Mothers’ and fathers’ overprotective parenting behaviour and positive and negative expressions of shyness: The role of social behavioural inhibition
E.M. Stoeten (10353895) Masterthesis Orthopedagogiek
Pedagogische en Onderwijskundige Wetenschappen
Universiteit van Amsterdam , supervisors: dr. M. Nikolic and dr. M. Majdandžić Amsterdam (January, 2018)
1 Abstract
A risk factor in the development of social anxiety is shyness. Research showed that positive and negative shy expressions have a different influence on social anxiety. Children who show more negative expressions of shyness score higher on social anxiety. In order to prevent the development of social anxiety it is important to explore how different expressions of shyness develop. In the current study the influence of overprotective parenting behaviour on the positive and negative expressions of shyness is investigated. Also, the moderating role of social behavioural inhibition on this relationship was investigated. The sample consisted of 121 families who were followed longitudinally. Both parents filled in a questionnaire
measuring parenting behaviour when the child was 2.5 years old, social behavioural inhibition was measured during a stranger approach task at age 2.5 and the child’s expressions of
shyness in a performance task at age 4.5. Overprotective parenting of mothers and fathers was not related to positive and negative expressions of shyness. Social behavioural inhibition did not moderate these relationships. However, social behavioural inhibition was positively related to negative expressions of shyness. Future research should take this study as a starting point in investigating the developmental pathways for both expressions of shyness.
Keywords: Shyness, social behavioural inhibition, parenting behaviour, overprotective parenting, positive shyness, negative shyness
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Mothers’ and fathers’ overprotective parenting behaviour and positive and negative expressions of shyness: The role of social behavioural inhibition
Shyness is one of the risk factors for the development of internalizing
psychopathology such as social anxiety disorders or depression (Coplan & Weeks, 2010). When children are shy there is a conflict between the motivation to approach and the
motivation to avoid a social situation, this is called the approach-avoidance conflict (Nikitin & Freund, 2010). When children are shy, the tension between the two competing motives may lead to avoiding or escaping social situations in order to avoid negative evaluations (Kashdan, Elhai, & Breen, 2008). This avoidance of social situations may lead to heightened social anxiety, and possibly social anxiety disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Therefore, it is relevant to look at the different ways in which shyness develops, so as to be able to develop early intervention for parents in preventing and treating shyness. In this study, the relationship between overprotective parenting behaviour and the expressions of shyness is investigated.
In previous research one important distinction is not given enough attention to. In recent studies a distinction is made between different expressions of shyness, called positive and negative shyness (Colonnesi, Napoleone, & Bögels, 2014). The positive expression of shyness is seen when children show a coy smile. A coy smile is head and/or gaze aversion with a simultaneous smile and with the peak of the smile just after turning their gaze or head away (Colonnesi, Bögels, De Vente, & Majdandžić, 2013). When a negative expression of shyness is observed aversion, by turning the gaze or head away, is observed without a smile (Colonnesi et al., 2014). Toddlers showing more positive expressions of shyness have been found to be less anxious and show higher sociability according to parents than toddlers who showed less positive expressions of shyness (Colonnesi et al., 2014). Research also shows that the physiological arousal of the toddlers who showed positive shyness was different from non-shy children (Nikolić, Colonnesi, Majdandžić, De Vente, & Bögels, 2017). This research shows that children who showed more positive expressions of shyness were more
hyperaroused while interacting with a stranger than children who were not shy. Positive and negative expressions of shyness are differently related to social anxiety. Socially anxious children showed more negative and less positive expressions of shyness (Colonnesi, Nikolić, De Vente, & Bögels, 2017). The distinction between positive and negative shyness, therefore, seems very relevant when studying the development of shyness as it has previously been found to be differently related to social anxiety.
