1. Children's Effects Upon Parental Behavior: Mothers and Father's Responses to Dependent and Independent Child Behaviors.
- Author
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State Univ. of New York, Ithaca. Coll. of Human Ecology at Cornell Univ., Osofsky, Joy D., and Oldfield, Susan
- Abstract
A primary purpose of the present study was to further investigate the effects of children upon parents in order to gain a better understanding of the interactional relationship between parents and children. Subjects were 42 middle and upper-middle class parents and their daughters. Mothers and fathers were first observed separately with their child in structured and unstructured interaction situations. Each parent was also interviewed separately concerning child-rearing attitudes and behaviors. Interviews were videotaped. As predicted, children's task behaviors (both dependent and independent) resulted in different parental responses. Mothers and fathers interacted more, both verbally and physically, when the children acted dependent. Fathers seemed to reinforce daughters' dependent behaviors more than mothers did, but were less controlling than mothers when the child acted dependent. The differences in parental response may relate to parents' differential involvement or expectations for their children. Whatever the explanation, both mothers and fathers should be studied directly to gain understanding of the similarities and differences in parental behavior and the parent-child relationship. [Filmed from best available copy.] (Author/MK)
- Published
- 1971