Parental Regulation of Parent and Child Screen-Based Device Use.

Media use and screen time show both positive and negative effects on child development. Parents' behaviors, perceptions, and regulation of parent and child screen-based device (SBD) use may be critical understudied factors in explaining these mixed effects. We developed the Parent Screen-Based Device Use Survey (PSUS) to assess parental use of multiple SBDs (e.g., computers, phones, TVs) and tested its factor structure across two United States samples of mothers of children aged 2 to 6 years old (total N = 402). Subscales captured parental SBD use related to Discipline, Limit-Setting, Involvement, Child Care, Family Norms, Self-Regulation, Dysregulation, and Parenting Support, and showed good factor loadings and internal reliability. Validity was tested in relation to parent distress, parent executive function problems, and child behavior problems. Parental limit-setting and involvement were either unrelated to or related to fewer parent and child problems, whereas parental use of SBDs for self-regulation, child care, discipline, support, and family activities, as well as parents' more dysregulated use, were related to more parent and child problems. The PSUS holds promise in addressing the parental mechanisms that underlie media effects on child development.

Parental working memory buffers associations between COVID-19 hardships and child mental health.

The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has impaired young children's mental health, underscoring the need for research on protective factors. Using a cross-sectional design, we examined whether parental working memory (WM) buffered relations between COVID-19 hardships (home-life, economic, and quarantine) and child internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Female parents (N = 339; 83.19% White/Caucasian, 8.85% Black/African American, 3.54% Asian, 1.47% Native American, and 2.36% mixed race; 7.67% Hispanic/Latinx ethnicity) of children 2-5-years-old reported COVID-19 hardships and child internalizing and externalizing symptoms and completed a backward digit span task to measure WM. All types of COVID-19 hardships were positively related to child internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Higher parental WM weakened positive relations between all types of hardships and child internalizing symptoms, and between home-life and economic hardships and externalizing symptoms. Results suggest that parental WM, a malleable target for intervention, may buffer associations between the detrimental effects of COVID-19 and young children's mental health.

Ecological validity in measuring parents' executive function.

Parents' executive functions (EFs), or cognitive skills facilitating thought and behavior management, are meaningful correlates of parenting behavior. EFs are theorized to support parents in inhibiting reactive responses, managing information during parent-child interactions, and adapting to novel developmental demands. Less effective EFs associate with risk for harsh parenting and physical abuse, underscoring the importance of research on parental EFs in promoting healthy child development. Yet, despite the strong theory, findings are mixed and reveal only modest effect sizes in relations between EFs and parenting. One explanation may be a lack of ecological validity in measuring parental EFs. Traditional measures of adult EFs have been used, but these are decontextualized and do not reflect the cognitively and emotionally demanding nature of parenting. In this article, we argue that new and adapted measures are needed. We discuss the role of EFs in parenting, review measurement, and offer suggestions for improvements in ecological validity.

The dynamics of maternal scaffolding vary by cumulative risk status.

Parental scaffolding, or parenting behaviors that support children's independence and competence, can foster children's self-regulation development. Children facing higher cumulative risk may experience less scaffolding and more directives from parents, but it is unclear how cumulative risk affects the dynamics of parent-child interactions in real time. We examined the role of cumulative risk in mothers' moment-to-moment use of scaffolding and directives in response to preschoolers' off- and on-task behaviors (N = 117). Mothers answered questionnaires about cumulative risk at child age 2.5 years and completed a challenging puzzle task with their preschoolers at age 3 years. Continuous-time multilevel survival analyses revealed differences by cumulative risk in the likelihood of mothers' parenting responses following children's off- and on-task behavioral transitions over the course of the interaction. Specifically, when children went off-task, higher cumulative risk was associated with a lower likelihood of maternal scaffolding, but a comparable likelihood of directives, compared to lower risk mothers. When children got on-task, mothers with higher cumulative risk were less likely to respond with scaffolding and more likely to respond with directives than lower risk mothers. These results suggest that parents at higher risk respond with less scaffolding regardless of child behavior and respond with more directive commands when they may be unnecessary. Findings provide novel, real-time descriptive information about how and when parents experiencing cumulative risk use scaffolding and directive strategies, thus informing microlevel targets for intervention. Implications for the development of self-regulation in children at risk are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).