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How parenting behaviour is related to behaviours of the child is a frequently
investigated subject, although in the field of shyness not that much research is conducted yet. Because there is research conducted about parenting behaviours in predicting social anxiety in children and social anxiety and shyness are related, the research about the relations between parenting behaviours and social anxiety may be relevant also for shyness. In research on anxiety in general overprotective parenting behaviour is found to be important (e.g., Möller, Nikolic, Majdandžić, & Bögels, 2016). Overprotective parenting behaviour is found when parents over-manage situations for their children, restrict the behaviour of the child, discourage the independence of the child and tries to direct the child’s activities (Coplan, Reichel, & Rowan, 2009). According to one meta-analysis, parental control is substantially positively correlated (d = .58) with anxiety in children (Van der Bruggen, Stams, & Bögels, 2008). In this analysis parental control included overprotective parenting. Another meta-analysis from McLeod, Wood, and Weisz (2007) found a medium effect (d = .25) of parental control on childhood anxiety. Although the results were significant, parental control only accounted for 6% of the variance in childhood anxiety (McLeod et al., 2007). In a third meta-analytic study also a small but significant effect of overprotective parenting behaviour on anxiety in children from 0 to 5 years of age was found (Möller et al., 2016). This meta analysis also showed that there was a low correlation between the precursors of anxiety, including shyness, and parenting behaviour in general (Möller et al., 2016). However all these meta analyses focus on anxiety in general, whereas shyness seems to be more relevant for social anxiety specificly (e.g., Kashdan et al., 2008).
When looking specifically at social anxiety some studies found a relationship with overprotection of the parents (e.g., Spokas & Heimberg, 2008). For example, in a sample of college students an association between social anxiety and parental overprotection was found (Spokas & Heimberg, 2008). Besides, also for children the relationship between social anxiety and controlling behaviour of the parent was found, even after controlling for general anxiety (Greco & Morris, 2002). Although no researchers investigated whether overprotective
parenting behaviour was related to shyness, research on anxiety indicates that some parenting behaviours, for example maternal solicitous parenting behaviour (Rubink, Cheah, & Fox, 2001), are negatively associated with shyness. Because overprotective parenting might be related to social anxiety, it is expected that overprotective parenting might also be positively related to the expression of negative shyness which is related to social anxiety, and might be negatively related to the expression of positive shyness, which is negatively associated with social anxiety.
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Although many studies focus only on the parenting behaviours of mothers, it is also important to look at the distinct relationships between parenting behaviour of mothers and fathers and the development of shyness. Mothers are assumed to have an important role in teaching wariness, while fathers are assumed to teach social confidence (Bögels, Stevens, & Majandžić, 2010). According to the model of Bögels and Perotti (2011), fathers are more influential in social threatening situations than mothers, because of their external protective role in the course of human evolution. Because the cues of the father are in these situations more important to the child, overprotective parenting in fathers might have a larger role in predicting the expressions of negative shyness and positive shyness than overprotective parenting behaviour of mothers. In the meta-analysis of Möller et al. (2016) the effect of overprotective parenting behaviour on social anxiety was lower for mothers (r = .12) than it was for fathers (r = .27). However, another study done with both parents showed that fathers had more influence on highly socially anxious children while mothers’ influence was higher for average and low socially anxious children, so the results may differ according to the child (Bögels et al., 2010). The results of previous research might be seen as preliminary evidence for the assumption about the different roles fathers and mothers have in children’s shyness.
