Abstract
Substantial research has focused on the negative associations between coparenting conflict, parental psychological functioning, and parenting behavior in European American, middle-income, families. However, less attention has been given to ethnic minority families and to families that are nontraditionally structured. In an effort to address this gap, the current longitudinal study examines the relation between conflict with the mother-identified primary co-caregiver and parenting practices in single parent, economically disadvantaged African American families. Participants included 234 mother–child dyads. It was hypothesized that conflict would relate to less utilization of positive parenting practices and that this association would be mediated, at least in part, by maternal psychological distress. Hypotheses were examined using structural equation modeling (Lisrel 8.3): Conflict with a co-caregiver was significantly related to parenting both directly and indirectly through maternal psychological distress. Implications of the findings are discussed.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
According to the 1991 US Bureau of Census, births to single parents constituted 67% of all births to African American women.
According to Vandenberg (personal communication), models demonstrating a close fit to the data, with a small chi-square value, can sometimes return goodness of fit indices that appear ‘perfect’ due to the fact that the fit induces used in the current study employ some form of the chi-square to degree-of-freedom ratio minus 1 in the numerator (the denominator is typically the null model minus 1). As such, as long as the chi-square to degree-of-freedom ratio is less than 1, as is the case in the current study (i.e., 13.67/23 = 0.59), the indices can be relied upon to indicate excellent, but not perfect, fit.
The CFA model is available from the first author, upon request.
References
Ahrons, C. (1981). The continuing coparental relationship between divorced spouses. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 51, 415–428.
Arnold, D. S., O’Leary, S. G., Wolff, L. S., & Acker, M. M. (1993). The Parenting Scale: A measures of dysfunctional parenting in discipline situations. Psychological Assessment, 5, 137–144.
Bentler, P. M., & Bonnett, D. G. (1980). Significance tests and goodness of fit in the analysis of covariance structures. Psychological Bulletin, 88, 588–606.
Berg-Neilsen, T. S., Turid, S., Vikan, A., & Dahl, A. A. (2002). Parenting related to child and parental psychopathology: A descriptive review of the literature. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 7, 529–552.
Brody, G. H., Flor, D. L., & Neubaum, E. (1998). Coparenting processes and child competence among rural African American families. In M. Lewis & C. Feiring (Eds.), Families, risk, and competence. (pp. 227–243). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Brody, G. H., Stoneman, Z., Flor, D., McCrary, C., Hastings, L., & Conyers, O. (1994). Financial resources, parent psychological functioning, parent co-caregiving, and early adolescent competence in rural two-parent African American families. Child Development, 65, 590–605.
Cheung, G. W., & Rensvold, R. B. (1999). What constitutes significant differences in evaluating measurement invariance? Paper presented at the 1999 conference of the Academy of Management, Chicago.
Coley, R. L. (2001). (In)visible men: Emerging research on low-income, unmarried, and minority fathers. American Psychologist, 62, 743–753.
Conger, R. D., Conger, K. D., Elder, G. H., Jr., Lorenz, F. O., Simons, R. L., & Whitbeck, L. B. (1992). A family process model of economic hardship and adjustment of early adolescent boys. Child Development, 63, 526–541.
Conger, R. D., Ge, X., Elder, G. H., Jr., Lorenz, F. O., & Simons, R. L. (1994). Economic stress, coercive family process and developmental problems of adolescents [Special Issue on children and poverty]. Child Development, 65, 6541–6561.
Conger, R. D., Wallace, L. E., Sun, Y., Simons, R. L., McLoyd, V. C., & Brody, G. H. (2002). Economic pressure in African American families: A replication and extension of the family stress model. Developmental Psychology, 38, 179–193.
Cummings, E. M., Goeke-Morey, M. C., & Dukewich, T. L. (2001). The study of relations between marital conflict and child adjustment. In J. H. Grych & F. D. Fincham (Eds.), Interparental conflict and child development. (pp. 39–63). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Derogatis, L. R., & Spencer, P. M. (1982). The brief symptom inventory administration, scoring and procedures manual. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Clinical Psychometrics Research Unit.
Derogatis, L. R., Rickles, K., & Rock, A. F. (1976). The SCL-90 and the MMPI: A step in the validation of a new self-report scale. British Journal of Psychiatry, 128, 280–289.
Dorsey, S., & Forehand, R. (2003). The relation of social capital to child psychosocial adjustment difficulties: The role of positive parenting and neighborhood dangerousness. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 25, 11–23.
Downey, G., & Coyne, J. C. (1990). Children of depressed parents: An integrative review. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 50–76.
Erel, O., & Burman, B. (1995). Interrelatedness of marital relations and parent–child relations: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 118, 108–132.
Fincham, F. D., & Grych J. H. (2001). Advancing understanding of the association between interparental conflict and child development. In J. H. Grych & F. D. Fincham (Eds.), Interparental conflict and child development. (pp. 443–452). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Fincham, F. D., Beach, S. R. H., Harold, G. T., & Osborne, L. N. (1997). Marital satisfaction and depression: Different causal relationships for men and women? Psychological Science, 8, 351–357.
Forehand, R., & Kotchick, B. A. (1996). Cultural diversity: A wake-up call for parent training. Behavior Therapy, 27, 187–206.
Grych, J. H., & Finchan, F. D. (2001). Interparental conflict and child adjustment: An overview. In J. H. Grych & F. D. Fincham (Eds.), Interparental conflict and child development. (pp. 1–8). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Hammen, C. L. (1991). The generation of stress in the course of unipolar depression. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 100, 555–561.
Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1995). Evaluating model fit. In R. Hoyle (Ed.), Structural equation modeling (pp. 76–79). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural Equation Modeling, 6, 1–55.
