Theories of parent-child relations

1. Theories of parent-child relations Tomo Umemura 23.9.2013

2. Theories of parent-child relations Overview for today • Maccoby, E. E. (1992). The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview. Developmental Psychology, 28, 1006-1017. • Lecture & Discussions • Cox, M. J., & Paley, B. (2003). Understanding families as systems. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12, 193-196. • Lecture & Discussions • Guidelines for writing an introduction paragraph

3. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview Three major historical changes • From grand, all-encompassing theories to more modest theories that were more limited to specific behavioral domains or specific age periods. • From top-down processes (parents as trainers) to bidirectional and interactive processes. • From direct connections to indirect connections.

4. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview • From grand theories to domain-specific theories. • Grand theories • Behaviorism • Parents are teachers, and children are learners. • Conditioning: rewards and punishments • B. F. Skinner's speech • Psychoanalytic theory • Early childhood is a time of high plasticity • Two major intrapsychic forces – sexuality and aggression • Parents lower toxic intrapsychic forces • “Internal” conflict in children: relation vs. rejection

5. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview • From grand theories to domain-specific theories. • More domain-specific theories • Developmental psycholinguistics • Innate language acquisition device • Not random • Child’s readiness • Age • Attachment theory • Evolutionary biology (ethology): infant-parent relationship as a primary outcome for survival, but neither as a secondary outcome nor as a reduction of sexuality. • Social learning theory (or nonreinforced learning through modeling) • Modeling: children could acquire new behaviors without rewards or punishments

6. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview • From top-down processes (parents as trainers) to bidirectional and interactive processes. • Parents are antecedents, and children are outcomes. • Asymmetry: power and competency • Moment-to-moment sequences of interactions between parent and child • Children learn about positive social interactional skills in non-coercive and coherent joint activities. • Parents and children coconstruct (or coregulate) their interactions.

7. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview • From direct connections to indirect connections. • Earlier: Direct connections between parental practices and child outcomes • More recent: Processes that may influence the way in which parental practice affects child.

8. Parental Practice Child Outcome Mediation A spurious relation Parental Practice ? Child Outcome ? Moderation Parental Practice Child Outcome Parental Practice Child Outcome ?

9. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview • From direct connections to indirect connections. (Umemura & Šerek, under review)

10. Maccoby, 1992 The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview Three major historical changes • From grandtheories to more domain-specific theories. • From top-down processes (parents as trainers) to bidirectional and interactive processes. • From direct connections to indirect connections.

11. Thought Questions • In early 1990s, E. Maccoby stated that “the family has continued to be seen as a major – perhaps the major – arena for socialization“. (Maccoby, 1992; pp. 1006) • But does it mean socialization as a whole, or just certain spheres (e.g. values, religiousness or political orientation) of it? • And maybe more importantly, is role of the family in socialization process really so important, at least from a certain age? • Aren’t more important institutions like school, to which family submits more and more of its competences (Lasch, 1997)? • Or aren’t more important peers and group socialization, as some authors suggest (e.g. Harris, 1998)?

12. Thought Questions • What are the benefits and pitfalls of the asymmetry of parent-child relationship? • The role of a parent changes through time with development of a child. At the very beginning of the relationship there is a clear distance in power, strength, knowledge and competences, which might differ later on according to specific nature of built up connection between the two of them. It could be useful to be aware how both sides can benefit from such an asymmetry and what needs a special attention. 

13. Thought Questions • The article stated that,according to Youniss,every relationshipinvolve coregulation. My question is, what exactly term "coregulation" inparent-child relation means? In my humble opinion,child does not have anydirect influence on his parents, child cannot regulate parents by giving themorders. I have few ideas how the child could "control" his parents, but unlessparents voluntary obey child, it would not work.

14. Thought Questions • I have read that parental responsiveness was not seen as reinforcing dependentbehavior (Maccoby, 1992). By contrast children dependency bids (like crying orapproaching) were decreased when parents were responsive. Is the opposite alsotrue? I mean, when parents are not responsive to dependent children does itlead to more dependency (and more dependency bids)?

15. Thought Questions • Macoby (1992) mentions that Piaget and Lewin were the first to emphasizeand demonstrate that parenting must undergo systematic change with theincreasing cognitive capacities of children. Were the cognitive capacitiesreally increasing in that era or it was only an impression stemming from theinterest of these psychologists in children’s cognitive development? (Or it wasmeant in the way that parents must systematically change the parenting duringthe development of their child?)

