‘Mixed blessings’: parental religiousness, parenting, and child adjustment in global perspective

Abstract

<div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S1"> <!-- named anchor --> </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d6348970e338">Background</h5> <p id="P1">Most studies of the effects of parental religiousness on parenting and child development focus on a particular religion or cultural group, which limits generalizations that can be made about the effects of parental religiousness on family life. </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S2"> <!-- named anchor --> </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d6348970e343">Methods</h5> <p id="P2">We assessed associations among parental religiousness, parenting, and childrens adjustment in a 3-year longitudinal investigation of 1198 families from 9 countries. We included 4 religions (Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, Islam) plus unaffiliated parents, 2 positive (efficacy and warmth) and 2 negative (control and rejection) parenting practices, and 2 positive (social competence and school performance) and 2 negative (internalizing and externalizing) child outcomes. Parents and children were informants. </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S3"> <!-- named anchor --> </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d6348970e348">Results</h5> <p id="P3">Parents greater religiousness had both positive and negative associations with parenting and child adjustment. Greater parent religiousness when children were 8 was associated with higher parental efficacy at 9 and, in turn, childrens better social competence and school performance and fewer child internalizing and externalizing problems at 10. However, greater parent religiousness at 8 was also associated with more parental control at 9, which in turn was associated with more child internalizing and externalizing problems at 10. Parental warmth and rejection had inconsistent relations with parental religiousness and child outcomes depending on the informant. With a few exceptions, similar patterns of results held for all 4 religions and the unaffiliated, 9 sites, mothers and fathers, girls and boys, and controlling for demographic covariates. </p> </div><div class="section"> <a class="named-anchor" id="S4"> <!-- named anchor --> </a> <h5 class="section-title" id="d6348970e353">Conclusions</h5> <p id="P4">Parents and children agree that parental religiousness is associated with more controlling parenting and, in turn, increased child problem behaviors. However, children see religiousness as related to parental rejection, whereas parents see religiousness as related to parental efficacy and warmth, which have different associations with child functioning. Studying both parent and child views of religiousness and parenting are important to understand effects of parental religiousness on parents and children. </p> </div>