How do you respond to your child’s disruptive behavior? Harsh parenting, self-competence and temper tantrums in a Dutch community sample

How do you respond to your child’s disruptive behavior? Harsh parenting, self-competence and temper tantrums in a Dutch community sample

Master Thesis

University of Amsterdam Mathilde Anker Nilson, 12607606

Supervisor: Patty Leijten Second Supervisor: Eddie Brummelman Course: Master Thesis Master: Youth at Risk Word count: 5359

Abstract

Young children might have temper tantrums when they feel frustrated. Temper tantrums can be a forerunner for disruptive child behavior problems later in life. In order to control a child’s behavior, parents use discipline and boundary setting. The form discipline takes varies from parent to parent. Some parents use harsh physical or verbal parenting which has

consistently been linked to detrimental outcomes for all children. Parents may be particularly likely to use harsh parenting when they feel less competent as parents. Self-competence is the extent to which parents believe that they are competent in their role. This daily diary study was conducted over seven consecutive days, and asked mothers (N = 220) about the

frequency of their child’s tantrums and whether they responded with harsh parenting to each tantrum. Prior to the first entry, mothers reported on their feelings of parental

self-competence. It was hypothesized that parents use more harsh parenting when children show more frequent tantrums, especially parents who scored lower on parental self-competence. We found that children who had more tantrums had parents who responded with harsh parenting more often. Secondly, we found that parents who reported lower parental self-competence used more harsh parenting when faced with more temper tantrums. Developing interventions specifically targeting parent’s self-competence could limit the amount of harsh parenting parents use and increase the chance of children’s positive outcomes.

Children can be disruptive for their parents at times, and do not always comply as quickly and easily as parents wish. When children do not get their way, feel frustrated, irritable or misunderstood, they might have a temper tantrum as a way to express their frustration. Temper tantrums are an expected part of development for many children (Wakschlag et al., 2012) and are defined as “behavioral outbursts reflecting a dysregulated response to frustration” (p. 1, Manning et al., 2019). They have been found to be present in up to 83% of toddlers in a community samples (Manning et al., 2019). Tantrums can be typical and appropriate if they happen at times where it can be expected, such as when the child is tired or hungry. They will typically be brief and the parent is able to soothe or

redirect the child (Wakschlag et al., 2012). However, if these tantrums become more frequent and disrupt daily life, they could be signs of clinical levels of irritability in the child and they become an issue that needs to be taken seriously (Manning et al., 2019). Temper tantrums go under the umbrella term “disruptive child behavior”, which is used as a precursor for

childhood behavior that might later become clinical diagnoses like Conduct Disorder (CD), Oppositional Defiant Disorder (OPP) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Disruptive child behavior has been linked to a plethora of negative outcomes, such as poor academic achievement, juvenile delinquency, conflicts within the family, mental health problems, and antisocial behavior across the life course (Combs-Ronto, Olson,

Lunkenheimer, & Sameroff, 2009; Tremblay, 2000). Research has shown that it is likely tantrum severity that is the biggest risk factor for developmental impairment (Carlson, Danzig, Dougherty, Buffer, & Klein, 2016). Furthermore, severe tantrums impair family life as they increase stress levels, and interfere with social life and children’s academic

achievement (Manning et al., 2019).

Evidence suggest a bidirectional relationship between harsh parenting and disruptive child behavior (Oliver, 2015). Interactions between parent and child can become coercive

cycles, a theory which was first proposed by Patterson (1982). The theory is known as Coercion Theory, and suggests that through a process of mutual reinforcement, caregivers unintentionally reinforce children’s difficult behaviors, which in turn provokes greater caregiver negativity (Smith et al., 2014). Coercive family interactions are detrimental to the development of early disruptive behavior as well as more serious antisocial behavior patterns (Smith et al., 2014). Thus, parents might inadvertently foster further aggressive and

disruptive behavior, if they use harsh parenting as a response (Erath, El-Sheikh, & Cummings, 2009).

Harsh Parenting

The majority of parents want to provide their children with a warm and safe environment in which the children can learn to navigate the world and later become well-functioning, contributing members of society. In order to control their child’s temperament and behavior, parents use discipline and boundary setting, however the type of discipline parents use varies greatly from family to family (Kingsbury, Sucha, Manion, Gilman, & Colman, 2019). As of 2019, 58 countries have outlawed the use of corporal punishment (Global Initiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children, 2020), use of corporal punishment still remains strong in some countries (Gershoff, Lansford, Sexton, Davis-Kean, & Sameroff, 2012). Corporal punishment is described as: “the use of physical force with the intention of causing a child to experience pain but not injury for the purpose of correction or control of the child’s behavior” (p. 540, Straus, 1994 as cited in Gershoff, 2002). Spanking is the most used form of physical punishment and consists of the adult striking the child on the bottom with an open hand (Gershoff et al., 2018). Over 80% of Americans state they use spanking as a way of disciplining their child (Gershoff et al., 2012). Nevertheless, an abundance of research shows that there is practically no evidence to indicate that physical punishment is beneficial to children, or that it should be used as a backup when alternative

ways are not effective (Gershoff et al., 2019). Research has reliably linked physical punishment to increased risk of impairment to children and many studies found that harsh physical parenting is linked to adverse outcomes for all children, regardless of the context in which it takes place (Gershoff et al., 2018; Gershoff et al., 2019; Sege & Siegel, 2018).

