Mothers' parenting self-appraisals: the contribution of perceived infant temperament.
To learn how a mother's perception of her infant's temperament contributes to her appraisal of her parenting and of her problem-solving competence during the first 3 months postpartum, we explored a conceptual model, including infant gender and maternal attributes (education and parity) and the personal and social context of the parenting experience (infant centrality and life change), in a sample of 117 mothers. The set of temperament variables contributed to the variance in both parenting evaluation and problem-solving competence at 1 and 3 months. The pattern of infant temperament variables contributing to maternal self-appraisal variables at 1 and at 3 months suggests change in the temperament variables that are salient to mothers as the infants grow older.
Pridham
K F
KF
School of Nursing, University of Wisconsin-Madison 53792-2455.
Chang
A S
AS
Chiu
Y M
YM
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D009034:Mother-Child Relations; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D016487:Parenting / Q000523:psychology*; D011340:Problem Solving; D002666:Psychology, Child / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012649:Self Concept; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013694:Temperament