Relationships between Traumatic Events, Children’s Gender, and Political Activity, and Perceptions of Parenting Styles

Abstract

The associations between traumatic events, children’s gender and political activity, and parenting styles were examined among 108 Palestinians of 11-12 years of age. The results showed that the more the children were exposed to traumatic events, the more they perceived both their parents as strictly disciplining, rejecting, and hostile, and their mothers as more negatively evaluating. The boys perceived both their parents as treating them more negatively than the girls did. Affectionate parenting, such as intimacy and love, for its part, was not associated with traumatic events, and did not vary according to the child’s gender or political activity. The gender of the child affected the association between traumatic events, political activity, and perceived parenting. Traumatic events increased perceived parental rejection and hostility only among the boys, and perceived strict disciplining only among the girls. Although politically active children perceived both of their parents as more negative in general, in the families exposed to a high level of traumatic events, passive boys perceived their fathers as more rejecting and hostile than active boys did. It is suggested that mothers and fathers rear girls restrictively and with greater attention, and boys with rejection, when the family faces traumatic events. In exposed families, fathers also tend to discourage boys’ political passivity and apparently encourage activity.

Annual Research Review: Resilience and mental health in children and adolescents living in areas of armed conflict – a systematic review of findings in low‐ and middle‐income countries

“…That is, protective effects were found for overall psychological difficulties and PTSD (Punamäki, Qouta & El Sarraj, ), but not for depressive symptoms (Qouta et al., ), neuroticism, and risk‐taking tendencies (Qouta et al., ). Moreover, political activity's protective effect on psychological difficulties was only found in a period of relative stability and not in the first wave of the study during active conflict (Punamäki, Qouta, & El Sarraj, ). At the last follow‐up in this study, the protective effect for PTSD was no longer identified, but this could be a power issue, given high loss to follow‐up (from n = 108 to n = 65) (Qouta et al., ).…”

Parental Control: A Second Cross-Cultural Research on Parenting and Psychological Adjustment of Children

“…Parental control is also influenced by the child's gender. Despite the literature on the harshness and strictness with which girls are treated in eastern countries (Dwairy 1997;Zakareya 1999), many research findings in the Arab world indicate that the perceived parental control of boys is higher than it is of girls (Dwairy et al 2006;Fershani 1998;Punamaki et al 1997;Zegheena 1994). These puzzling findings were associated with greater submissiveness of girls, which make parental control perceived as more salient by boys, who tend to challenge the parents' rules.…”

Violent Conflict and Gender Inequality: An Overview

“…Experiences of war violence are highly correlated with greater levels of social capital, community engagement, and peaceful political engagement. Carmil and Breznitz (1991) found that exposure to war led to greater political activism among groups such as Jewish Holocaust survivors and Palestinian victims of bombardment (Punamäki, Qouta, and El Sarraj 1997). Regarding El Salvador, Wood (2003) argued that government violence prompted its victims to support and even join opposition forces out of moral outrage.…”