Instead of using physical punishment as a way to discipline, some parents might yell, scream or call their child names. This is known as harsh verbal parenting and is often not considered as intrusive and aggressive as harsh physical parenting; however, its use can still lead to negative effects on child development (McKee et al., 2007). Harsh verbal parenting is also more likely to occur than harsh physical parenting and is therefore equally important (McKee et al., 2007). Harsh verbal discipline is defined as: “the use of psychological force with the intention of causing a child to experience emotional pain or discomfort for the purposes of correction or control of misbehavior” (p. 908, Straus & Field, 2003 in Wang & Kenny, 2014). Up to 90% of American parents in a sample, reported one or more cases of harsh verbal discipline towards children, regardless of the children’s age (Wang & Kenny, 2014). In previous research, children who were exposed to parental verbal aggression (such as name-calling and yelling) exhibited higher levels of disruptive child behavior, aggression, delinquency and internalizing behavior (McKee et al., 2007; Vissing, Straus, Gelles, & Harrop, 1991). In 2009, the UN wrote that harsh verbal discipline, like yelling, is psychologically aggressive towards children (Sege & Siegel, 2018). Children who are

exposed to harsh verbal abuse before adolescence are at risk of increased disruptive behavior problems and depressive symptoms at ages 13 and 14 (Wang & Kenny, 2014).

For decades, researchers have investigated why some parents use harsh forms of discipline when there is substantial evidence showing the adverse effects of it. In the late 70s and 80’s, Julia Steinmetz concluded that the most significant determinant of harsh parenting practices, is having experienced it yourself as a child (Simons, Whitbeck, Conger, & Chyi-In,

1991). This is also called the “cycle of violence”. Social learning theory posits that children learn aggressive behavior from their parents through modeling, when they use it as a way to discipline (Mendez, Durtschi, Neppl, & Stith, 2016). If a child grows up receiving harsh treatment from its parents, it is likely that it will see these coercive measures as a normal part of parenting and therefore accept these practices as typical. Some parents might believe harsh parenting to be an effective rearing tool because they received it from their parents, and they themselves “turned out okay” (p. 626, Gershoff et al., 2018). Harsh parenting can also affect children’s social information processing, as they perceive aggressiveness as an appropriate way to interact with their environment and take control of difficult situations (Weiss, Dodge, & Bates, 1992). Even if parents wanted to do parenting differently, they might only have a superficial understanding of which parenting practices take place in other families, and seeking out resources and information on more positive parenting strategies is not an option for everyone.

Secondly, some parenting styles are more associated with harshness and control than others. Parents who have authoritarian beliefs value parental authority and control of their children’s behavior (Crouch et al., 2017). In authoritarian parenting, teaching obedience and to do what is “right” are some of the most important goals. According to some researchers, one of the factors that define authoritarian parents is their use of “coercive power assertion strategies” (Baumrind et al., 2010). These include harsh verbal parenting and physical punishment. One explanation why parents choose this type of parenting could simply be because they believe harsh and coercive parenting to be the most effective in managing their child’s “naughtiness”. Previous research found that parents who spanked their children were more likely to believe spanking was an effective way of getting their child to behave,

compared to parents who never spanked their children (Holden, Miller, & Harris, 1999 in Crouch et al., 2017). The parents from the same study were also more likely to believe that

spanking promoted desired socialization goals for their children, and taught them to respect parental authority. These findings suggest that authoritarian parents use more harsh parenting strategies because they expect them to result in positive outcomes for their children.

Conversely, it could also be because parents who believe in authoritarian parenting are more likely to attribute negative intent to their children (Crouch et al., 2017). They might believe that they are intentionally trying to be annoying. Thus, parents can use different types of harsh parenting (i.e. verbal or physical) and for different reasons. Yet the intention or justification behind this parenting behavior does not change the fact that it is harmful to children and is likely to result in more disruptive behavior in the long term. Whether the frequency of disruptive child behavior predicts the use of more harsh parenting warrants further investigation.