Besides the parenting behaviour and the gender of the parent, the child’s temperament may also be important in predicting the expressions of shyness. Previous studies investigating child’s temperament focused again more on social anxiety than on the expressions of shyness. The relationship between parenting behaviour and the development of social anxiety seems to be depending on the temperament of the child. Behavioural inhibition is a temperament style that some infants and young children show. Behavioural inhibition is a style of reacting to novel situations or unfamiliar adults or peers with freezing or avoidance (Fox, Henderson, Marshall, Nichols, & Ghera, 2005). Within the research on behavioural inhibition a distinction is made between two types of behavioural inhibition: social and non-social behavioural inhibition (Dyson, Klein, Olino, Dougherty, & Durbin, 2011). Research done with only mothers showed that children with a higher level of general behavioural inhibition reacted more strongly to the mothers’ anxious behaviours (De Rosnay, Cooper, Tsigaras, & Murray, 2006). Research on shyness showed that general behavioural inhibition was
positively associated with shyness when mothers showed low maternal support (Chen et al., 2014). According to a study conducted by Dyson et al. (2011), social and non-social
behavioural inhibition are not significantly associated and correlated, and therefore should be treated as different constructs. To our knowledge, no research has been conducted about how children’s behavioural inhibition is influencing the relationship between overprotective
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parenting and the expressions of shyness. Behavioural inhibition might be a marker of susceptibility, which is an explanation of why some children are more and some are less influenced by a certain environmental factor (Pluess & Belsky, 2010). Again, based on
previous research on social anxiety, it is argued that overprotective parenting behaviour might be related to more negative expressions of shyness and less positive expressions of shyness and that this effect is larger for children who score high on behavioural inhibition because these children are more susceptible to environmental influences. Because shyness can be seen only in social situations, the construct of social behavioural inhibition seems to be most likely related to this. For example, previous research showed that parent-reported shyness
significantly correlated with social behavioural inhibition alone, whereas it did not correlate with the non-social behavioural inhibition (Dyson et al., 2011). Social behavioural inhibition is therefore the construct that is being measured in this study.
In the current study, the different development pathways of positive and negative shyness are investigated. We investigated whether the expression of shyness at 4.5 years of age is predicted by overprotective parenting behaviour at 2.5 years of age. It was expected that more overprotective parenting behaviour is related to more negative expressions of shyness and to less positive expressions of shyness. We expected this relationship to be stronger for the fathers and when the child had a high level of social behavioural inhibition at 2.5 years of age. This research is filling in a gap in the scientific literature by measuring the relationship between overprotective parenting and the different expressions of shyness. The results will provide specific information on the role of parenting in the development of shyness. When it is clear if parenting behaviour predicts the expression of shyness,
practitioners can detect children at risk for social anxiety and can develop early intervention for parents in preventing and treating problem behaviour. The following hypothesis will be tested:
H1a: Overprotective parenting is related to more expressions of negative shyness. H1b: Overprotective parenting is related to fewer expressions of positive shyness.
H2a: Overprotective parenting of fathers has a stronger positive relation with the negative expression of shyness than overprotective parenting of mothers.
H2b: Overprotective parenting of fathers has a stronger negative relation with the positive expression of shyness than overprotective parenting of mothers.
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H3a: Overprotective parenting has a stronger positive relation with the negative expression of shyness when the child scores higher on social behavioural inhibition.
H3b: Overprotective parenting has a stronger negative relation with the positive expression of shyness when the child scores higher on social behavioural inhibition.
Methods
Participants
Data from the longitudinal study on the development of anxiety, called ‘The social development from baby to pre-schooler’, was used for the present study. The parents of the children were recruited for a longitudinal study at the University of Amsterdam while pregnant of the first child. This happened through leaflets in several relevant places, like babyshops and pregnancy courses. The participants in this research are 121 children who visited the Family lab at the age of 2.5 (N = 98, Mage= 30.20 months, SD = 0.76) and at age of
4.5-yeard (N = 96, Mage = 53.86 months, SD = 1.40). All parents spoke Dutch or English and
their education level was relatively high (M = 7.09, SD = 1.11, measured on a scale of 1 = primary education to 8 = university). For 116 participants the questionnaire about parenting behaviour was filled out by at least one of the parents. Children were excluded from the study if they weighted less than 2500 grams at birth, had any neurological conditions or had an Apgar score of less than eight (Nikolic, Colonnesi, De Vente, & Bögels, 2016).
However since not all parents filled in the questionnaire about parenting behaviour, or the children did not visited the laboratory at all ages, the final sample in this study consisted out of 76 participants for whom multiple data was present.