16. Thought Questions • I was thinking about term scaffolding used in the second article (Macoby, 1992). I don’t know this term. I haven’t heard this term in czech language in context with Vygotsky. I found on the Internet that it is connected to the theory of Vygotsky even though he never used this term. Is there a the difference between scaffolding and zone of proximal development?

17. Cox and Paley, 2003 Understanding families as systems • To understand parent-child relations in family systems • Family as a whole • Each relationship within a particular family influences the family as a whole. • Only looking at parent-child relationships does not give you a good understanding of parent-child relationships • Mutual influences among family subsystem • Mother-child, father-child, mother-father, etc. • E.g., mother-father -> mother-child • E.g., mother-child -> mother-father

18. Cox and Paley, 2003 Understanding families as systems

19. Cox and Paley, 2003 Understanding families as systems • Empirical finding: parents behave differently when the whole family was together than when they were interacting one-on-one with child • E.g., couples were less hostile toward each other when child is present. • Coparenting: how parents interact together to take care of their children • Supportive (cooperative): help each other • Undermining (competitive): blame on the partner's caregiving behaviors • E.g., father calling mother “pig” influences child calling mother “pig.” • Triangulating: include the child into the fight • Emotional-security theory (Cummings and Davies) • Marital conflict between parents threatens child’s sense of security in the family

20. Cox and Paley, 2003 Understanding families as systems • Families need to adjust to disequilibrium (or changes). • Normative transitions • Birth of a child, child entering school, etc. • New parents are at increased risk for depression • Nonnormativetransitions • Departure of spouse, entrance of new spouse, death of family member

21. Cox and Paley, 2003 Understanding families as systems • Family as a whole • Mutual influences among family subsystem • Families need to adjust to disequilibrium (or changes).

22. Thought Questions • In Cox´s and Paley´s article (2003),a birth of child affectsits parents and their interactions which then influence the family system as awhole. I also wonder if family system (or maybe more specifically relationshipswithgrandparents) influence the new parents? More specifically how?

23. Thought Questions •  In the article,therapists had long noted that problems in the parent-child relationshipwere often associated with marital distress. I would like to ask whichparticular problems in relationship between child and parent can be caused orinfluenced by the marital distress?

24. Thought Questions • I understood, that in Maccoby´s article it is said, that poor relationshipbetween mother and father can develop poor parent-child relationships. But,inmy opinion, it can be the opposite as well. I have witnessed many cases whenthe poor relationship between mother and father has led the mother to developbetter relationship especially with her daughter. The situation made themcloser to each other.

25. Thought Questions • The authors cite their other paper which says that “the tendency for a husband to withdraw during one-on-one interaction with his wife is related to several features of family-level interaction. Such withdrawal, for example, is associated with an increased likelihood of parent-child alliances within the family. Also, whole family interactions have lower levels of positive emotionsand higher levels of negative emotions and detachement in families characterized by this kind of marital relationship than in other families.” • What exactly should this withdrawal mean? Does it mean that a husband avoids his wife and their relationship lacks intimacy and closeness? Or how should I imagine that?

26. Thought Questions • In their article, Cox and Paley (2003) have mentioned that husband´s tendencyto withdraw during interaction with his wife is associated with an increasedlikelihood of parent-child alliances within the family. Does it means thatthere is a increasedlikelihood of mother-child alliances or father-childalliances and why does this happen?

27. Thought Questions • I understand Belsky, Hsieh, and Crnic (1998) findings about toddlers whose mothers responded to their irritability with negative affect and intrusive behavior (i.e., inserting their “own goals and agendas upon the child without apparent regard or concern for what the child was doing or feeling,” p. 309) were more likely to go on to develop behavior problems than were children whose mothers responded to their irritability with less negative affect and less intrusive behavior or children who had not been irritable as toddlers. • I am interested in cases of e.g. orphans. When the child is in the first years of life surrounded by many different people (nurses, doctors, fosters, e.tc.,...) without negative affects or intrusive behavior. When everybody is positive and kind, is there a good reason to predict that the child will be without behavior problems?

28. Thought Questions •  I understand the advantages of so much complex research of family system (e.g.great context and environment validity, good understanding for familyprocesses, ..) but it is very demanding to make it. I think this approach isstill much more usable in therapy. • However, there are any special methods which researchers can use for suchcomplex research? • And is there any research which covers all these levels (marital, parent-child,co-parenting, ...)?

