The effects of early parenting and child variables on subsequent parental monitoring

This project sought to determine the relationship between early parental warmth and communication, child disruptive behaviors and later parental monitoring. Children and their families were recruited from a school in a midsize Midwestern town serving a high risk population. Longitudinal data were collected for child disruptive behaviors along with data on parenting variables, parental monitoring and parental warmth and communication. Using structural equation modeling, prospective relationships from parental warmth and communication and childhood disruptive behavior in Kindergarten to parental monitoring were estimated. Of particular interest in this study were differences in the relationship between early parental warmth and communication and parental monitoring based upon the topography of child disruptive behavior. Specifically, this study sought to determine whether parental monitoring was differentially affected by overt verses covert disruptive behaviors. Finally, child overt and covert disruptive behaviors mediated the effect of parental warmth and communication on parental monitoring. The mediational effect of covert disruptive behavior on parental monitoring was stronger than is overt disruptive behavior.