Design and Procedure
At the age of 2.5 both parents filled in a questionnaire about their parenting behaviours and came to the Family lab University of Amsterdam with their child. During the visit with the mother the child was recorded during a stranger-approach task to code social behavioural inhibition. The child visited the lab with the father and mother again when the child was 4.5 years of age, and during the visit with the father, a performance and self-watch task with the child was recorded again to code the expressions of shyness. Both parents filled in the
informed consent prior to participation and the study was approved by the ethics committee of the University of Amsterdam.
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Shyness. The expression of shyness was measured at 4.5 years during a social
performance task. The task consists of a performing assignment in which the children need to sing a song in front of an audience. The reaction of the child is recorded and is coded through a micro-coding system from the study of Colonnesi et al. (2014). The recorded data was coded second-by-second. Positive expressions of shyness were coded when a gaze and/or head aversion occurred 0-2 seconds before the apex of the smile. Negative expressions of shyness were coded when the gaze/head aversion was observed during the negative facial expression in an episode of 2 seconds. The performance task was coded by three observers with a Cohen’s kappa of .89. After the micro-coding the child was given two scores, one for positive shyness and one for negative shyness. The number of positive and negative shy expressions was coded for the first 60 seconds. If a child performed less than 60 seconds the correct amount of expressions was calculated by dividing the amount of expressions by the number of seconds the performance was coded and multiplying this number by 60.
Social behavioural inhibition. Social behavioural inhibition was measured at 2.5 years by an observation done during a stranger-approach task using the Laboratory Temperament Assessment Battery (Lab TAB) (Goldsmith, Reilly, Lemery, Longley, & Prescott, 1999). During this observation a male stranger entered the room, sat down opposite of the child and engaged the child in a conversation that was standardized following a
protocol (Nikolić, Aktar, Bögels, Colonnesi, & De Vente, 2017). The social behavioural inhibition of the child was observed during the task by coding the child’s behavioural reactions: like facial fear, bodily fear, escape behaviour and vocalisations of fear. The behaviour was coded by six observers. The stranger approach task had an interobserver reliability of .89 (SD = .07). The scores were aggregated into one single social behavioural inhibition score for each child.
Overprotective parenting behaviour. Overprotective parenting behaviour was measured by the Comprehensive Parenting Behavior Questionnaire that was provided to both parents (Majdandžić, de Vente, & Bögels, 2008). The overprotective parenting subscale with eleven items was used for this study. Questionnaires were filled in by both parents when the children were 2.5 years of age. The validated-reliability of the subscale is proven in prior research (Majdandžić, De Vente, & Bögels, 2015) The questions used for this study were the questions from the subcategories caution and shielding. The subcategory caution consists of six items (e.g., I always keep an eye on my child to prevent him/her from hurting him-/herself), whereas the subcategory shielding consisted out of five items (e.g., I don’t take my
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child to places that are very busy). All items were measured on a five points Likert-scale (1= not true at all, 5 = completely true). Both the scale for overprotective parenting behaviour of the mother and the father were reliable (Cronbach’s alpha is respectively .76 and .72). Data Analysis
First, outliers were detected using the criteria of being above or below three standard deviations from the mean. Detected outliers were Winsorized to the closest values in the range of +/-3SD (Dixon, 1960). Data was checked for normality using standardized skeweness and when they were not normally distributed, were logarithm transformed in order to obtain normality.
The independent variable in this study was overprotective parenting behaviour of mothers and fathers. The dependent variables were the expression of positive and negative shyness. One moderating variable, behavioural inhibition, was included in all models.
The analysis were performed with SPSS Statistics 20 (IBM Corp., 2011). Four distinct models were tested with regression analysis including moderations using PROCESS (Hayes, 2004). First, the relationship between overprotective parenting behaviour of the mother and the positive and negative expression of shyness was tested. Second, the same was done with the relationship between father’s overprotective parenting behaviour and the positive and negative expression of shyness. Behavioural inhibition of the child was included as a moderator in the models.
