The Role of Infant Temperament in Stability and Change in Coparenting Across the First Year of Life

The current study investigated the role of infant temperament in stability and change in coparenting behavior across the infant’s first year. Specifically, bidirectional relations between infant temperament and coparenting were examined and temperament was further considered as a moderator of longitudinal stability in coparenting behavior

Fathers’ Involvement in Child Health Care: Associations with Prenatal Involvement, Parents’ Beliefs, and Maternal Gatekeeping

Using data from 182 dual-earner couples experiencing the transition to parenthood, this study examined associations between prenatal involvement, gender role beliefs, and maternal gatekeeping and new fathers’ involvement in child health care. Results indicated that prenatal father involvement was associated with both fathers’ direct engagement in child health care and fathers’ perceived influence in child health-related decision-making. Fathers also demonstrated greater direct engagement in child health care when mothers held more nontraditional beliefs about gender roles. Moreover, when mothers were more encouraging of fathers’ involvement in childrearing, fathers felt more influential in child health-related decision-making, whereas when mothers engaged in greater gate closing behavior, fathers with more traditional gender role beliefs felt less influential in child health-related decision-making. This study suggests that fathers’ prenatal involvement, mothers’ beliefs, and maternal gatekeeping may play a role in the development of new fathers’ involvement in child health care at the transition to parenthood

Parental beliefs, infant temperament, and marital quality: Associations with infant–mother and infant–father attachment.

The present research examined parental beliefs about the importance of the paternal caregiving role, mothers’ and fathers’ reports of infant temperament, and observed marital quality as predictors of infant-mother and infant-father attachment security, over and above the effects of parental sensitivity. Infants’ attachment security to mothers and fathers were observed in the Strange Situation at 12- and 13-months, respectively (N = 62 two-parent families). Hierarchical regression models revealed that mothers who viewed the paternal caregiving role as important were less likely to have securely attached infants, but only when infant fussiness was high. Additionally, fathers who viewed the paternal caregiving role as important were more likely to have securely attached infants, but only when infants’ fussiness or marital quality was high

Parents’ differential susceptibility to the effects of marital quality on sensitivity across the first year

The current investigation examined the differential susceptibility of parents to the effects of marital quality on changes in parenting. We predicted that parents who were high on the personality constructs Negative Affect and Constraint would be more susceptible to the effects of marital quality on their level of sensitivity. Sensitivity was assessed at 3.5 and 13 months for both mothers and fathers during a triadic interaction. Consistent with the differential susceptibility theory, results suggested that when mothers were high on Negative Affect and when fathers were high on Constraint, their marital quality was associated with changes in sensitivity. This investigation suggests that personality factors may create “vulnerabilities” in parents that make them differentially susceptible to the effects of the family environment on parentin

Externalizing behavior in early childhood and body mass index from age 2 to 12 years: longitudinal analyses of a prospective cohort study

Background: Some evidence suggests that obesity and behavior problems are related in children, but studies have been conflicting and have rarely included children under age 4. An association between behavior problems in early childhood and risk for obesity could suggest that a common set of factors contribute to both. Our research objectives were to determine the extent to which externalizing behavior in early childhood is related to body mass index (BMI) in early childhood and through age 12, and to evaluate whether these associations differ by sex and race. Methods: Data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development were analyzed. Externalizing behaviors at 24 months were assessed by mothers using the Child Behavior Checklist. BMI was calculated from measured height and weight assessed 7 times between age 2 and 12 years. Linear mixed effects models were used to assess associations between 24 month externalizing behavior and BMI from 2 to 12 years, calculate predicted differences in BMI, and evaluate effect modification. Results: Externalizing behavior at 24 months was associated with a higher BMI at 24 months and through age 12. Results from a linear mixed effects model, controlling for confounding variables and internalizing behavior, predicted a difference in BMI of approximately 3/4 of a unit at 24 months of age comparing children with high levels of externalizing behavior to children with low levels of externalizing behavior. There was some evidence of effect modification by race; among white children, the average BMI difference remained stable through age 12, but it doubled to 1.5 BMI units among children who were black or another race. Conclusions: Our analyses suggest that externalizing behaviors in early childhood are associated with children's weight status early in childhood and throughout the elementary school years, though the magnitude of the effect is modest.https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-10-4

The Transition to Coparenthood: Influences on the Development of the Parenting Partnership

164 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2003.This study investigated factors that contribute to the development of parenting partnerships across the transition to parenthood. The potential roles of expectant parents' personal characteristics, relationship characteristics, and beliefs and expectations about parenthood were examined in relation to parents' perceptions of the quality of their parenting alliance and the quality of observed coparenting behavior. Thirty-nine expectant couples expecting their first child together completed questionnaires and were observed interacting together during the third trimester of the pregnancy; the same couples completed additional questionnaires and were observed interacting together with their infants when they were 3.5 months old. The results of this study point to several important and unique harbingers of the quality of developing parenting partnerships: expectant fathers' personalities, expectant parents' perceptions of childhood relationships with their own mothers, partners' prebirth projections about their parenting alliance, and partners' agreement/disagreement about plans for childcare and paternal role investments, as well as qualities of the preexisiting couple relationship. Importantly, the predictors of perceptions of parenting alliance and coparenting behavior were somewhat different. Taken together, these findings highlight the complex nature of parenting partnership development during the period of early family formation.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

