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Purpose: Raising a child with Down syndrome (DS) brings unique challenges to parents' psychological functioning. Extensive quantitative research has shown that these parents tend to experience higher levels of parental stress and lower well-being. However, a more in-depth and balanced insight is essential to fully grasp the complexity of parenting a child with DS. To address this gap, this study uses a qualitative approach to explore the experiences and behaviors of parents raising a child with DS., Design and Methods: By adopting the Self-Determination Theory as a comprehensive theoretical framework, this study attends to both opportunities and challenges for parents' psychological needs of autonomy, relatedness, and competence, and provides insights into how they support the psychological needs of their child with DS. Eleven in-depth interviews were conducted with parents of a child with DS (aged 4 to 23 years)., Results: Through thematic analysis, six themes of parental experiences and three themes of parenting behaviors were distinguished., Conclusions: The findings indicated that parents experience many opportunities for need satisfaction, predominantly in their need for relatedness. However, raising a child with DS also involves challenges for the parents' family relationships, personal freedom, professional ambitions, and feelings of competence. Regarding their parenting behaviors, parents considered stimulating independence, tuning into the child's mental world, and being patient as essential practices when raising a child with DS., Practical Implications: This study provides important clues to promote parents' well-being as well as their engagement in need-supportive parenting practices towards their child with DS., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors have no competing interests to declare., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

This nine-year longitudinal study addresses the joint contribution of parent-rated negative controlling parenting and child personality on psychosocial outcomes in 141 families of children with autism spectrum disorder (83% boys, mean age Time 1 = 10.1). Latent change modeling revealed substantial variation in within-person change in parenting and psychosocial outcomes across a six- and three-year-interval. Over time, negative controlling parenting and child personality were consistently related to externalizing problems, whereas child personality was differentially related to internalizing problems and psychosocial strengths. Three personality-by-parenting interactions were significant, suggesting that children with less mature personality traits show more externalizing behaviors in the presence of controlling parenting. This study identified both parenting and child personality as important modifiers of developmental outcomes in youth with autism.

The purpose of this study was to advance the current understanding of the daily dynamics that are involved in raising a child with Cerebral Palsy (CP). Specifically, we examined the role of mindful parenting and of day-to-day variation in parents' psychological needs and child behavior in explaining day-to-day variation in parents' autonomy-supportive, psychologically controlling, and responsive parenting behavior. Parents (N = 58) of children with CP (Mage = 12.68 years) participated in a 7-day diary study. Multilevel analyses indicated that parents' autonomy-supportive, psychologically controlling, and responsive behaviors fluctuate considerably between days. Further, daily fluctuations in both child behavior and parents' own psychological needs were found to be associated with this daily variability in parenting. In addition, interindividual differences in mindful parenting were associated positively with parents' responsiveness and negatively with psychologically controlling parenting across the week. These findings point towards the changeability of parenting behavior among parents of a child with CP and suggest that interventions targeting parenting behavior in the context of CP will be most effective when taking into account both the parents' and the child's functioning.

This study aimed to gain more insight in the sources of daily parenting among mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Specifically, we examined associations between daily variations in child behavior, mothers' psychological needs, and mothers' controlling and autonomy-supportive parenting. Moreover, the study examined the potential mediating role of daily vitality and stress within these associations. In total 41 mothers (M age = 41.84 years) of children with ASD (M age = 10.92 years, range 7-15) participated in a 7-day diary study. Multilevel structural equation modeling revealed that both daily child behavior (i.e., externalizing problems and prosocial behavior) and mothers' psychological needs relate to day-to-day variation in parenting behavior. Daily stress and vitality played an intervening role in most of these associations.