Results
Preliminary Analyses
To test whether overprotective parenting of the father predicts more positive and negative shyness, the total sample size was 76 children. Twelve fathers did not fill in the questionnaire about parenting behaviour, information about shyness was missing for 26 children and information on behavioural inhibition was missing for 24 children. For
overprotective parenting of the mother and the influence on positive and negative shyness, a total sample size was 76 children. Twelve mothers did not fill in the parenting style
questionnaire and for 26 children data on shyness was missing. Besides, for 24 children information on behavioural inhibition was missing. Some overlap in participants missing data resulted in a final sample of 76 for all analysis.
Outliers (above or beyond 3 standard deviations from the mean) were detected and Winsorized by adding the value to the closest observed value within the range of three
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standard deviations. Winsorizing the scores resulted in normally distributed data for behavioural inhibition and for overprotection of the father each after correcting for one outlier. Overprotection of the mother was normally distributed. However, after Winsorizing positive shyness (one outlier Winsorized) and negative shyness (two outliers Winsorized) these data were still not normally distributed. Skewness for positive shyness was 1.09 (SD = .25), and skewness for negative shyness was 1.83 (SD = .25). Both these variables were therefore transformed to a log(10) scale in order to improve their normality. After this transformation positive shyness was normally distributed, while negative shyness was
improved but still not normally distributed. This is because of the large tendency to score 0 on the scale. Means and standard deviations of each variable are presented in table 1.
The transformed scales were used to calculate correlations (Table 2). There was no correlation between overprotection of the mother and positive shyness, nor was there a correlation with negative shyness. The same results are seen in the correlation between overprotection of the father and positive and negative expressions of shyness. A significant correlation was found between positive and negative shyness, r = -.38, p < .001. The correlation is medium sized and negative. These results show that if a child showed more positive shyness, less negative shyness was observed. Also, a significant correlation was found between overprotection of mother and father, r = .28, p = .004. The correlation was small and positive. More overprotection of the mother was correlated with more
overprotection of the father. The last correlation found in this study was the correlation between social behavioural inhibition and negative shyness, r = .30, p = .007. There is a Table 1
Mean Scores and Standard Deviations of all Variables
M SD Minimum Maximum Positive shyness 0.40 0.32 0.00 1.09 Negative shyness 0.27 0.40 0.00 1.36 Overprotection mother 2.65 0.55 1.09 3.82 Overprotection father 2.64 0.50 1.27 3.74 Behavioural inhibition 0.02 0.58 -1.06 1.53
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medium correlation in a positive direction. When children scored higher on behavioural inhibition at the age of 2.5 they also scored higher on negative shyness at the age of 4.5. Table 2
The Correlation Between all Variables
Overprotection father Overprotection mother Negative shyness Positive shyness Behavioural inhibition r p -.06 .596 -.03 .783 .30 .007 -.06 .573 Overprotection father r p .28 .004 -.04 .688 -.08 .446 Overprotection mother r p -.18 .103 -.08 .487 Negative shyness r p -.38 .000
Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of Fathers and Negative Expressions of Shyness of the Child
The first main analysis tested whether there is a relation between overprotection of the father and the child’s negative expression of shyness and the influence of social behavioural inhibition on this relation. The model was not significant, F(3, 72) = 2.13, p = .104, R2 = .08.
The interaction between social behavioural inhibition and overprotection was also not significant. Overprotection of the father did not predict the child’s negative expression of shyness and social behavioural inhibition did not moderate this relation. Social behavioural inhibition did however predict the amount of negative expressions of shyness a child showed. Social behavioural inhibition showed a significant positive relationship with the expression of negative shyness. Children who showed more socially inhibited behaviour, showed more negative expressions of shyness (Table 3).
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Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of Fathers and Positive Expressions of Shyness of the Child
The second analysis was testing the relationship between overprotection of the father and the child’s positive expressions of shyness. Again the influence of behavioural inhibition on this relationship was analysed in this model. The overall model was not significant, F(3, 72) = .83, p = .483, R2 = .03, and neither was the interaction within the model (Table 4). Father’s overprotection did not predict the expressions of positive shyness in children, neither did social behavioural inhibition had an influence on this effect.
Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of Mothers and Negative Expressions of Shyness of the Child
The third analysis was the relationship between overprotection of the mother and the child’s negative expressions of shyness. Again the moderating role of behavioural inhibition was taken into account, to see if this variable had an influence on the effect. Unlike in the regression analysis with fathers, significant results were found for the model of overprotection Table 3
The Relation Between Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of the Father on Negative Expressions of Shyness
Β SE T p
Constant .02 .11 .18 .859
Social behavioural inhibition .28 .16 2.46 .016
Overprotection father -.02 .12 -.14 .892
Interaction .05 .11 .42 .676
Table 4
The Relation Between Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of the Father on Positive Expressions of Shyness
Β SE T p
Constant -.03 .12 -.26 .796
Social behavioural inhibition -.06 .12 -.48 .631
Overprotection father -.16 .13 -1.28 .205
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of the mother, F(3, 72) = 3.40, p = .022, R2 = .35. However although the model is significant, again the interaction and the distinct relations were not significant. Only social behavioural inhibition showed a trend towards significance (Table 5).
Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of Mothers and Positive Expressions of Shyness of the Child
The last analysis is conducted to test if the overprotection of the mother predicted the child’s positive expressions of shyness. Like with fathers this model for mothers was also not significant, F (3, 72) = .22, p = .881, R2 = .01. Like in the other models, again in this model no significant result of the interaction was found (Table 6). Neither was there a trend towards significance in this model.
Discussion Table 5
The Relation Between Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of the Mother on Negative Expressions of Shyness
Β SE T P
Constant .08 .11 .67 .507
Social behavioural inhibition .22 .11 1.93 .058
Overprotection mother -.17 .11 -1.56 .124
Interaction -.14 .10 -1.39 .169
Table 6
The Relation Between Overprotective Parenting Behaviour of the Mother on Positive Expressions of Shyness
Β SE T p
Constant .02 .12 .19 .852
Social behavioural inhibition -.07 .12 -.61 .546
Overprotection mother -.06 .11 -.56 .579
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The aim of the current study was to investigate the different development pathways of positive and negative shyness. First of all, the relationship between overprotective parenting behaviour of mothers and fathers and the children’s expressions of positive and negative shyness was tested. Second, social behavioural inhibition was added to these models as a moderating variable. It was expected that overprotective parenting of mothers and fathers relates to more expressions of negative shyness, whereas it relates to less expressions of positive shyness. Besides it was expected that these relationships were stronger for fathers than they were for mothers and that the relationship was stronger when the child scored higher on social behavioural inhibition.
The results from the current research showed that overprotective parenting is not related to the expressions of positive and negative shyness. Both mother’s and father’s overprotective parenting behaviour was not significantly related to positive and negative expressions of shyness. Therefore, we did not find evidence for stronger influences of fathers than mothers on the negative and positive expressions of shyness. Finally, social behavioural inhibition did not moderate the relations between overprotective parenting behaviour and the expressions of positive and negative shyness.
The results of the current research showed that overprotective parenting is not related to the expressions of positive and negative shyness. Previous research found that
overprotective parenting was related to more social anxiety (e.g., Möller et al., 2016). Because socially anxious children showed more negative and less positive expressions of shyness (Colonnesi, et al., 2017), it was expected that overprotective parenting was also related to those concepts. However, this hypothesis was not confirmed in the current study. The results of the current study are, however, in line with the meta-analysis that showed that there were low correlations between parenting behaviour and the precursors of social anxiety, such as shyness (Möller et al., 2016). Thus, it seems that the previously found relationship between overprotective parenting and social anxiety might go through other precursors than the expression of shyness. This might be because anxiety and shyness are different constructs. Where anxiety involves fear (American Psychiatric Association, 2013), shyness involves an ambivalence between motives to approach and motives to avoid a situation (Nikitin & Freund, 2010). The constructs seem different and therefore it might be that those are not influenced by the same parenting behaviours. However, this is not to say that parenting is of no influence on shyness. It might well be that other parenting behaviours, like solicitous parenting behaviour which has previously been related to shyness in general (Rubink, et al., 2001), do have a relationship with the development of different expressions of shyness.
