Agreement With Night-Waking Strategies Among Community Mothers of Preschool-Aged Children

Objective To explore the night-waking schemas of mothers of preschool-aged children, using a new measure of agreement with night-waking strategies (Night-waking Vignettes Scale; NVS). Method A community sample of 203 mothers (M age = 32 years, SD = 5.1) of 2- to 5-year-olds (M age = 3.4 years, SD = 1.0) provided demographic information and completed the NVS and measures of night-waking and general parenting behavior. Results Few mothers endorsed strong agreement or disagreement with limit-setting, active comforting, or rewards; mothers generally disagreed with punishment. Significant associations between agreement with night-waking strategies, child sex, and maternal educational attainment were observed; only agreement with punishment was correlated with general parenting. Agreement with night-waking strategies differed across the night-waking behaviors depicted in the NVS vignettes. Agreement with limit-setting and agreement with active comforting were correlated with night-waking. Conclusions Mothers may be ambivalent about common night-waking strategies. Night-waking schemas appear to be complex.