cluster sampling. Also, their teachers and their mothers completed Rutter's behavior questionnaire and Baumrind's parenting style test respectively. Findings: our statistical findings revealed significantly positive relationship between authoritarian parenting style and affective-behavioral disorders of students. Similarly, further affective-behavioral disorders were created in children of permissive mothers with no attention for parenting. Conversely, authoritative parenting led to decrease in affective-behavioral disorders. Conclusion: Our study indicated that increase in employment of authoritative parenting methods resulted in decreasing affective-behavioral disorders. Moreover, decrease in permissiveness among mothers at first caused decrease in affective-behavioral disorders and then further decrease of this variable caused increase in disorders. As there is significant relationship between mothers' parenting styles and affective-behavioral disorders of students, such disorders can be decreased as the result of authoritative parenting style. Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of ICM21, Iran.

Keywords: parenting styles, affective-behavioral disorders, students, authoritarian style

Introduction: The first social institution in which a child enters and begins to live is family. Family may be supposed to be regarded the second constituent of humans' behavior and personality after heredity. In recent years, among social, developmental and educational theories, a more assiduous attention has been excited for role of family in socialization and education of children (Bettnt, 1991). There is relationship between parent-children interaction and parenting styles and due to its consistent adaptation and adjustment, this interaction is a dynamic phenomenon. For example, mothers



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embrace their infants and kids regularly. But, as children attain greater ages, mothers' display of affection changes; for some changes occur in children in cognitive terms (Hartup & Laursen, 1999). Accordingly, concurrent with children's growth, parents reflect change in their affection towards them in terms of display and frequency (Collins, 1997). Parents' social and economic status, culture and attitude towards parenting exert impact upon their interaction with children (Pinderhughes et al., 2000; Rohuer et al. 1991). Additionally, normal changes in interaction between parents and children exert impact on children's socialization. Recognition of these changes is viewed as main components of dynamic approaches (Collins & Medson, 2003). In family, mothers play the most significant role in relation with children. Baumrind (1997) suggests three parenting styles: authoritarian parenting, authoritative parenting, and permissive parenting. Obviously, personality and behavioral-cognitive attributes of humans are affected by their parents and it seems parenting styles have influence in children's education (Serven, 2001). Parenting styles involve various dimensions including children's education and educational values and behaviors and exerting great impact upon growth and development of children. Respective studies reveal that different educational methods bring about different effects on students' self-esteem. For instance, Sigward et al. (1992) indicates that educational methods in levels of control and acceptance are in positive relationship with children's self-esteem. On the other hand, there is negative correlation between parents' control and children's self-esteem. But, parent's acceptance is positively correlated with children's self-esteem. Findings of Brook et al. (2003) suggest that when parents' request is accompanied by affection and kindness, children tend to comply with them. Conversely, parents exerting discipline with unfriendliness stir rebellion and are met by children's refusal. Mothers with authoritarian style attach so much significance to compliance that their children do not tend to comply with their rules. They expect absolute obedience of their children and hardly talk to them. If the children do not obey their rules, authoritarian mothers impose punishment and pressure. This results in negative behaviors such as behavioral disorders (Diaz, 2005). On the other hand, mothers with authoritative parenting style make reasonable requests, placing restrictions and insisting on children's compliance. Moreover, they display affection and kindness towards them, listen patiently to them and convince them to participate in family's decision making. Authoritative parenting style is a rational and democratic method of procedure in which mother's and child's rights are respected. In such family, children gain higher scores in terms of competency, attainment, social growth, self-esteem, and mental health (Maccoby & Martin, 1983). Mothers with permissive parenting display a welcoming behavior and do not exert control over their children. Permissive mothers allow their children to make decisions themselves in any years of age although they are incapable of decision making. They can eat food and sleep in any time they like and they can watch television as much as they want. They are not forced to maintain standards of behavior or to do any work in home. Children of permissive parents are very inexperienced and face difficulty with their impulse control. When they are asked to do any work in contradiction with their passing interests, they stir rebellion. In addition, they are not easily satisfied and rely on their parents (Baumrind, 1997). Different studies introduce parenting styles as one of significant causes of behavioral disorders in children (Frick, 1994). Relationship between parenting styles (i.e. parent's behavior) and children's difficulty in behaviors is demonstrated in different studies. Smart (2001 as cited in Hallenstein, 2004) point out that interaction between parent and child is often viewed as determinative of difficulties in child's behavior. Interactions in which there is mutual unfriendliness, pessimism, excessive control and violence result in most pathology of childhood. Owns, Jewani and Winslow (2001 as cited in Grimple and Halland, 2002) reveal that elementary-school students with pathologically behavioral disorders have aggressive and highly depressed mothers. And, they do not receive considerable social supports. In their parenting style, these mothers impose punishment.



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The present study attempts to provide greater insight about children's behavioral disorders and characters of mothers' behavior, along with assessing practical implications. Indeed, it intends to answer this question: which parenting style can be regarded as determinative of behavioral disorders in children? Methodology: The population consists of all students as well as their mothers and teachers in elementary schools of 9th district of Tehran's education department, among which we selected 120 boys from first to fifth grade through multistage cluster sampling. To accomplish this objective, we selected one grade out of every 5 schools in 9th district. Students and their mothers were selected randomly. Among teachers, we randomly selected teachers teaching at least two courses. We designed our research on the basis of ex post facto research. Instruments: We used the following questionnaires in this study: Baumrind's Parenting Style Test: This questionnaire is designed for examining parenting styles which we used for group of mothers. As Baumrind (1967) suggests, there are three parenting styles: authoritarian parenting, authoritative parenting, and permissive parenting. This questionnaire consists of 30 items in each there are three options shown by 0, 1, and 2. Teachers were asked to examine questions in order to determine to what extent they are true about their students. In the case that they were really relevant, partially relevant, and irrelevant, they were required to mark 2, 1, and 0 respectively. By additions of these scores, the total score was calculated. The score range for each person includes within 0 and 60. Esfandiari (1995) measured reliability for permissive, authoritarian, and authoritative parenting styles respectively as follows: 0.69, 0.77, and 0.73. Validity of this questionnaire was ensured by experts in psychology and psychiatry.

