Parenting preschoolers in rural appalachia: Measuring attitudes and Behaviors and their relations to child development

Objective. This study examines the relations between multiple measures of parenting attitudes and behaviors and to child development in a sample of low-SES rural Appalachian European American families. Design. Seventy mothers completed questionnaire measures of parenting attitudes and behaviors, described their parenting behaviors in open-ended interviews, and were observed interacting with their child in the laboratory. Children were assessed with measures of mother-reported behavior problems, kindergarten teacher ratings of social competence, and standardized language scores. Results. Very limited convergence was found between parenting measures. These relations were more evident among measures with common source variance (parent-report) or those with more specific and concrete operational definitions of behavior. Rural Appalachian parenting, observed in the laboratory and described by mothers in interviews and questionnaires, accounted for significant variance in child social and language development, even when contextual predictors and child sex were taken into account. Negative parenting was more predictive than positive. Conclusion. In this little studied group, multiple methods identified individual differences in parenting behaviors, which related to behavior problems, language ability, and social competence in young children. The utility of semi-structured parent interviews was validated.