Parental Self-Competence

Parents may be particularly likely to use harsh parenting when they feel less competent as parents. Self-competence is the extent to which parents believe that they are competent in their role and that they are able to influence their environment (Bandura, 1977). Parents who have high levels of self-competence report higher parental satisfaction, more parental warmth and overall lower parental stress (Jones & Prinz, 2005;Mouton & Roskam, 2015). Parents who believe in their own capabilities as parents are also more responsive, use less harsh discipline, and tend to view their child as less disruptive (Dekovic et al., 2010). Alternatively, parents who report lower self-competence tend to report higher levels of child behavior problems and greater use of severe negative discipline techniques (Day, Factor, & Szkiba-Day, 1994). Research has shown that parents who lack competence show less

adequate parenting and withdraw more often from interacting with their child (Dekovic et al., 2010). Lacking confidence in one’s own abilities as a parent may increase irritation and frustration towards the child which contributes to harsh parenting practices such as criticism

and physical punishment, which in turn is related to difficult child behavior (Gershoff et al., 2012; Mouton & Roskam, 2015). Thus, confirming parents’ beliefs that they are not

competent. A parent who has low feelings of self-competence and lacks adequate disciplining techniques might, out of desperation, resort to harsh forms of discipline as obtaining

compliance becomes more and more difficult (Shaw & Bell, 1993). It is important to investigate under which conditions parents with a low sense of self-competence are more likely to use harsh parenting.

The Current Study

The current study will investigate to what extent the number of temper tantrums predicts the use of more harsh parenting. I hypothesize that children who have a greater number of temper tantrums will have parents who use more harsh parenting. Furthermore, I hypothesize that the relation between tantrums and harsh parenting will be moderated by the parents’ feelings of self-competence, such that parents who feel less competent will be particularly likely to use more harsh parenting, in the light of frequent temper tantrums.

Methods

Participants

The sample included 220 mothers, aged between 22 and 45 years old (M = 32.47, SD = 4.19). The majority of the mothers were married (67.3%). The children in the sample (51.8% boys) were aged between 12 and 55 months (M = 30.01, SD = 8.32). Four of the children had a physical disability (Cerebral Palsy, chromosome aberration, Marfan syndrome, Pulmonary Valve Stenosis, and hearing impairment).

Participants were recruited between February 2016 and June 2017. Bachelor students recruited parents through online parenting fora, Facebook and face-to-face on the streets of Amsterdam. Parents who indicated that they had a child between 1.5 and 3.5 years old were asked to participate in the study. Following recruitment, parents were informed about the study and gave informed consent.

The study was a daily diary study for seven consecutive days with questions regarding temper tantrums of the child and the reactions of the parents. Prior to the first diary entry, parents reported on their general sense of parental competence. Parents who participated for at least four days of the daily diary study received a small gift (a book for their child for 2 euros). The procedure was repeated in April and May of 2017, in order to increase sample size. Another gift certificate of 50 euros was given to a participant selected at random. The study procedures were approved by the ethics review board of the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences of the University of Amsterdam.

Measures

Parental self-competence.

Parental self-competence was measured at baseline using the parent subscale for Competence from the Nijmeegse Ouderlijke Stress Index (NOSI; De Brock et al., 1992), which is the Dutch version of the Parenting Stress Index (PSI; Abidin, 1990). The subscale consists of 13-items and parents are asked to indicate how much they agree with each statement (1 = completely disagree, 6 = completely agree). Sample items included:

“Whenever something is the matter with my child, I doubt my skills as a parent” and “I enjoy being a parent”. Statements 1-6, 9 and 11-13 were reverse scored. An overall mean composite score was calculated for each participant and good internal consistency was found

Temper tantrums.

Child tantrum frequency was measured daily with the questions “Did your child have a tantrum today?” (yes/no), and “How many tantrums did you child have today?” (1-7 or more). These questions were adapted from the Vragenlijst Woedebuin bij Kinderen – Ouderversie (van Leeuwen, Bourgonjon, Huijsman, & Van Meenen, 2007). The number of tantrums reported over the seven days by parents via the question “How many tantrums did your child have today?” were calculated into a mean score for each family.

Harsh parenting.

Parents reported how they responded to each of their child’s tantrums by selecting 1 of 11 response options. Parents answered yes or no to each option depending on whether or not they showed this reaction. Three of these responses represented harsh parenting (“I became angry with my child”, “I punished my child”, and “I grabbed my child”). The scores on these three responses were added and a mean score was created for each family,

representing their average use of harsh parenting during the seven consecutive days. Analytic Strategy

The independent variable in this study is the number of tantrums children had during the seven consecutive days and the dependent variable is the frequency of harsh parenting used. The moderator is parents’ reported feelings of parental self-competence. Data from 19 participants were not included in the analysis as they did not complete the parental self-competence questionnaire at baseline.