Purpose: Research suggests that parenting a child with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) brings about major challenges to parents' own psychological resources. Considered through the lens of Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2017), parents rearing a child with ASD particularly face challenges to their psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. In turn, these challenges potentially jeopardize parents' capacity to attune to their child. This qualitative study aims to advance insight into (the interplay between) parents' experiences and parenting behaviors when raising a child with ASD, thereby using SDT as a framework to understand how these experiences and behaviors relate to the psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness and competence., Design and Methods: Fifteen parents of children with ASD, aged 6 to 17, participated in an interview concerning their behaviors and experiences in raisin their child with ASD., Results: Four sets of parental behaviors and five sets of parental experiences were identified, with the majority being relevant to the psychological needs postulated by SDT., Conclusions: The findings of this study provide (1) a deeper understanding of the threats and opportunities for the well-being of parents of children with ASD, (2) an in-depth insight into how these parents adjust their parenting behaviors to their child, and (3) an understanding of how parents' need-related experiences and parenting behaviors are dynamically intertwined., Practical Implications: By structuring how parents perceive threats and opportunities when raising a child with ASD within the SDT-framework, important targets for parent-support are identified., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Research in parents of youngsters with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) increasingly documents associations between children's problem behaviors and symptom severity and more dysfunctional and less adaptive parenting behaviors. However, the mechanisms underlying these associations have not been examined thoroughly. This study examines the mediating role of parental need frustration in the relation between child maladjustment (i.e., problem behavior and autism severity) and parenting behavior (i.e., controlling and autonomy-supportive parenting). The sample included 95 parents of adolescents/emerging adults with ASD (M age =18.8years, SD=2.3). Parents completed questionnaires assessing their parenting strategies and psychological need frustration as well as the internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors and autism severity of their child. Results indicate that the association between externalizing problems and controlling parenting was partially mediated by need frustration. This suggests that externalizing problems go together with lower feelings of parent-child closeness, lower parental competence, and a decreased sense of volitional functioning, feelings that, in turn, relate to more controlling strategies. Symptom severity has a direct negative association with autonomy support, suggesting that parents lower their autonomy support when their child has high levels of autism symptoms, without experiencing these symptoms as a threat to their own psychological needs., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Longitudinal bidirectional effects between parents and children are usually studied in samples of typically developing children, but remain understudied in families with a child with autism spectrum disorder. This three-wave longitudinal study examined how parents and children with autism spectrum disorder influence one another, relying on parent reports of parenting behaviors and children's problem behaviors across 9 years, in a sample of 139 youngsters (M age Time 1 = 10.2 years, 83% boys). Cross-lagged analyses indicated that children's externalizing problems at Time 1 predicted negative controlling parenting 6 years later (Time 2) that in turn predicted externalizing problems 3 years later (Time 3). Negative parental control at Time 1 also increased the risk for internalizing problems at Time 2. It was surprising that externalizing problems at Time 2 also predicted positive parental involvement at Time 3. Thus, although results indicate that externalizing problems generally elicit maladaptive reactions in parents, this study also suggests that parents adjust their way of reacting to externalizing child problems as their child reaches adolescence/emerging adulthood. Implications for future research on parenting dynamics in families with a child with autism spectrum disorder are discussed.

