NCJ Number
221810
Journal
Journal of Family Violence Volume: 23 Issue: 4 Dated: May 2008 Pages: 243-251
Date Published
May 2008
Length
9 pages
Annotation
The hypothesis that parenting mediates the relationship between parenting stress and child behavioral and emotional problems, known as Abidin’s model, was tested in a sample of women and children.
Abstract
In summary, findings from the study did not support Abidin’s (1992) model that parenting behavior mediates the relationship between parenting stress and child emotional and behavioral problems, but instead, revealed a strong direct relationship between parenting stress and child difficulties. This was the first study to test this model in a sample of 190 families experiencing intimate partner violence (IPV), adding to the growing evidence that parenting stress might directly affect children and/or might affect parent behaviors. Future research is recommended to investigate these family processes further in other IPV samples. The results suggest that interventions may be most effective by targeting parenting stress, in particular as a way to aid both maternal and child adjustment. The main purpose of this present study was to examine this mediation model within a predominantly African-American sample of battered women and their children (n = 190 mother-child pairs). Tables, references