To answer the question of whether the number of tantrums predicted parents’ use of harsh parenting, I used a simple linear regression analysis. I included the dependent variable, harsh parenting, and the independent variable, temper tantrums. A simple linear regression can be used to predict the values of the dependent variable as a function of the independent

variable. It is a simple regression because the outcome variable is related to a single predictor (i.e. the independent variable).

To answer the second research question of whether the strength of the relationship between number of tantrums and harsh parenting was moderated by parental

self-competence, I used a hierarchical multiple regression analysis. In the first model I included the dependent variable, harsh parenting, and the independent variable, temper tantrums. In the second model I included the dependent variable, harsh parenting, and both independent variables, temper tantrums and parental self-competence. Furthermore, I included an interaction term between temper tantrums and parental self-competence to investigate the moderation effect of parental self-competence.

Prior to answering the research question, assumptions for a linear regression analysis were checked for all three variables: (1) homoscedasticity was checked by looking at the

scatterplot in the output, (2) linearity was also checked by looking at the scatterplot, (3) normality was checked using Kolmogorov-Smirnov, and (4) multicollinearity was checked by looking at the Variance Inflation Factor (VIF).

Results

Preliminary Analyses.

Firstly, assumptions of homoscedasticity and linearity as assessed with a scatterplot were met. Secondly, normality was checked using Shapiro-Wilk test and found significant results for harsh parenting, W(220) = .453 , p = .000, number of tantrums, W(201) = .819, p = .000, and the moderator parental self-competence, W(201) = .900, p = .000. The assumption of normality was thus violated. Following this test, I checked skewness and kurtosis for all three variables. The data for the independent variable, number of tantrums, was slightly skewed with skewness of 1.64 (SE = 0.17) and kurtosis of 2.61 (SE = 0.34). This means that

the majority of the children showed very few tantrums and the curve is negatively skewed, leaning towards the left. As the sample used in this study is a universal sample, randomly recruited among the Dutch population, it cannot be expected that the children show a large number of tantrums as they were not recruited from a clinical population. The dependent variable, harsh parenting, was substantially skewed with skewness of 3.16 (SE = 0.16) and kurtosis of 10.80 (SE = 0.33). These findings show that the majority of the sample reported no or close to no use of harsh parenting during the seven consecutive days and the bell curve is therefore negatively skewed as the mean is less than the mode. However, this can be explained by looking at the greater national use of harsh parenting. Reports show that only 3% of participating parents from the Netherlands report the use of corporal punishment and it could therefore not be expected that our sample showed a higher use (duRivage et al., 2015). In addition, violation of the normality assumption was expected to not be problematic because our sample size was greater than 30 and deemed sufficient for the Central Limit Theorem (CLT) to hold (Rouaud, 2013). According to the CLT, as a sample size increases, the mean of the sample data will be closer to the mean of the overall population and the data is therefore accurate whether the distribution if normal or not. For the moderator, parental self-competence, the data was not substantially skewed. Lastly, multicollinearity was checked using the Variance Inflation Factor (VIF) and greatly violated the assumption. This was fixed by standardizing all variables and computing new mean scores for each family. After the standardization, all VIFs were below 3 for all variables.

Descriptive statistics.

Table 1 shows the range, means, and standard deviations and for all three variables. With regard to the theoretically possible scores, the mean scores in the table are very low. Parents could potentially have reported the use of harsh parenting a total of 49 times (if they responded harsh to seven out of seven tantrums on all seven days), yet the actual mean score

is 0.003 which indicates and extremely low use. This is similar for the number of tantrums which also have a theoretically possible score of 49, however, the mean is 0.559, indicating less than one tantrum per family on average. For the scores on parental self-competence, parents could answer each question on a scale of one to six dependent on how competent they felt. As the mean score for competence is over five, it suggests that the parents in our sample felt very competent as parents.

Table 1

Means, standard deviations, minimum and maximum scores for all variables.

Variable N Minimum Maximum Mean SD

Harsh Parenting 220 0.00 0.04 0.003 0.006 Number of Tantrums 220 0.00 2.86 0.559 0.599 Parental Self-Competence 201 2.38 6.00 5.031 0.649

Table 2 shows the correlations between the dependent variable and the two independent variables. Harsh parenting and the number of tantrums were significantly positively correlated, which shows that when parents used more harsh parenting children had more tantrums. Harsh parenting was significantly negatively associated with parental self-competence which suggests that parents used less harsh parenting when they had a higher competence score. The number of tantrums was negatively associated with parental self-competence, suggesting that the children who has less tantrums had parents who were more competent, however this correlation was not statistically significant.

Table 2

Pearson’s R Correlations

Harsh Parenting Number of Tantrums Parental Self-Competence Harsh Parenting - .371*** -.316*** Number of Tantrums - -.110 Parental Self-Competence - Main results.

