3~4岁幼儿气质与父母教养方式的交叉滞后分析

Temperament and Parenting Style in 3-to 4-Year-Old Preschoolers:A Two-Wave Longitudinal Study

为探讨幼儿气质与父母教养方式的相互作用关系,研究采用交叉滞后研究设计对269名3~4岁幼儿及其父母进行间隔一年的两次追踪测量。结果发现:T1幼儿气质的专注性负向预测T2母亲溺爱型教养方式;T1母亲溺爱型教养方式负向预测T2幼儿气质的活动性;幼儿气质的活动性与父亲专制型教养方式在一年内能够互相负向预测。研究揭示了幼儿气质与父母教养方式的动态作用关系,对于儿童早期家庭教育与个性化发展具有一定的指导价值。

Temperament refers to the biologically-based individual differences in reactivity and self-regulation that appears early in life,which is believed to play an important role in children’s social and personality development and psychological adjustment.It has been found that preschool stage is critical to temperament development.Both the family system theory and the ecological systems theory emphasize that family is the main factor influencing the temperament development of preschoolers,particularly in terms of parenting style.Parenting style refers to the attitudes and behavioral tendencies that parents show when educating and raising their children.Furthermore,the transactional model proposes that parenting style and preschoolers’temperament dynamically influence each other and thus contribute to the social development of preschoolers.The effect of children on parents is as important as the effect of parents on children during the parent-child interaction.More specifically,preschoolers’temperament can evoke different parenting behaviors,while parenting style can elicit preschoolers’specific temperament.However,previous related evidences were basically based on cross-sectional data.There have been relatively few longitudinal studies testing bidirectional relations between child temperament and parenting.Furthermore,previous research on the bidirectional relationship generally focused on specific parenting behaviors rather than a more generalized parenting style.Importantly,such bidirectional process between parenting style and child temperament may impact preschooler’s social development and deserves further investigation.Therefore,from the perspective of the transactional model,this study investigated the bidirectional relationship between preschool children’s temperament and parenting style by using cross-lagged research design.In this study,using a longitudinal method,a total of 2693-to 4-year-old preschoolers and their parents were investigated by questionnaires at two waves one year apart.Parents completed the Parental Authority Questionnaire and teachers completed the Children’s Temperament Teacher Assessment Questionnaire at both measurements.All the measures had acceptable reliability and validity.IBM SPSS version 22.0 was used for descriptive statistics,reliability analysis,and partial correlation analysis for all study variables.Mplus version 7.4 was used to analyze path analysis of the cross-lagged model.The results indicated that:(1)Partial correlation analysis showed that some dimensions of preschoolers’temperament were significant correlated to parenting style.(2)Cross-lagged analyses indicated that Time 1 concentration dimension of preschoolers’temperament negatively predicted Time 2 mother’s doting parenting style.Time 1 maternal doting parenting style negatively predicted the Time 2 activity dimension of preschoolers’temperament.(3)Time 1 activity dimension of preschoolers’temperament negatively predicted Time 2 paternal authoritarian parenting style.Time 1 paternal authoritarian parenting style could negatively predict Time 2 activity dimension of preschoolers’temperament.In other words,the activity dimension of preschoolers’temperament and paternal authoritarian parenting style could predict each other,but the paternal authoritarian parenting style had a greater impact on the activity dimension of preschoolers’temperament.In summary,the current study reveals that preschool children’s temperament and parenting style are dynamic interaction relations.Thesefindings expand the understanding of the complex mutual relations between preschoolers’temperament and parenting style in Chinese children,which has practical implications for promoting family education and personalized development in early childhood.