Child Maltreatment: 'Discipline practices among biological and foster parents'.

Linares, L. Oriana ; Montalto, Daniela ; Rosbruch, Nicole 等

11:2, pp 157-67, May 2006, USA

In a sample of 124 parents (62 pairs of biological and foster parents) of children who were maltreated, this study compared self-reports of discipline practices between biological and foster parents towards a target child and explored the role of child, parent, and foster care ecology factors on discipline practices. Controlling for parental age, psychological distress and marital status, biological and foster parents reported using similar levels of positive, appropriate and harsh discipline. For biological and foster parents, child characteristics (being female, younger and having more conduct problems) were associated with parental self-reports of less effective discipline. The US study also found a positive association between parent-to-parent co-operation and effective discipline. These findings suggest that parenting interventions may need to move beyond simple presumption of deficits in parenting knowledge and that children could benefit from enhancement of supportive relationships between biological and foster parents involved in the foster care system.