Estimating the Effect of Romantic Relationship in Adolescence With IPTW: Using Machine Learning to Compute Propensity Scores

Romantic relationships are prevalent during adolescence and engagement in romantic relationships may affect socio-emotional development (Collins, Welsh, & Furman, 2009). For instance, Beckmeyer (2015) found that participation in serious romantic relationships was associated with increased odds of substance use, including alcohol, tobacco, and marijuana. The current study takes a step further to distinguish causation from selection effect of serious romantic relationship participation on adolescents’ socio-emotional development, by computing each adolescent’s probability to participate in romantic relationships (i.e., propensity scores) and adjusting the model using the scores (i.e., Inverse Probability to Treatment Weighting; IPTW). IPTW balances the baseline covariates among treatments, therefore reducing the non-randomness in treatment assignment (i.e., adolescents engage in romantic relationships or not), and creates an experiment-like condition to allow for causal inference (Austin & Stuart, 2015). Estimating propensity scores is more of a prediction problem than an explanatory problem. However, most studies estimate propensity scores with logistic regression (Westreich, Lessler, & Funk, 2011). Very limited attention has been paid to evaluating model assumptions and cross-validation errors. Westreich et al. (2011) suggested considering machine learning methods, and in particular, using boosting algorithms as an alternative to logistic regression. Boosting methods are robust against overfitting issues and perform well in classification problems (Schapire, 2003). Using information about adolescent’s family background, physical development, and socio-emotional development in middle childhood in NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (SECCYD), the boosting model correctly predicted whether the adolescent participated in serious romantic relationships in 75% of the cases with test data, with both specificity and sensitivity greater than 70%. Applying the inverse probability weighting with resulting propensity scores, we found that adolescents who participated in serious relationships were less work-oriented and more likely to take risks. However, these adolescents were also less lonely and perceived themselves to be more popular

Same Behaviors, Different Outcomes: Mothers’ and Fathers’ Observed Challenging Behaviors Measured Using a New Coding System Relate Differentially to Children’s Social-Emotional Development

This study used a newly developed coding system for measuring the quality of parenting behavior to examine associations with children’s social-emotional development. The Risky Interaction Support and Challenge Scale (RISCS) measures the extent to which parents engage in behaviors that present physical and regulatory challenges to children, as well as parents’ tendency to allow children to pursue action goals autonomously. These behaviors were observed while parents (n = 57 fathers; n = 55 mothers; n = 50 pairs) interacted with their 1-year-olds who played on a structure that included a slide, a small climbing wall, and a tunnel. Trained raters reliably used the RISCS to measure several dimensions of parent behaviors related to children’s exploration, and all but one of the dimensions captured adequate variability in parent behavior. Although mothers and fathers did not differ in any of the dimensions, the associations between parent behavior and children’s social-emotional development did not overlap. Fathers who engaged in greater autonomy allowance and lower overprotection had toddlers with lower levels of internalizing behavior, whereas mothers who challenged children’s regulatory competence had toddlers with lower levels of externalizing behavior and greater competence. We discuss the implications of the findings for the literature on attachment theory and father-child relationships

Externalizing behavior in early childhood and body mass index from age 2 to 12 years: longitudinal analyses of a prospective cohort study

Abstract Background Some evidence suggests that obesity and behavior problems are related in children, but studies have been conflicting and have rarely included children under age 4. An association between behavior problems in early childhood and risk for obesity could suggest that a common set of factors contribute to both. Our research objectives were to determine the extent to which externalizing behavior in early childhood is related to body mass index (BMI) in early childhood and through age 12, and to evaluate whether these associations differ by sex and race. Methods Data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development were analyzed. Externalizing behaviors at 24 months were assessed by mothers using the Child Behavior Checklist. BMI was calculated from measured height and weight assessed 7 times between age 2 and 12 years. Linear mixed effects models were used to assess associations between 24 month externalizing behavior and BMI from 2 to 12 years, calculate predicted differences in BMI, and evaluate effect modification. Results Externalizing behavior at 24 months was associated with a higher BMI at 24 months and through age 12. Results from a linear mixed effects model, controlling for confounding variables and internalizing behavior, predicted a difference in BMI of approximately 3/4 of a unit at 24 months of age comparing children with high levels of externalizing behavior to children with low levels of externalizing behavior. There was some evidence of effect modification by race; among white children, the average BMI difference remained stable through age 12, but it doubled to 1.5 BMI units among children who were black or another race. Conclusions Our analyses suggest that externalizing behaviors in early childhood are associated with children's weight status early in childhood and throughout the elementary school years, though the magnitude of the effect is modest.</p