Paternal Scores Research Articles

Assessment of mother and father concern in childhood hydrocephalus

Parental concern can play an important role in overall management of children with serious chronic illness. We quantitatively assessed the concerns of parents of children with hydrocephalus, using the Hydrocephalus Concerns Questionnaire for parents (HCQ-P). Over a 12-month study period, parents of 332 children with hydrocephalus (mean age 11.7 years, SD 3.8) attending a routinely scheduled out-patient clinic at the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, completed the HCQ-P. HCQ-P scores were widely distributed, with mean maternal (N = 283) and paternal (N = 137) scores of 0.53 (SD 0.30) and 0.51 (SD 0.29), respectively (0 = least concerned, 1 = most concerned). Based on a multivariable regression model (adjusted R (2) = 0.49), important associations with greater maternal concern were: Worse child cognitive health (p < 0.001) and worse child social-emotional health (p < 0.001). Identified important associations with greater paternal concern based on a multivariable model (adjusted R (2) = 0.45) were: Worse child cognitive health (p = 0.03), worse child social-emotional health (p = 0.03), frequent child seizures (p < 0.001), younger child age at first surgery (p = 0.03) and having had an endoscopic procedure for the child's hydrocephalus treatment (p = 0.04). Based on the adjusted multivariable models, less than 5% of parents were considered to have extreme levels of concern (either very high or very low). This study confirms that parental concern is highly variable in this population. Much of the parental concern can be appropriately explained by child health factors.

The measurement of a major childhood risk for depression: Comparison of the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI) ‘Parental Care’ and the Childhood Experience of Care and Abuse (CECA) ‘Parental Neglect’

Background Lack of adequate parental care is a consistent predictor of adult depression. Questionnaire measures that compare well with interviews are needed for large-scale studies of affective disorders in the general population. A widely used questionnaire, the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI), was compared with a detailed standardized interview, the Childhood Experiences of Care and Abuse (CECA). Methods PBI ratings of maternal and paternal care were obtained from 192 women aged 25–36, identified from primary care lists. The women were interviewed for childhood neglect using the CECA, and ratings made blind to their PBI responses. Results The discriminative ability of PBI care scores to predict measures of neglect in the CECA were moderate to high, and the addition of paternal scores did not add to the prediction from maternal scores. Shortened forms of the PBI maternal care scales provided comparable predictions to those from the full scale, particularly three items from the maternal care scale, identified by logistic regression. Limitations PBI and CECA measures on the women were retrospective. Low numbers in some of the subgroups of interest limited statistical power and is reflected in wider confidence intervals. The three maternal care items identified by logistic regression need to be confirmed in other samples as being as efficient as the combined maternal and paternal care scale scores. Conclusions The maternal care scale of the PBI compares reasonably well as an index of overall neglect in childhood to that provided by the CECA.

DOES MATE GUARDING PREVENT RIVAL MATING IN SNOW SKINKS? A TEST USING AFLP

We report on likely mixed paternity in a natural population of snow skinks (Niveoscincus mirolepidotus) from alpine Tasmania, Australia. This species is nonterritorial and males guard females after copulation, suggesting that guarding behavior has evolved to prevent rival mating of still-receptive females. To what degree does this mate-guarding prevent rival copulations? We sampled gravid females at random in the wild and looked for within-clutch mixed paternity among their offspring using amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP). Incorporating all visualized fragments, offspring band-sharing based on maternal bands was 0.94 (60.05, SD), whereas for paternal fragments it was 0.54 (60.46, SD). We then tested paternal band-sharing scores for all young of pairs against the mean score of the maternally inherited fragments to assess whether paternal genetic variation was larger than for a known single parent, hence, suggesting multiple sires. To reduce the risk of unequal sampling of polymorphic maternal and paternal fragments, we based our statistical tests on heterozygous bands only. Offspring band sharing based on maternal heterozygous fragments was on average 0.68 (60.22, SD), versus 0.35 (60.33, SD) based on paternally inherited fragments. In six of eight clutches (75%), at least one pair of young in a clutch had paternal scores outside of the confidence interval for a single parent (i.e., the mother). Thus, mixed paternity seems to be widespread in this population, despite prolonged postcopulatory mate-guarding by males.

