Parental Competence, Parenting Stress, Family Harmony, and Perceived Available Support among Mothers with Children Aged 3-6 Years

Abstract

There is a growing body of research focused on examining family dynamics. This article reports on two studies. Study 1 aimed to develop a parental competence scale and examine its psychometric qualities. Data was gathered from 915 Turkish mothers with children aged 3-6 years. In order to evaluate the instrument’s internal structure, exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) were performed. EFA revealed that there is a single factor structure consisting of 13 items. CFA confirmed that all items in the one-dimensional scale are compatible with the model and goodness of fit values are acceptable. Reliability analyses showed that the scale’s internal consistency was high. Study 2 aimed to investigate the direct and indirect effects of parenting stress on parental competence and family harmony through the perceived available support. Data was obtained from 261 mothers with children ages 3-6 years. The results of the study revealed that the perceived available support not only mediated the relationship between parenting stress and parental competence, but also the relationship between parenting stress and family harmony. Findings were discussed in light of family dynamics literature.