Rutter's Behavior Questionnaire for Teachers: This questionnaire which was designed by Michael Rutter in 1967 contains two main forms i.e. form A for parents and form B for teachers. In this study, we utilized form B. its question items were 30 in number, of which 24 items were extracted directly and the remaining items were added on the basis of culture and particular characters of the concerned population. The method of scoring was as follows: we placed three options for each question items including ((it is true)), ((it is more or less true)), and ((it is perfectly true)) which were given scores of 0, 1, and 2 respectively. (Yousefi, 1998). By using Cronbach's alpha, we measured reliability for this questionnaire with a value of 0.78. Procedure: In this correlational study, we asked teachers to complete Rutter's Behavior Questionnaire. Then, we asked mothers to do Baumrind's Parenting Style Test. The data were analyzed by using Pearson's correlation coefficients and multivariate regression. Results: Table 1 shows descriptive statistics of affective-behavioral disorders.

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of Affective-Behavioral Disorders & Parenting Styles Mini Maxi Stand Ran Statistics Mea Medi mum mum ard ge of of Variables n an Obtained Obtained Deviation Scores Score Score affective16.3 14 11.85 0 45 0-60 behavioral 0 disorders 22.9 22.5 8.59 5 39 0-40 Authoritat



ive style Permissive Style Authorita rian Style

6 17.8 5 16.2 2

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18

5.60

5

30

0-40

16

4.7

4

28

0-40

For data analysis, we used Pearson's correlation coefficients and multivariate regression. Correlation between parenting styles and affective-behavioral disorders was assessed by correlation coefficient as shown in Table 2. Table 2. Matrix of Correlation between Parenting Styles & Affective-behavioral Disorders Behavioral Variables M P disorders Authoritative 22.96 **-0.48 0.001 style 16.22 *0.21 0.2 Permissive Style Authoritarian 17.85 *0.22 0.2 Style As Table 2 shows, authoritative parenting and authoritarian parenting are valid determinatives of affective-behavioral disorders respectively with regression coefficients of -0.48 and 0.22. The only difference lies in the fact that the former is a more strongly negative determinative and the latter a positive determinative. In other words, the former causes a decreasing level of affective-behavioral disorder and the latter an increasing level of disorder. As a result, greater attention to authoritative style decreases children's affective-behavioral disorder. Graphical analysis reveals that decrease in mothers' permissiveness at first cause decrease in affective-behavioral disorder. But then, children suffer from more serious affective-behavioral disorder. As indicated in Table 2, there is significantly positive relationship between authoritarian parenting style and affective-behavioral disorders. In other words, the more mothers employ authoritarian style, the more affective-behavioral disorders are created. On the other hand, authoritative style is correlated negatively with affective-behavioral disorders i.e. children whose mothers employ authoritative method suffer from the minimum affective-behavioral disorders. Also, we observed a significant correlation between permissive style and affective-behavioral disorders. Due to significant correlation between parenting styles and affective-behavioral disorders and in order to determine role of these styles on creation of disorders in terms of variance, we used multivariate regression. Table 3. Results of Multivariate Regression Analysis for Determination of AffectiveBehavioral Disorders Authorita tive Style Regressi on Coefficient Degree of significance

Permis sive Style

Authorita rian Style

-0.48

0.17

0.13

0.001

0.34

0.001

F 2 0.88

R

R 2

0 .51

A dj. R2

0 .26

0 .25

Parenting styles, Table 3 indicates, can act as determinatives of affective-behavioral disorders in teenagers and kids. In relatively 25 percent of changes in variance, affective-behavioral disorders could be given an account by parenting styles. In order to calculate coefficients of each parenting style as



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regards its impact (degree of determination)on affective-behavioral disorders, we used the below formulation: e+bnxn+x22b+x11A+b =Y Affective-Behavioral Disorders= 0.77+2.97+42.48 Therefore, authoritative style (2.97) and permissive style (0.77) by virtue of which mothers display no sensitiveness to their children's discipline determine affective-behavioral disorders of teenagers and kids. Conclusion: In this study, we examined the relationship between parenting styles and affective-behavioral disorders. Our findings demonstrated there is significantly positive correlation between these authoritarian style and affective-behavioral disorders. Relationship between authoritative style and affective-behavioral disorders is of significantly negative correlation. These findings are in agreement with Chen et al. (2001), David and Arnold (2004), Chang et al. (2005), Alexander (2006), and Aunola and Nurmi (2005). Baumrind (1991) finds out children with authoritarian parents experience enormous difficulty in communication with their peers. These children often have vexatious worry, aloof and unhappy. In the case that they feel failure of interaction with their peers, they provoke anxiety. Findings demonstrate that mother's verbal and physical threats are accompanied by different dimensions of child's behavior such as insecurity and dependence. Our findings –consistent with Baumrind (1991)- suggest that children with authoritative mothers achieve greater scores in activeness, self-esteem, independence, etc. These children are realistic, competent, and happy. Baumrind's findings indicate that these persons are grown well. These delighted children exude self-confidence for doing new homework. This study was conducted only on boys aged between 7 and 11 years old in elementary schools of Tehran, on the basis of which we can not make generalization for other groups of children. Moreover, we put emphasis only on parenting styles of mothers. Therefore, next studies are recommended to concentrate on parenting styles of fathers as well.

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