The parent threat inventory: development, reliability, and validity

Objective: The goal was to develop a retrospective inventory of parental threatening behavior to facilitate a better understanding of such behavior’s role in the etiology of psychological distress. Method: Inventory items were developed based on theory and 135 students’ responses to a question eliciting examples of threatening parental behavior. Following item development, two additional student samples ( n = 200 and n = 603) completed batteries of self-report measures. Responses were used to eliminate unstable or redundant items from the inventory and to examine the inventory’s psychometric properties. Results: Factor analysis of the inventory revealed three factors, accounting for 66.2% of variance; this factor structure is compatible with theory, and consistent across maternal behavior scores, paternal behavior scores, and combined maternal and paternal scores. Cronbach’s coefficient alphas indicated acceptable internal consistency; Pearson correlation coefficients indicated acceptable 4-week test-retest reliability. Moderate intercorrelations with two retrospective measures of childhood experiences suggested construct validity. Regression analyses demonstrated the ability of the inventory to predict both anxious and depressive symptomatology and lifetime symptoms of anxiety and depressive disorder. Normative data on combined parent scores, maternal scores, and paternal scores are also presented. Conclusions: Initial psychometric testing of the Parent Threat Inventory (PTI) suggests it is a reliable and valid tool for investigating the developmental antecedents of adult psychological distress. Further research should focus on addressing two limitations: (1) lack of normative and psychometric data on men and women suffering from clinical disorders, and (2) lack of validation by parental reporting.

The effect of parental expressed emotion on glycaemic control in children with Type 1 diabetes: Parental expressed emotion and glycaemic control in children

Objective: To measure expressed emotion (EE) in parents of young children with diabetes and to examine the relation between EE and glycaemic control in children with Type 1 diabetes in a longitudinal study over 24 months. We hypothesised that good glycaemic control, as measured by low glycated haemoglobin levels, would be predicted by high parental emotional over-involvement, low frequency of critical comments and absence of hostility. We predicted that these effects would be stronger in maternal than paternal scores. Methods: Forty-seven children attending a Paediatric Diabetes Clinic and their parents were studied over 24 months. Glycated haemoglobin was measured on three occasions, at the start of the study period, 12 and 24 months later. At 12 months, parental EE was measured using an adapted version of the Camberwell Family Interview, and child emotional and behavioural problems were measured using the parent version of the Child Behavior Checklist. Multiple regression models were used to test the hypotheses. Results: Forty-three maternal and 33 paternal interviews of adequate quality for analysis were obtained. Paternal hostility was found to be associated with elevated glycated haemoglobin measured 12 months before interview and 12 months after interview, accounting for 22% and 29% of the variation in glycated haemoglobin respectively. Conclusion: We did not find that parental emotional over-involvement or criticism predicted glycaemic control. Presence of hostility was important, but in contrast to our hypothesis, this was paternal rather than maternal hostility. We suggest that (i) relatively absent, rejecting fathers play little role in diabetes management and children perceive this negatively, or (ii) mothers who are unsupported by fathers cannot in turn support their children in diabetes care.

Parental bonding in pathological gambling disorder.

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of perceived parenting behavior in the childhood of patients with pathological gambling disorder (PGD). Thirty-three outpatient subjects with DSM-IV pathological gambling disorder, and no other current Axis I disorders, completed the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI), which measures subjects' recollections of parenting on dimensions of care and protection. PBI scores of pathological gamblers were compared to normal controls. Subjects with PGD had significantly lower maternal and paternal care scores than the control subjects (22.6 +/- 8.9 vs. 26.9 +/- 7.3 on maternal care [p = 0.010], and 17.4 +/- 9.6 vs. 23.8 +/- 7.6 on paternal care [p = 0.001]). In terms of parental bonding patterns based on a combination of care and protection, the pathological gamblers reported low rates of optimal parenting and high rates of neglectful parenting. These preliminary findings suggest that neglectful parenting appears to be associated with pathological gambling disorder.

The Development of a Brief Screening Measure of Emotional Distress in Children

We report several studies developing a parent-rated measure of emotional distress for children in Singapore, with the key objectives being to derive a very brief valid measure of global distress. The refined item set comprised behaviourally expressed broad manifestations of emotional distress. Three developmental studies were undertaken, with the first two involving parental ratings on the measure for validation against clinician-rated distress levels, while also testing two rating options for the measure. We established clear comparative advantages to the rating anchors used in the Revised Rutter Scales. High inter-rater agreement was established across parental ratings, with the latter finding supporting objectives for the measure. Paternal scores correlated more strongly than maternal scores with clinician-generated distress scores. Additional properties of the measure were tested in a large community sample of nearly 2,000 Singapore schoolchildren in their last 2 years of primary school, allowing prevalence estimates and mean scores to be derived for each item. Here, girls and boys received identical total scores, scores were also independent of the number of children in the family and of ordinal position, and mothers returned higher scores than fathers.

