IJCM_79A: A cross sectional study to compare the emotional maturity between middle school children of working and non-working mothers.

Abstract

Background: A child’s overall development is based on physical and emotional well-being. Parenting skills plays a vital role in child’s emotional well-being and can be influenced by many factors and one of the factors is mother’s working status. Objectives: 1. To assess the emotional maturity level of middle school children. 2. To compare the emotional maturity levels between middle school children having working mothers and middle school children having non- working mothers. Methodology: An analytical cross-sectional study among middle school children between the age of 13 and 16 years was conducted in a school. A questionnaire-based interview was conducted using a standard semi structured Emotional maturity scale questionnaire. Results: The total students interviewed were 150 and were equally divided based on working status of mothers. Among them, 54.7% were boys and 45.3% were girls. 1.3% of the children of working mothers exhibited very low emotional maturity, but none of the children of non-working mothers did. Of the children of working mothers, 12% demonstrated low emotional maturity, compared to 8% of the children of non-working mothers. 78.7% of children whose mothers were working had an average level of emotional maturity, compared to 85.3% of children whose non-working mothers. 8% of the children of working mothers exhibited a high level of emotional maturity, compared to 6.7% of the children of non-working mothers. There was no significant difference between emotional maturity of children of working and non-working mothers (P=0.595). Conclusion: The study showed nil significant difference in emotional maturity score between children of working and non-working mothers. However, very low emotional maturity level was seen in Children of working mother which needs further importance. So, similar Future Studies with higher sample size will be needed to address this statistically and the concept of emotional maturity needs to be looked into with more preference to emotional maturity factors.