29. Thought Questions • What are the dangers of viewing and understanding families as systems?Help question (Do the theories become too general and vague? - Are thereconsequences - do you go from looking at family "as" a systems thinking, to afamily "is" a system ?)Because in my mind after reading our assigned syllabus text, family systemtheory looks for diverse contexts and they want to apply these "general" ideasto them."Family Theories" by J.M.White & David M.Klein (2nd edition)also gave me inspiration to ask this question.

30. Introduction paragraphis due on October 8th. Timetable: • September 18: Possible topics for your paper • September 25: Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • October 1: APA format • October 8: Introduction due

31. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph 3 things you need to include in your intro paragraph: • Describe how important your topic is. • Define your topic if needed • Describe your topic in very general terms at the end of the paragraph • Optional: Include your take-home message(s).

32. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Describe how important your topic is. • What is the impact of the topic on society? • Or why your topic is an important area of inquiry? • You should catch the readers’ attention. • Example: the effect of parent-child relation on trust in other people. • It is considered important for adolescents to trust other people. For example, adolescents who trust their friends spend time with them, do not feel lonely, and therefore are satisfied with their lives.

33. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Define constructs if constructs in your topic are not commonly used in everyday language. • You need to define: coparenting, triangulation, sensitive parenting, democratic parenting • You do not need to define: divorce, depression, etc. • Examples: • Adolescents’ trust that their political leaders work for their citizens (defined as “political trust”) does not necessarily come from their evaluations of politics. • Some children believe that other people are in general trustworthy. Hereafter, this belief is referred to as “general social trust.”

34. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Describe your topic in very general terms at the end of the paragraph • One sentence description of your specific topic that you pursue in your paper. • Simple is better • Examples: • “Hence, I explore the effect of X on Y” • “Thus, this paper focueses on X.” • “Therefore, I review whether X affects Y.” • “This paper examines the relation between X and Y.”

35. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Describe how important your topic is. • Define your topic if needed • Describe your topic at the end of the paragraph Example: It is considered important for adolescents to trust other people. For example, adolescents who trust their friends spend time with them, do not feel lonely, and therefore are satisfied with their lives. According to attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969/1982), individuals who trust their parents are more likely to assume that other people are trustworthy (hereafter, we call it “general social trust”). The present paper explores the effect of parent-child relationships on children’s general social trust.

36. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Describe how important your topic is. • Define your topic if needed • Describe your topic at the end of the paragraph Example: More than 60 percent of infants and young children under five experience some type of nonmaternal childcare (U.S. Census Bureau, 2005). Several studies have examined potential negative effects of the hours infants spend in nonmaternal care on infant-mother relationships. However, findings on associations between hours of nonmaternal care and parent-child relationships have been mixed (e.g., Belsky & Rovine, 1988; NICHD study, 1997). In this paper, I review the mixed finings on the effect of nonmaternal care on parent-child relationships.

37. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Optional: Include your take-home message(s). • “Divorce has been more prevalent in past a few decades. It has been empirically demonstrated that parents’ divorce leads their children to develop behavior problems. However, findings from recent studies suggest that parental conflict negatively influences children’s behavior problems, rather than does parental divorce. Hence, in this paper I explore associations among parental divorce, parental conflict, and child behavior problems.”

38. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph • Think of your introduction as a funnel; start general and get more specific.

39. Class Exercise • Write one sentence for each of the 3 (+1) guidelines. • Describe how important your topic is. • Define your topic if needed • Describe your topic in very general terms at the end of the paragraph • Optional: Include your take-home message(s). • Introduce the topic of your paper to your classmate.

40. Guidelines for writing introduction paragraph More tips: • One paragraph (not two or three paragraphs) • Use past tense for previous studies and present tense for your paper in the introduction. • Make sure organization is logical with smooth transitions • Be concise: Use as few words as possible • × “look for” → ○ “explore” × “bring up” → ○ “raise” • Write precisely and clearly • Make sure it is clear what pronouns are referring to • Say exactly what you mean (e.g., דfeel” → ○ “believe” or “propose”) • Do not use gendered language • דmankind” →○“human beings” דhe” → ○“he/she” or “she or he”

41. Homework • Read two articles • Aunola, K. & Nurmi, J. (2005). The role of parenting style in children’s problem behavior. Child Development, 76, 1144-1159. • Lansford, J. E. et al. (2005). Physical discipline and children’s adjustment: Cultural normativeness as a moderator. Child Development, 76, 1234-1246. • Email me your thought questions by Tuesday midnight. • Start reading assigned readings related to your paper topic, and start writing the introduction paragraph.