Parenting practices and expectations among Mexican mothers with young children

Parenting practices and developmental expectations were examined in a sample of 221 Mexican mothers with very young children living in Guadalajara, Jalisco. They completed a Spanish version of the Parent Behavior Checklist (PBC), a 100-item rating scale that measures parents' developmental expectations, discipline, and nurturing practices. The psychometric properties of the PBC for Mexican mothers, including test-retest reliabilities, were very similar to those found for mothers of young children in the United States. Younger Mexican mothers used more frequent discipline and less nurturing with their young children than older mothers did. Married mothers nurtured their children more than unmarried mothers; young, unmarried mothers nurtured their children the least. Lower nurturing scores were associated with lower education levels, and higher nurturing scores were associated with higher education levels. Mothers from higher socioeconomic levels held higher developmental expectations for their children, and they used less frequent discipline and more frequent nurturing practices than mothers from lower socioeconomic levels. These findings are consistent with those for mothers of young children in the United States.