Earl S. Schaefer

CROSS-NATIONAL VALIDITY OF A SPHERICAL CONCEPTUAL MODEL FOR PARENT BEHAVIOR

An adapted and translated version of the Childs Report of Parent Behavior Inventory was administered to 182 Walloon high school students. A factor analysis of the intercorrelations of the 18 scales revealed three factors-Acceptance versus Rejection, Psychological Control, and Lax Control versus Firm Control-that were similar for boys and girls, for reports of mothers and fathers, and for American and Walloon subjects. A map of a nomological network of parent-behavior concepts was generated by stereographic projections of each scales factor loadings. The findings provide evidence of the cross-national validity of a spherical conceptual model for parent behavior.

Parental Beliefs and Values Related to Family Risk, Educational Intervention, and Child Academic Competence.

Traditional, authoritarian and progressive, democratic beliefs about child rearing and education, and self-directing and conforming values for children were contrasted in parents of 126 children entering kindergarten. Eighty-three parents were socioeconomically disadvantaged; their children were at risk for mild mental retardation and school failure and had taken part in an experimental study of early childhood educational intervention. Forty-three subjects were parents of randomly selected kindergarten peers from the local population. Mothers of at-risk children with preschool intervention scored lower on traditional beliefs; such beliefs by parents were negatively correlated with child achievement in reading. Parents of children at risk differed from local population parents in both beliefs and values.

Dimensions of mother-infant interaction: Measurement, stability, and predictive validity☆

Abstract Goals of identifying and determining stability and predictive validity of replicated dimensions of mother-infant interaction guided analyses of data from observations during bathing, dressing, and play and from ratings of entire home visits at 4 and 12 months. Factor analyses identified dimensions of positive interaction and gentle/sensitive versus punitive/irritable at 4 and 12 months. Higher reliability and stability was found for positive interaction than for gentle/sensitive. The dimension of positive interaction was significantly correlated with child academic competence, but the less reliable and less stable dimension of gentle/sensitive was not significantly correlated with child behavior during kindergarten.

Prediction of Child Competence from Maternal Beliefs and Behaviors During Infancy

Research on parental attitudes, beliefs, and values and observational studies of maternal behavior during infancy provide a basis for a longitudinal study of maternal predictors of child academic competence. A review of research on parent beliefs and values contributes to the development of a concept of parental modernity. Integration of previous factor analyses of observations of maternal behavior during infancy with the factor analyses of this research reveals two major dimensions that can probably be replicated in future studies. Factor analyses of teacher ratings of child adaptive behavior differentiate child academic competence from two major factors of child social-emotional adjustment. Longitudinal analyses reveal that modern parent beliefs and behaviors are significantly correlated with child academic competence. A discussion of relationships among constructs of parental modernity, individual modernity, and societal modernity and their probable relationship to historical increases in mental test scores supports an environmental interpretation of correlations between maternal behavior and child competence.