An evaluation of the shortened embu scale in youngoffenders and non-offenders in England

The EMBU has been used in a number of countries as a measure of perceived parentalchild rearing behaviour. In this study a shortened version of the EMBU was used with an Englishpopulation consisting of male offenders and male and female non-offenders. The analysisshowed that maternal scores on perceived emotional warmth were higher than paternal scores inall three samples. Perceptions of maternal rejection and over-protection were also higher thanpaternal scores among non-offenders. Male offenders and male non-offenders, and male andfemale non-offenders were compared on perceived parental rejection, emotional warmth andover-protection. The results showed that the male offenders perceived their fathers as being morerejecting than the male non-offenders. There were no significant differences between the maleand female non-offenders. Broad comparisons were made with findings from other countrieswhich suggested that the non-offenders perceived their parental behaviour similarly to otherWestern countries, whereas offenders perceived higher levels of parental rejection than thecomparison nations.

Personality and behavior in parents of tempermentally inhibited and uninhibited children.

Parents of children categorized as behaviorally inhibited or uninhibited at age 30 months were assessed on measures of affectivity, personality, and behavior. Parents of inhibited children showed lower extraversion, higher avoidance and shyness, and faster drawing times on a task involving uncertainty than did parents of uninhibited children. Faster speed on the uncertainty task was interpreted as evidence of increased anxious responding. The Extroversion, Avoidance, Shyness, and Sociability scales loaded heavily on a singe factor, the scores of which differed significantly by group. Child behavioral inhibition (BI) negatively correlated with maternal scores on the Extroversion scale and the extracted factor and positively correlated with maternal scores on the Avoidance scale. BI correlated with both maternal and paternal scores on the uncertainty task in the predicted direction; Low parental extraversion, high parental avoidance and shyness, and parental tendency toward anxious responding were associated with BI children

Neonatal cardiovascular dynamics in relation to matroclinous and patroclinous history of high blood pressure.

Genetic risk is a primary contributing factor to the predisposition of a newborn child to elevated blood pressure later in life. An index of this factor is needed to assess in the neonate the success or failure of preventive interventions instituted for the pregnant women. This index could be based on characteristics of blood pressure and heart rate variability measured during the first 2 days after birth. In the search for such an index, the systolic and diastolic blood pressures and heart rates of 127 newborn babies were automatically monitored at about 30-min intervals for 48 h with a Nippon Colin device, starting early after birth. Circadian parameters (obtained by the linear least-squares fit of a 24-h cosine curve to each individual series) and descriptive statistics for the three circulatory variables were used in a multiple regression analysis to compute a linear prediction function for the cardiovascular risk score. This score was obtained for each neonate on the basis of the presence or absence of overt cardiovascular disease, elevated blood pressure, or obesity across two generations, those of the newborn's parents and grandparents. Results from regression indicate that the best model includes the circadian amplitudes of systolic and diastolic blood pressure and the circadian ranges of systolic blood pressure and heart rate. The contributions from patroclinous versus matroclinous family history were then compared. Results show that linear prediction models include the same variables for both paternal and maternal cardiovascular risk score. These results provide a neonatal index of cardiovascular risk, to be used later for the evaluation of the effects on the newborn of intervention for the pregnant women.

Differential Parental Attachment; Empirical Support for the Self-in-Relation Model

This study investigated the self-in-relation model of development for men and women. Retrospective and current maternal and paternal attachment scores were assessed for 52 college men and 197 women. Analysis indicated that differential parental attachment occurs as a function of gender. The observed pattern of differences supports the self-in-relation model as applied to women.

The effect of home nursing visits on parental anxiety and CPR knowledge retention of parents of apnea-monitored infants.

The use of structured home nursing visits was evaluated for its effect upon parental anxiety and retention of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) knowledge in the family of the apnea-monitored infant. A two-group design was used, with treatment families receiving three visits by the researcher during the 6 weeks postdischarge. Anxiety levels and CPR knowledge of parents were measured at the discharge teaching sessions and again 6 weeks later in both groups. The difference between test scores was evaluated to assess for a treatment effect. Despite no statistically significant difference in anxiety or knowledge over time, the treatment families did show a greater decrease in anxiety scores and maintained or improved their CPR scores. Maternal scores tended to be higher than paternal scores for both variables. There was also some evidence of enhanced parental adaptation to the monitor and to the parental role in the treatment group.