Neighborhood Danger and Maternal Parenting in Medellin-Rome: The Role of Negative Emotional Self-Efficacy

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to analyze the effect of perceptions of neighborhood danger on positive parenting and whether it is mediated by the mothers' perceived self-efficacy in managing negative emotions, comparing two countries: Colombia and Italy. Participants were 434 mothers and children between ages of 8 and 10 years old (108 dyads from Medellin, Colombia and 109 dyads from Rome, Italy). selected by convenience, non-probabilistically and proportionally to the social stratum of each city. Mothers and children answered the neighborhood violence perception scale, mothers also answered the emotional self-efficacy scale and children the Acceptance-Rejection/Control questionnaire. The multigroup analysis found that mothers' self-efficacy in managing negative emotions behaved differently in Colombia compared to Italy. In Colombia, mothers' perceived self-efficacy in managing negative emotions mediated the link between the effect of perceived neighborhood violence and the quality of mother-child relationship. In Italy, mothers' self-efficacy in managing negative emotions did not mediate this link. Perceived self-efficacy in managing negative emotions of Colombian mothers indirectly explains the adverse effect of perceived neighborhood danger on positive parenting. With mothers from Rome-Italy, there is no significant relationship between perceived self-efficacy for the management of negative emotions and positive parenting.