To answer the first research question of whether the number of tantrums predicted parents’ use of harsh parenting, I used a simple linear regression. Including a linear effect of the number of tantrums explained 13.3% of the variance in the use of harsh parenting. This is a moderate effect size and statistically significant, F(1, 199) = 31.80, b = 0.151, 95% CI [0.098, 0.204], β = 0.371, p < .001. I conclude that the more tantrums children showed, the more harsh parenting parents used.

Next, to answer the second research question of whether parental self-competence moderated the strength of the relationship between the number of tantrums children had, and parents’ use of harsh parenting, I conducted a multiple linear regression. I concluded that the relationship between the number of tantrums children had, and parents’ use of harsh

parenting is moderated by parental self-competence, t(197) = -3.09, p = .002, b = -0.16, 95% CI [-0.26, -0.06], β = -0.19. This suggests that when parents score lower on self-competence, they are more likely to use harsh parenting in the face of temper tantrums.

Figure 1 illustrates the moderation analysis within the multiple regression. Parents who scored lower on parental self-competence used more harsh parenting as their child’s

number of tantrums increases. Parents who score higher on parental self-competence did not show an increase in harsh parenting as their child’s number of tantrums increases.

Figure 1.

Graph showing the moderation in the regression analysis.

Note. Low self-competence -1 SD and high self-competence +1 SD.

Discussion

In order to improve our understanding of parental use of harsh parenting when toddlers show temper tantrums, I used a daily diary study for seven consecutive days. Both hypotheses were supported: children who showed more tantrums had parents who used more harsh parenting, especially if these parents felt less competent as parents.

My first finding is in line with previous research (e.g., Smith et al., 2014). When a child displays disruptive behavior more frequently, there is an increased chance of the parent responding with harsh discipline. According to coercion theory (Patterson, 1982) this is because the child’s disruptive behavior provokes greater caregiver negativity, which in turn exacerbates the child’s disruptive behavior and the coercive cycle is established. The parent struggles with getting the child to comply and might, for several reasons, increase the frequency of harsh parenting.

Secondly, I found that parents who score lower on parental self-competence, use more harsh parenting when children have more tantrums, compared to parents who score higher on parental self-competence. This is consistent with previous research which shows that parents who report lower self-competence also reported a greater use of negative discipline

techniques (Day et al., 1994). This could be because their frustration and stress increases as the child have more tantrums, and due to their lack of self-competence, they fail to respond in an effective and positive way. They might also believe that the child will more likely comply if they use a harsher form of discipline. This makes sense intuitively as one could think the child would “behave well” in order to avoid harsher punishment. Parents who are low in self-competence could perhaps resort to harsh parenting out of desperation when faced with more frequent tantrums, and getting the child to comply becomes more and more difficult (Shaw & Bell, 1993). As the child becomes more disruptive and parents are unable to redirect or soothe them, they are again and again faced with their ineffectiveness as parents, and the energy and skills to respond effectively and positively to their child seem further and further away.

It is important to improve our understanding of how different parenting strategies affect children, in order to successfully help and support parents. We want parents to use parenting that provides children with the best possible foundation to become happy and

contributing members of society. Children who grow up and receive diagnoses, as well as treatment for these diagnoses, become a great cost to society (Christenson, Crane, Malloy, & Parker, 2016). By conducting research into how different types of parenting affect children, we become better able to target and deliver interventions with greater outcomes. In this way we ensure the interventions focus on the right aspects and that the right parents get the proper support. This both lowers societal cost in the short-term, as interventions are not delivered where they are not needed, but also in the long-term as children will have more positive outcomes.

One of the strengths of this study is that it is a daily diary study. Daily diary studies are ideally suited to investigate practices within a family. Parenting practices vary within the parents themselves during the day and from day-to-day (Mabbe, Soenens, Vansteenkiste, van der Kaap-Deeder, & Mouratidis, 2018). Furthermore, daily diary studies capture what

happens in an ecologically valid context and helps limit retrospective recall bias in

participants (Almeida, Wethington, & Chandler, 1999). This benefitted our study as parents were arguably more likely to remember correctly how many tantrums their child had and how they responded, as they were asked every day consecutively. They were also able to complete the daily diary within their home which further limits any pressure they might feel had

researchers been present to collect the data.

Another strength is the focus on self-competence as a moderator for harsh parenting. Self-competence has previously been studied in relation to harsh parenting and there is a clear association between the two. However, our knowledge about how parental self-competence can moderate the relationship between harsh parenting and frequent disruptive child behavior is more limited. Intuitively, parents who have low feelings of self-competence are likely to become frustrated and desperate more easily as they find their parenting

like temper tantrums, there is an increased risk of them resorting to harsh parenting,

compared to parents who are more competent. Previous studies have found that parents who have higher parental self-competence before they participate in a parenting program will have more successful outcomes, both with regards to the child’s disruptive behavior, but also in terms of their overall parenting skills (Dekovic et al., 2010).

