The Effects Of Parenting Beliefs On Children’s Adjustment In Turkey

Official URL: https://risc01.sabanciuniv.edu/record=b3403590

This thesis focuses on the effects of parental ethnotheories (i.e., cultural beliefs about child development) on children’s adjustment. Past literature on the association between cultural parenting beliefs and outcomes for children has been lacking. This study aimed to address the gap in the literature by investigating the link between parental ethnotheories and child adjustment. Drawing from past literature on cultural models, parenting beliefs were examined within the cultural context in a large project supported by TÜBİTAK (1003-118K050). A representative sample of parents (N = 1398) in Turkey completed the Parenting Beliefs Scale (PBS) developed based on the common beliefs about a child’s nature and child-rearing practices. Parents were asked to rate the target child’s psychological adjustment using the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). Both measures were factor analyzed to see the underlying culture-specific dimensions of parental beliefs and child adjustment. Factor analyses on the items of the PBS yielded three factors, representing (1) negative and (2) positive beliefs/attributions about child nature and (3) the environment shapes the child. Factor analyses on the SDQ yielded two general factors, one representing the combination of all problem behaviors and the other representing prosocial behaviors. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were conducted to predict the two adjustment variables from the three types of parenting beliefs after controlling for the effects of socio-demographic variables. The results showed that all three types of parenting beliefs significantly predicted both problem and prosocial behaviors, above and beyond the effects of socio-demographic characteristics. Negative parenting beliefs explained much larger variances in problem behaviors than positive ones. The predictive power of the parenting beliefs that environment shapes the child was relatively weaker than the other two types of parenting beliefs. Separate analyses of variance (ANOVA) revealed an interaction effect between parent and child gender on problem behaviors, and a significant effect of parent gender on negative parenting beliefs. Mothers reported higher levels of negative parenting beliefs than fathers. Finally, fathers’ reports of their daughters’ problem behaviors were higher than those of their sons. The findings were discussed, considering the cultural implications and parenting consequences of child-rearing beliefs in Turkey in light of the existing literature