Parental Cognition, Emotions, and Behaviors Associated with the Risk of PsychologicalMaltreatment of Preschoolers

Abstract

ABSTRACT The main objective of the present study was to explore cognitions, emotions, and parental behaviors that could potentially be associated with an increased risk of psychological maltreatment towards preschoolers by means of a semi-structured interview. During the inter view, 45 young mothers and 13 fathers were asked to think of a typical episode with their child that they find difficult to cope with. Parents were then asked to discuss causes, emotions, self- and child's reactions, strategies used to calm themselves, self-evaluation of their reactions during the episode, as well as other related aspects. Content analysis was performed and subsequent categories were submitted to a multiple correspondence analysis procedure. Results show that a cluster of 15 variables for mothers and 5 variables for fathers is associated with the risk of child psychological maltreatment. Globally, these results indicated that some specific cognition, emotions, and parental behaviors could be identified in mother-child and father-child disciplinary interactions that may serve as guidelines for the assessment of psychological maltreatment.