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Besides also no differences between mothers and fathers were found when looking at the relation between overprotective parenting and the expressions of shyness. This specific relationship between factors was not investigated yet, but was expected because research on social anxiety had found that overprotective parenting of the father had more influence than overprotective parenting of the mother (Möller et al., 2016). The result that no differences were found might have to do with the fact that there was no relationship between
overprotective parenting and the expressions of shyness. Differences in gender of the parent did not matter in this case since overprotective parenting does not play an important role in predicting shyness. If differences in the relationship between other parenting behaviours of fathers and mothers and the expressions of shyness can be found cannot be said based on these results.
Last social behavioural inhibition is the only variable in the current research that is predicting the expressions of negative shyness, but not the expressions of positive shyness. The current research showed that early social behavioural inhibition at the age of 2.5 predicts later negative expressions of shyness at an age of 4.5. Previous research on shyness showed, in line with the findings of the current study, that behavioural inhibition was positively associated with shyness (Chen et al., 2014). This means that, based on the current research and previous research, the temperament style of social behavioural inhibition at the age of 2.5 can predict which children will show more negative expressions of shyness at 4.5 years of age and therefore are at a higher risk for avoiding social situations and developing social anxiety later in life.
However Chen et al. (2014) found that the relationship between behavioural inhibition and shyness only existed when mothers showed low maternal support, whereas in the current study no moderating effect with parenting behaviour was found. Social behavioural inhibition is also found to be a moderating variable in research on for example the reaction on the mother’s anxious behaviour (Rosnay et al., 2006). The fact that in the current research different results were found might be explained by the nonexistence of the relationship between overprotective parenting and the expressions of negative shyness. It might be the case that the characteristic of high social behavioural inhibition of the child is a precursor in itself for the negative expression of shyness as found in the current research or that other parenting behaviour have an effect on the expressions of shyness, in which social behavioural inhibition might be playing a moderating role.
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First of all the current study relied on data about parenting behaviour that was obtained by using self-report. This data might be different from observed behaviour because self-report may include reporter biases, whereas observed behaviours include objective coders. Besides the sample was relatively highly educated. It is unclear if the results found also generalize to a lower educated population, where parenting behaviours might be different. In families with a lower socio-economic status parenting behaviours might be different from the sample used in the current study.
Future Research
First of all future research should include observations for parenting behaviour, next to the questionnaires, to test if overprotective parenting behaviour influences children’s shyness. Besides statistical analysis with gender of the parent as a moderator should be added in future research, in order to be able to make statements about differences in gender. In the current research separate models were analysed for mothers and fathers. This is done because the measurements of mothers’ and fathers’ parenting behaviour are dependent, since two parents reported about the same child. Also multiple measurement points for parenting behaviour should be added in future research, since parenting behaviour might change over time. By reproducing the current study with the suggested improvements, more thorough claims can be made about the relationship between overprotective parenting and the expressions of shyness.
However, since overprotective parenting is not related to the different expressions of shyness, it is important to study which parenting behaviours or child characteristics do predict negative and positive expressions of shyness. Since the expression of shyness seems relevant for the development of social anxiety, it is important to research the developmental pathways of the different strategies to cope with shyness. Research should therefore focus on different parenting behaviours, like supportive behaviour, and different characteristics of the child, like emotion-regulation strategies. This should be done in order to provide practitioners with more information on how to prevent social anxiety to occur, by focusing on the development of the expressions of positive and negative shyness.
Finally, it is not only important to see how positive and negative shyness develop, but also to research the pathways through which shyness is related to social anxiety, and possibly to social anxiety disorder. To be able to do so, the different expressions of shyness in relation to later social anxiety should be investigated in future research.
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