Attributions And Parenting Strategies For Children’s Problem Behaviors:a Comparison Of Parents And Grandparents From Urban Families

Parents and grandparents’ co-parenting is widely adopted in urban Chinese families.However,contradictions and conflicts between the two parent generations occur from time to time in everyday co-parenting.The present study focused on the intergenerational differences of parents’ attributions and parenting strategies to children’s problem behaviors between grandparents and parents in urban co-parenting families.In this study,30 parents and 30 grandparents from 30 urban middle-class coparenting families were recruited from four public kindergartens in Shanghai.Mixed methods were used in the current study.In the quantitative phase,semi-structured interviews were used to examine parents’ and grandparents’ attributions and parenting strategies for children’s externalizing and internalizing problem behaviors,and coding for parents’ and grandparents’ responses was conducted subsequently in order to investigate the differences between parents and grandparents and the predictive effect of attributions on parenting strategies.In the qualitative phase,grandparents and parents from three families as typical cases were interviewed in order to explain findings from the quantitative data.Findings from the quantitative data suggested that:（1）In terms of the intergenerational differences of attributions and parenting strategies,parents tended to attribute children’s problem behaviors to children’s transient affective states and transient internal needs,while grandparents tended to attribute problem behaviors to children’s immature development.Parents tended to use distancing strategies such as inquiry and observation,distraction or non-involvement to discipline children’s problem behaviors and at the same time express or demonstrate support to children,while grandparents were more likely to give in to children’s demands.（2）In terms of the differences between externalizing and internalizing problems,parents and grandparents tended to attribute externalizing problems to children’s transient affective states and intentional power motives,while tended to attribute internalizing problems to children’s transient internal needs,biological processes,as well as personality,mental processes or other stable internal causes.To discipline externalizing problems,parents and grandparents tended to use teaching or modeling and aggressive/nonaggressive power assertion strategies,but for internalizing problems parents and grandparents tended to adopt distancing strategies,express understanding or demonstrate support for children,and outreach for help from others.（3）Attributions had no significant predictive effect on parenting strategies of children’s externalizing problem behaviors.For internalizing problems,only some of the attribution dimensions could predict parenting strategies.Based on the qualitative data: intergenerational differences were resulted mainly from different child-rearing responsibilities between the two parent generations,and the changes of parenting beliefs throughout time.Differences of attributions and parenting strategies between externalizing and internalizing problems were mainly caused by parents’ and grandparents’ different understanding of the two types of behavioral problems.Parenting strategies were influenced by many factors,such as individual differences,transient affective states of parents/grandparents,situational characteristics of children’s problem behavior,parenting beliefs and behaviors of other parents/grandparents around,therefore,the predictive effect of attributions on parenting strategies（especially for externalizing problem behaviors）was often not significant.This study could be beneficial for understanding intergenerational differences in parenting beliefs and behaviors,so as to provide practical suggestions for alleviating conflicts in co-parenting.