Despite its strengths, this study also has limitations. First, the harsh parenting measure did not contain any measure for harsh parenting on the days where children did not show any tantrums. If parents use harsh parenting as a response to temper tantrums, it is possible they also use harsh parenting as a response to other child behavior during the day. How this affects the subsequent parent-child interactions and the occurrence of more temper tantrums, was not taken into consideration in this study. It could be interesting to investigate how parents use of harsh parenting one day, affect the child’s disruptive behavior the following day.

Second, the three “harsh parenting” answer options provided to parents, were included as harsh parenting because they “seemed” the harshest out of the 11 options. They were not chosen specifically because they represented harsh parenting behavior. In many countries, corporal punishment such as hitting with a hand or an object, has been outlawed and there is a general consensus that this type of parenting is bad and should be avoided at all costs. However, lighter forms of harsh parenting, such as yelling, punishing and grabbing might not be considered “harsh” in all contexts and cultures. The individual researcher should determine what constitutes harsh parenting in the context in which they are doing their

research. Nevertheless, this might mean that the findings from this study are not generalizable to populations with a different view on harsh parenting and the reader should take this into consideration.

Third, for the current study we chose to calculate composite mean scores for each family for all three variables to represent their overall use of harsh parenting, frequency of temper tantrums and a mean self-competence score. We analyzed it using a simple linear regression and hierarchical multiple regression. If we were to replicate the study, it could be more sensitive to treat the data as nested data and analyze it using a multilevel regression. Using a multilevel regression, we would be able to investigate the variation between groups and recognize that the data was grouped within the individual subjects. This type of analysis would further have increased the strength of the daily diary study as would be used in the most optimal way.

Based on the findings from this paper, it is recommended for future research to focus on parental feelings of self-competence in relation to harsh parenting and disruptive child behavior. Parental self-competence has successfully, and repeatedly, been increased through parenting programs and interventions (Dekovic et al., 2010; Mouton & Roskam, 2015) and any significant findings from this study can be useful in improving parenting interventions or help target new ones. Parental self-competence should be included as a moderator in future studies which looks at problematic parent-child interactions to investigate the effect is has on other parenting behaviors in relation to child behavior. Additionally, including parental self-competence in micro-trials for intervention components would be useful to test for whom self-competence can successfully be increased and under which conditions.

Furthermore, we recommend that researchers look at the relations and interactions between family members, and how these may “spillover” or transfer from one day to the next. Daily diary studies are the ideal research design for this, as the provide high ecological validity and allow researchers to look more in-depth into family interactions. It is important that future research does not overlook the impact daily coercive family interactions can have on subsequent negative interactions on the following days. It is unlikely that a negative

parent-child interaction on any given day is an isolated incident and its effects should be taken into consideration when conducting research in this field. Lastly, it is recommended that researchers always take culture into consideration as behaviors, definitions and constructs can vary in their meaning and importance depending on the location. Harsh

parenting, such as corporal punishment, is still legal in many countries. However, by adapting our research to the context we conduct it in, we might aim to show parents all over the world that it does not have any benefits and should be avoided at all costs. Researchers can take culture into consideration by connecting with native researchers in the place where they are conducting their studies in an attempt to be as culturally sensitive as possible. Moreover, when conducting a literature review, the focus should be on the culture in question to explore which results have previously been found within the given culture. Finally, depending on the circumstances, it might be worth observing some of the group-level cultural differences between the culture where the majority of the research has been done, and the current culture, or the differences between the researchers own culture and the culture in question.

The way we respond to our children’s behavior can have a great impact on their future healthy development and the relationship between parent and child. Whether we respond with harshness or with warmth can be greatly affected by our faith in ourselves as parents and the extent to which we believe we are competent in our role. Helping parents who often resort to harsh parenting by providing them with alternative positive options as well as increasing their parental self-competence might be a good place to start in ensuring that all children grow up happy and healthily. From the evidence presented in this paper, it is concluded that disruptive child behavior and harsh parenting are closely related and might indeed exacerbate each other. Furthermore, it is concluded that parental self-competence moderated this relationship and parents who are low in self-competence are more likely to use more harsh parenting, in the face of more disruptive behavior. Our findings contribute to the promotion and wider

implementation of positive, supportive and warm parenting strategies to further foster healthy and positive child development.

