The authors developed a 10‐week school‐based therapy program using music for teenagers who demonstrated depressive symptoms. Pre‐ and posttesting indicated a significant decrease in depressive symptoms.

This study assesses whether the stresses associated with parenting a child are indirectly related to adolescent self-concept through parenting behaviors. We examined longitudinal associations among mothers' and fathers' parenting stress at age 10, children's perceptions of parenting at age 10, and adolescents' self-concept at age 14 in 120 European American families. Mothers' and fathers' parenting stress was related to children's perceptions of acceptance and psychologically controlling behavior, and psychologically controlling behavior (and lax control for fathers) was related to adolescent self-concept. We further examined which domains of parenting stress and perceived parenting behaviors were associated with adolescents' scholastic competence, social acceptance, physical appearance, and behavioral conduct. Parenting stress was related to specific parenting behaviors, which were, in turn, related to specific domains of self-concept in adolescence. Parenting stress appears to exert its effects on early adolescent self-concept indirectly through perceived parenting behavior. KeywordsParenting Stress; Parenting Behavior; Self-concept; Adolescence Although parenting is rewarding for most parents (Rogers & White, 1998), parenting a child provides ever-changing challenges as the child grows and develops. Parenting stress (also called childrearing stress) can be attributed to the behavior of the child, to parental difficulty in managing parenting tasks, or to dysfunctional interaction between child and parent (Abidin, 1995). Parenting stress is experienced across all sociodemographic groups and many contexts (Crnic & Low, 2002). In this article, we explore processes by which parenting stress plays a role in children's perceptions of parenting behaviors and how those perceived parenting behaviors then influence children's self-concept during the psychologically vulnerable period of the transition into adolescence.Self-concept (broadly defined as encompassing self-esteem and self-perceptions) is a major component of well-being that has been linked to overall life satisfaction (Diener, 1984;Myers & Diener, 1995), positive emotions (Mahon & Yarcheski, 2002), and protection against anxiety and depression (Ohannessian, Lerner, Lerner, & von Eye, 1994 NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript concept as our outcome for two specific reasons beyond these global relations between selfconcept and well-being. First, self-concept appears to decline across late childhood and early adolescence (Baldwin & Hoffmann, 2002). Second, in adolescence, self-concept becomes increasingly differentiated (Harter, 2006), and adolescents' self-concepts in different domains are conceptually and statistically independent (Harter, 1988). Measuring only global selfconcept ignores important variations in emotional, academic, social, and behavioral domains of self-concept (see DuBois & Tevendale, 1999). The ability to assess self-concept across multiple domains is especially significant for adolescents who ar...

This study examined unique associations of multiple distal context variables (family socioeconomic status [SES], maternal employment, and paternal parenting) and proximal maternal (personality, intelligence, and knowledge; behavior, self-perceptions, and attributions) and child (age, gender, representation, language, and sociability) characteristics with maternal sensitivity and child responsiveness in 254 European American mothers and their firstborn 20-month-olds. Specific unique relations emerged in hierarchical regression analyses. Mothers who worked fewer hours per week and reported less dissonance in their husbands' didactic parenting, whose children spoke using more vocabulary, and who reported less limit setting in their parenting and attributed their parenting failures to internal causes were observed to be more sensitive in their interactions with their children. Children in higher SES families, whose mothers worked fewer hours and attributed their parenting failures to internal causes, and who themselves used more vocabulary were observed to be more responsive in their interactions with their mothers. Although potential associations are many, when considered together, unique associations with maternal sensitivity and child responsiveness are few, and some are shared whereas others are unique.

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Despite waxing international interest in child disability, little information exists about the situation of children with disabilities in developing countries. Using a culture-free screen for child disability from the 2005–2007 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, this study reports percentages of children in 16 developing countries who screened positive for cognitive, language, sensory, and motor disabilities, covariation among disabilities, deviation contrasts that compare each country to the overall effect of country (including effects of age and gender and their interactions), and associations of disabilities with the Human Development Index. Developmental disabilities vary by child age and country, and younger children in developing countries with lower standards of living are more likely to screen positive for disabilities. The discussion of these findings revolves around research and policy implications.

Using the Family Assessment Device (FAD; Epstein, Baldwin, & Bishop, 1983) and incorporating the perspectives of adolescent, mother, and father, this study examined each family member's “unique perspective” or non-shared, idiosyncratic view of the family. To do so we used a modified multitrait-multimethod confirmatory factor analysis that (1) isolated for each family member's six reports of family dysfunction the non-shared variance (a combination of variance idiosyncratic to the individual and measurement error) from variance shared by one or more family members and (2) extracted common variance across each family member's set of non-shared variances. The sample included 128 families from a U.S. East Coast metropolitan area. Each family member's unique perspective generalized across his or her different reports of family dysfunction and accounted for a sizable proportion of his or her own variance in reports of family dysfunction. Additionally, after holding level of dysfunction constant across families and controlling for a family's shared variance (agreement regarding family dysfunction), each family member's unique perspective was associated with his or her own adjustment. Future applications and competing alternatives for what these “unique perspectives” reflect about the family are discussed.

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SYNOPSISObjective-Experiencing some degree of parenting stress is virtually unavoidable, particularly as children enter early adolescence and assert their independence. In this study, we examined how parenting stress attributed to the parent, the child, or the dyad changed in mean level and relative standing across their child's transition to adolescence. We also compared mothers and fathers from the same families in terms of parenting stress and explored how one parent's stress affected the other parent's stress. Design-Participants included 222European American parents (111 mothers and 111 fathers), assessed when their children were 10 and 14 years old.Results-Parenting stress was highly stable from 10 to 14 years. Total parenting stress increased across time, and was attributable to stress due to increased parent-child dysfunctional interaction, not parental distress or stress due to child behavior. Mothers and fathers agreed moderately in their relative standing and in the average levels of parenting stress in the three different domains of parenting stress at each time point. Mothers' and fathers' stress across domains were sometimes related.Conclusions-Mothers' and fathers' increased parenting stress across their child's transition to adolescence seems to derive from parent-child interaction rather than qualities of the parent or the child per se. Finding ways to maintain parent-child communication and closeness may protect parents and families from increased stress during this vulnerable time. INTRODUCTIONMost mothers and fathers value parenthood, are satisfied with their parental roles overall (Chilman, 1980), and are more committed to parenting than to work (Cinamon & Rich, 2002). However, more than half of parents also report that parenting is more difficult than their jobs (Chilman, 1980). Parenting stress (also called childrearing stress) is stress that can be attributed to parental difficulty in managing parenting tasks, to the behavior of the child, or to dysfunctional interaction between child and parent (Abidin, 1995;Deater-Deckard, 1998 NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptParent Sci Pract. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2011 January 1. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author ManuscriptParenting stress is a universal experience for parents in all sociodemographic groups and contexts (Crnic & Low, 2002). Parents who experience even moderate amounts of parenting stress may experience lower marital quality (Lavee, Sharlin, & Katz, 1996) and engage in less optimal parenting (Bonds, Gondoli, Sturge-Apple & Salem, 2002;Seigner, Vermulst, & Gerris, 2002). The children of stressed parents may also be adversely affected, though perhaps indirectly through parenting behaviors (Magill-Evans & Harrison, 2001;Putnick et al., 2008;Seigner et al., 2002). In this study, we explored the stability, continuity, and agreement of mothers' and fathers' parenting stress across their child's developmentally important transition to adolescence. Stress Associated with Parenting AdolescentsMuch ...