Jackson, A. P., Gyamfi, P., Brooks-Gunn, J., & Blake, M. (1998). Employment status, psychological well-being, social support, and physical discipline practices of single Black mothers. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 60, 894–902.
Jones, D. J., Forehand, R., Dorsey, S., Foster, S., & Brody, G. (2005). Coparent support and conflict in African American single mother-headed families: Associations with maternal and child psychosocial functioning. Journal of Family Violence, 20, 141–150.
Jones, D. J., Shaffer, A., Forehand, R. Brody, G., & Armistead, L. P. (2003). Coparent conflict in single mother-headed African American families: Do parenting skills serve as a mediator or moderator of child psychosocial adjustment? Behavior Therapy, 34, 259–272.
Joreskog, K., & Sorbom, D. (1996). Lisrel 8: User’s reference guide. Chicago: SSI, Inc.
Katz, L. F., & Gottman, J. M. (1996). Spillover effects of marital conflict: In search of parenting and coparenting mechanisms. In J. P. McHale & P. A. Cown (Eds.), New Directions for child development: No. 74. Understanding how family level dynamics affect children’s development: Studies of two-parent families (pp. 57–76). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Krishnakumar, A., & Buehler, C. (2000). Interparental conflict and parenting behaviors: A Meta-analytic review. Family Relations, 49, 25–44.
Loeber, R., & Farrington, D. P. (1994). Problems and solutions in longitudinal and experimental treatment studies of child psychopathology and delinquency. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 62, 887–900.
McLoyd, V. C., Harper, C. I., & Copeland, N. L. (2001). Ethnic minority status, interparental conflict, and child adjustment. In J. H. Grych & F. D. Fincham (Eds.), Interparental conflict and child development. (pp. 98–128). New York: Cambridge University Press.
McMahon, R. J., & Forehand, R. L. (2003). Hel** the noncompliant child: Family-based intervention. New York: Guilford.
Morlan, K. K., & Tan, S. (1998). Comparison of the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale and the Brief Symptom Inventory. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 54, 885–894.
Murry, V. M., Bynum, M. S., Brody, G. H., & Willert, A. (2001). African American single mothers and children in context: A review of studies on risk and resilience. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 4, 133–155.
Patterson, G. R., & Stouthamer-Loeber, M. (1984). The correlation of family management practices and delinquency. Child Development, 55, 1299–1307.
Preacher, K. J., & Leonardelli, G. J. (2001). Calculation for the Sobel test: An interactive calculation tool for mediation tests [Computer software]. Available from http://www.unc.edu/~preacher/sobel/sobel.htm.
Prinz, R. J., Foster, S., Kent, R. N., & O’Leary, K. D. (1979). Multivariate assessment of conflict in distressed and nondistressed mother–adolescent dyads. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 12, 691–700.
Reitman, D., Currier, R. O., Hupp, S. D. A., Rhode, P. C., Murphy, M. A., & O’Callaghan, P. M. (2001). Psychometric characteristics of the Parenting Scale in a Head Start population. Journal of Clinical Child Psychology, 30, 514–524.
Robin, A. L., & Weiss, J. G. (1980). Criterion-related validity of behavioral and self-report measures of problem-solving communication skills in distressed and nondistressed parent–adolescent dyads. Behavioral Assessment, 339–352.
Rook, K. S. (1984). The negative side of social interaction: Impact on psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46, 1097–1108.
Steiger, J. H. (1990). Structural model evaluation and modification: An interval estimation approach. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 25, 173–180.
Steinberg, L., Lamborn, S. D., Dornbusch, S. M., & Darling, N. (1992). Impact of parenting practices on adolescent achievement: Authoritative parenting, school involvement, and encouragement to succeed. Child Development, 63, 1266–1281.
Sudarkasa, N. (1993) African American females as primary parents. In H. P. McAdoo (Ed.) Family ethnicity: Strength in diversity. (pp. 191–200). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Taylor, R., Roberts, D., & Jacobson, L. (1997). Stressful life events, psychological well-being, and parenting in African American mothers. Journal of Family Psychology, 11, 436–446.
Tomarken, A. J., & Baker, T. B. (2003). Introduction to the special section on structural equation modeling. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 112, 523–525.
US Bureau of the Census. (1992). Poverty in the United States, 1991, Washington DC: Department of Commerce, September.
US Bureau of the Census. (1996). Poverty in the United States, 1995. Washington, DC: US Department of Commerce, September.
Vandenberg, R. J., & Lance, C. E. (2000). A review and synthesis of the measurement invariance literature: Suggestions, practices, and recommendations for organizational research. Organizational Research Methods, 3, 4–69.
Voight, J., Hans, S., & Bernstein, V. (1996). Support networks of adolescent mothers: Effects of parenting experience and behavior. Infant Mental Health Journal, 17, 58–73.
West, S. G., Finch, J. F., & Curran, P. J. (1995). Structural equation modesl with nonnormal variables: Problems and remedies. In R. Hoyle (Ed.), Structural equation modeling (pp. 56–75). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc.
Wilson, M. N., Kohn, L. P., Curry-El, J., & Hinton, I. (1995). The influence of family structure characteristics on the childrearing behaviors of African American mothers. Journal of Black Psychology, 21, 450–462.
Wilson, W. J. (1986). When work disappears: The world of the urban poor. New York: Alfred Knopf.
Acknowledgment
This research was supported by the William T. Grant Foundation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the University of Georgia’s Institute for Behavioral Research, and Grant No: T32 MH19117 from the National Institutes of Health.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Dorsey, S., Forehand, R. & Brody, G. Coparenting Conflict and Parenting Behavior in Economically Disadvantaged Single Parent African American Families: The Role of Maternal Psychological Distress. J Fam Viol 22, 621–630 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-007-9114-y
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-007-9114-y