References

Abidin, R. R. (1990). The parenting stress index. US: Psychological Assessment Resources. Almeida, D. M., Wethington, E., & Chandler, A. L. (1999). Daily transmission of tensions

between marital dyads and parent-child dyads. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 61(1), 49-61. doi:10.2307/353882

Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Baumrind, D., Larzelere, R. E., & Owens, E. B. (2010). Effects of preschool parents’ power assertive patterns and practices on adolescent development. Parenting, 10(3), 157– 201. doi:10.1080/15295190903290790

Carlson, G. A., Danzig, A. P., Dougherty, L. R., Bufferd, S. J., & Klein, D. N. (2016). Loss of temper and irritability: The relationship to tantrums in a community and clinical sample. Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology, 26(2), 114–122. doi:10.1089/cap.2015.0072

Christenson, J. D., Crane, D. R., Malloy, J., & Parker, S. (2016). The cost of oppositional defiant disorder and disruptive behavior: A review of the literature. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 25(9), 2649–2658. doi:10.1007/s10826-016-0430-9

Combs-Ronto, L. A., Olson, S. L., Lunkenheimer, E. S., & Sameroff, A. J. (2009). Interactions between maternal parenting and children’s early disruptive behavior: Bidirectional associations across the transition from preschool to school entry. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 37(8), 1151–1163. doi:10.1007/s10802-009-9332-2

Crouch, J. L., Irwin, L. M., Milner, J. S., Skowronski, J. J., Rutledge, E., & Davila, A. L. (2017). Do hostile attributions and negative affect explain the association between authoritarian beliefs and harsh parenting? Child Abuse & Neglect, 67, 13–21. doi:10.1016/j.chiabu.2017.02.019

Day, D. M., Factor, D. C., & Szkiba-Day, P. J. (1994). Relations among discipline style, child behaviour problems, and perceived ineffectiveness as a caregiver among parents with conduct problem children. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 26(4), 520–533. doi:10.1037/0008-400X.26.4.520

De Brock, A. J. L. L., Vermulst, A. A., Gerris, J. R. M., & Abidin, R. R. (1992). NOSI Nijmeegse Ouderlijke Stress Index. An instrument to measure parental stress. An extensive version (NOSI) for diagnostic purposes and an abbreviated version (NOSIK) for screening purposes. Lisse, The Netherlands: Swetz & Zeitlinger. Deković, M., Asscher, J. J., Hermanns, J., Reitz, E., Prinzie, P., & van den Akker, A. L.

(2010). Tracing changes in families who participated in the Home-Start Parenting Program: Parental sense of competence as mechanism of change. Prevention Science, 11(3), 263–274. doi:10.1007/s11121-009-0166-5

duRivage, N., Keyes, K., Leray, E., Pez, O., Bitfoi, A., Koç, C., Goelitz, D., Kuijpers, R., Lesinskiene, S., Mihova, Z., Otten, R., Fermanian, C., & Kovess-Masfety, V. (2015). Parental use of corporal punishment in Europe: Intersection between public health and policy. PLOS ONE, 10(2), 1-11. doi:0.1371/journal.pone.0118059

Erath, S. A., El-Sheikh, M., & Mark Cummings, E. (2009). Harsh parenting and child externalizing behavior: Skin conductance level reactivity as a moderator. Child Development, 80(2), 578–592. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01280.x

Gershoff, Elizabeth T, Miller-Perrin, C., Jackson, Y., Goodman, G. S., Holden, G. W., & Kazdin, A. E. (2019). There is still no evidence that physical punishment is effective or beneficial: Reply to Larzelere, Gunnoe, Ferguson, and Roberts (2019) and Rohner and Melendez-Rhodes (2019). American Psychologist, 74(4), 503-505.

Gershoff, Elizabeth T., Goodman, G. S., Miller-Perrin, C. L., Holden, G. W., Jackson, Y., & Kazdin, A. E. (2018). The strength of the causal evidence against physical

punishment of children and its implications for parents, psychologists, and

policymakers. American Psychologist, 73(5), 626–638. doi:10.1037/amp0000327 Gershoff, Elizabeth T., Lansford, J. E., Sexton, H. R., Davis-Kean, P., & Sameroff, A. J.

(2012). Longitudinal links between spanking and children’s externalizing behaviors in a national sample of White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian American families: Spanking and externalizing behavior. Child Development, 83(3), 838–843. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01732.x

Gershoff, Elizabeth Thompson. (2002). Corporal punishment by parents and associated child behaviors and experiences: A meta-analytic and theoretical review. Psychological Bulletin, 128(4), 539–579. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.128.4.539

Global Initiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children. (2020). Global report 2019: Progress towards ending corporal punishment of children. Global Initiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children. Retrieved from

http://endcorporalpunishment.org/wp-content/uploads/global/Global-report-2019.pdf

Jones, T. L., & Prinz, R. J. (2005). Potential roles of parental self-efficacy in parent and child adjustment: A review. Clinical Psychology Review, 25(3), 341–363.