Coping, personality, and identity are three well-known constructs within the field of psychology. Yet, findings regarding how these constructs relate to each other have been inconsistent. The present study employs network analysis to investigate coping, adaptive and maladaptive personality, and identity and how they are related, using data from the Flemish Study on Parenting, Personality, and Development (FSPPD; Prinzie et al., 2003; 1999–current). Young adults (N = 457; 47% male), aged between 17–23 years old, completed a survey on coping, adaptive and maladaptive personality, and identity. Results indicate clear associations between coping and both adaptive and maladaptive personality within the network, suggesting coping and personality are distinct, yet highly related constructs whereas identity proved largely unrelated. Potential implications and suggestions for future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parental burnout emerges as a response to chronic and overwhelming parenting stress and is related to dysfunctional parenting practices, such as neglectful or violent behavior. Grounded in Self-Determination Theory, the current study aims to evaluate parenting stress as an antecedent and the more general quality of parenting as an outcome of parental burnout. This objective is tackled within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, which posed major challenges to parents, especially to those raising children with complex care needs (CCN; i.e., an intellectual and/or physical disability, and/or behavioral and/or emotional problems). Therefore, this study explores mean-level group differences in parenting stress, parental burnout, and parenting behaviors between parents raising children with and without CCN, and tests whether associations between these variables are similar for both groups of parents. A group of 506 parents (88% mothers, Mage = 44 years) participated in a widespread online survey during the first lockdown in Belgium. Based on mean-level differences, parents of children with CCN reported substantially higher levels of parenting stress and parental burnout but scored similarly on the assessed parenting behaviors. Multigroup structural equation models showed that in both groups, parenting stress was related positively to parental burnout which, in turn, was related to less autonomy-supportive and responsive parenting and to more psychologically controlling parenting. Although raising a child with CCN may be a risk factor for increased parental stress and burnout, the functional role of these parental experiences in the quality of parenting appears to be similar across both groups of parents. Highlights: This study examines associations between parenting stress, parental burnout, and parenting behaviors during COVID-19. Parenting stress positively related to parental burnout which, in turn, related to less need-supportive and more need-thwarting parenting. Although parents of children with CCN experienced more parental stress and burnout, they did not display lower quality of parenting. The role of parental stress and burnout in the quality of parenting was similar across parents of children with and without CCN. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined the family emotional climate as assessed by Five Minute Speech Samples and the relation with parenting stress and parenting behaviors among parents of children (6–17 years, 64.7% boys) with autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, and without any known disability (n = 447). The large majority of parents (79%) showed low levels of Expressed Emotion, an indicator of a positive family climate. In all groups, more Emotional Over-involvement, more Criticism and fewer expressions of Warmth were associated with higher levels of parenting stress. Across groups, Emotional Over-involvement was related to more autonomy-supportive parenting, Criticism to more psychologically controlling and overreactive parenting, and Warmth was associated with more responsive and less psychologically controlling and overreactive parenting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because parents of children with cerebral palsy encounter many challenges, the quality of their parenting varies substantially across time. To understand how and why their parenting behaviors change across time, we examined the contributions of child behavior and parents' psychological needs to explanations of yearly variation in responsive, autonomy-supportive, and psychologically controlling parenting. We also explored whether parents' motivation to take care of their child explained why some parents engage in better-quality parenting than others. Parents (N = 117) of children with cerebral palsy (M age = 10.98 years) participated in a three-wave longitudinal study. Multilevel analyses indicated that yearly variations in parents' need satisfaction and frustration related to yearly fluctuations in, respectively, autonomy-supportive and psychologically controlling parenting. Child behaviors had few unique effects on parenting. Parents' autonomous motivation was associated with better overall quality of parenting. We discuss implications for practice and directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. Parental self-critical perfectionism has been identified as an important source of parents' psychologically controlling parenting. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how this well-established association can be explained. This study aims to advance insight in the association between parental self-critical perfectionism and psychological control by addressing the role of parental reflective functioning among parents of adolescents. Design. This cross-sectional study included 268 adolescents (Mage = 15.14 years, 50.7% female), mothers (Mage = 45.83 years), and fathers (Mage = 47.77 years). Parents completed questionnaires assessing self-critical perfectionism, parental reflective functioning, psychologically controlling parenting, and their child's problem behaviors. In addition, adolescents rated their parents' use of psychological control. Results. Self-critical perfectionism related both directly and indirectly, via parents' pre-mentalization, to psychological control among mothers and fathers. Most associations remained significant when controlling for adolescent problem behaviors. Conclusions. This incapacity to reflect on the adolescent's mental world, and the tendency to make maladaptive attributions about the adolescent's internal states, make parents with high levels of self-critical perfectionism vulnerable to rely on psychologically controlling parenting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]