doi:10.1016/j.cpr.2004.12.004

Kingsbury, M., Sucha, E., Manion, I., Gilman, S. E., & Colman, I. (2019). Adolescent mental health following exposure to positive and harsh parenting in childhood. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 65(6), 1-9. doi:10.1177/0706743719889551

Manning, B. L., Roberts, M. Y., Estabrook, R., Petitclerc, A., Burns, J. L., Briggs-Gowan, M., Wakschlag, L. S., & Norton, E. S. (2019). Relations between toddler expressive language and temper tantrums in a community sample. Journal of Applied

Developmental Psychology, 65, 101070. doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2019.101070 McKee, L., Roland, E., Coffelt, N., Olson, A. L., Forehand, R., Massari, C., Jones, D.,

Gaffney, C. A., & Zens, M. S. (2007). Harsh discipline and child problem behaviors: The roles of positive parenting and gender. Journal of Family Violence, 22(4), 187– 196. doi:0.1007/s10896-007-9070-6

Mendez, M., Durtschi, J., Neppl, T. K., & Stith, S. M. (2016). Corporal punishment and externalizing behaviors in toddlers: The moderating role of positive and harsh parenting. Journal of Family Psychology, 30(8), 887–895. doi:10.1037/fam0000187 Mouton, B., & Roskam, I. (2015). Confident mothers, easier children: A quasi-experimental

manipulation of mothers’ self-efficacy. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 24(8), 2485–2495. doi:10.1007/s10826-014-0051-0

Oliver, B. R. (2015). Unpacking externalising problems: Negative parenting associations for conduct problems and irritability. British Journal of Psychiatry Open, 1(1), 42–47. doi:10.1192/bjpo.bp.115.000125

Patterson, G. R. (1982). Coercive family process. Eugene, OR: Castalia.

Rouaud, M. (2013). Probability, statistics, and estimation: Propagation of uncertainties in experimental measurement. Creative Commons.

Sameroff, A. (2009). Conceptual Issues in Studying the Development of Self-Regulation. In S. Olson & A. Sameroff (Eds.), Biopsychosocial Regulatory Processes in the

Development of Childhood Behavioral Problems (pp. 1-18). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511575877.002

Sege, R. D., & Siegel, B. S. (2018). Effective discipline to raise healthy children. Pediatrics, 142(6), 1-10. doi:10.1542/peds.2018-3112

Shaw, D. S., & Bell, R. Q. (1993). Developmental theories of parental contributors to antisocial behavior. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 21(5), 493–518. doi:10.1007/BF00916316

Simons, R. L., Whitbeck, L. B., Conger, R. D., & Chyi-In, W. (1991). Intergenerational transmission of harsh parenting. Developmental Psychology, 27(1), 159-171. doi:10.1037/0012-1649.27.1.159

Smith, J. D., Dishion, T. J., Shaw, D. S., Wilson, M. N., Winter, C. C., & Patterson, G. R. (2014). Coercive family process and early-onset conduct problems from age 2 to school entry. Development and Psychopathology, 26(4pt1), 917–932.

doi:10.1017/S0954579414000169

Taylor, C. A., Manganello, J. A., Lee, S. J., & Rice, J. C. (2010). Mothers’ spanking of 3-year-old children and subsequent risk of children’s aggressive behavior. Pediatrics, 125(5), 1057–1065. doi:10.1542/peds.2009-2678

Tremblay, R. E. (2000). The development of aggressive behaviour during childhood: What have we learned in the past century? International Journal of Behavioral

Development, 24(2), 129–141. doi:10.1080/016502500383232

Van Leeuwen, K., Bourgonjon, L., Huijsman, L., & Van Meenen, M. (2007). Vragenlijst woedebuien bij kinderen – ouderversie. Gent: Universiteit Gent.

Vissing, Y. M., Straus, M. A., Gelles, R. J., & Harrop, J. W. (1991). Verbal aggression by parents and psychosocial problems of children. Child Abuse and Neglect, 15, 223– 238. doi:10.1016/0145-2134(91)90067-n

Wakschlag, L. S., Choi, S. W., Carter, A. S., Hullsiek, H., Burns, J., McCarthy, K., Leibenluft, E., & Briggs-Gowan, M. J. (2012). Defining the developmental

parameters of temper loss in early childhood: Implications for developmental psychopathology: Early childhood parameters of temper loss. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53(11), 1099–1108.

doi:10.1111/j.1469-7610.2012.02595.x

Wang, M.-T., & Kenny, S. (2014). Longitudinal links between fathers’ and mothers’ harsh verbal discipline and adolescents’ conduct problems and depressive symptoms. Child Development, 85(3), 908–923. doi:10.1111/cdev.12143

Weiss, B., Dodge, K. A., & Bates, J. E. (1992). Some consequences of early harsh discipline: Child aggression and a maladaptive social information processing style, Child