Introdução: As mudanças nas relações entre pais e filhos decorrentes das transformações pelas quais a família vem passando têm levado a um crescente questionamento sobre o papel dos pais na educação de seus filhos. Objetivo: Realizar um levantamento sistemático e revisão crítica da literatura referente a estilos e práticas parentais, buscando apontar diretrizes que possam ser orientadores para pesquisadores, profissionais e pais. Metodologia: Revisão sistemática integrativa da literatura. Definimos como questão norteadora O que tem sido estudado e publicado sobre estilo e práticas parentais que pode orientar pesquisadores, profissionais e pais? Estabelecemos como descritores parenting style AND parenting practices e SciELO, PsycINFO, Science Direct e Web of Science como bancos de dados. Optamos por artigos publicados em periódicos, desde o início do ano 2006 até o final de 2010 e estudos voltados para as práticas com crianças de 02 aos 12 anos. Após a obtenção do corpo da pesquisa ficamos com um total de 67 artigos na integra para serem analisados. Utilizando o programa Access criamos um banco de dados que permitiu análises do conjunto do material a partir de várias tabelas construídas automaticamente de acordo com a determinação do pesquisador. Foi realizado posteriormente um trabalho exaustivo de leitura dos artigos voltada para a análise das contribuições trazidas na temática. Resultados: Percebemos uma grande maioria de artigos (61,8%) oriundos dos Estados Unidos, um aumento no número das publicações no decorrer dos anos e trabalhos predominantemente quantitativos e transversais. O número amostral utilizado variou bastante, com uma maioria de artigos (60,3%) com até 200 participantes; quanto às crianças focalizadas, meninas e meninos aparecem com porcentagens praticamente iguais. No maior número de trabalhos (39,7%), os participantes eram as crianças e seus pais (pais e mães) e as pesquisas são realizadas principalmente nas escolas (50%). Encontramos na maioria dos artigos a caracterização da sua amostra tanto com relação ao fator socioeconômico (69,1%) como dos grupos étnicos (89,7%). Dentre os instrumentos o Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire é o mais utilizado (16%) e os autores mais citados foram Baumrind (1966, 1971), seguido por Maccoby e Martin (1983) e Darling e Steinberg (1983). Após várias leituras do material completo definimos três temas: a) conjunto de práticas que afetam o desenvolvimento (34% dos artigos); b) práticas educativas e saúde (28% dos artigos); c) contexto afetando as práticas parentais (38% dos artigos). A descrição do corpo reunido por tema permite apontar: a) é comum o uso de práticas parentais coercitivas, inclusive a punição física, sendo associada com problemas de adaptação, comportamento, ajustamento emocional e baixa autoestima; b) o aumento da obesidade infantil é foco de várias pesquisas, que sugerem que o uso de práticas inadequadas, relacionadas aos estilos autoritário, negligente e indulgente propicia a obesidade infantil; c) os treinamentos para pais foram impulsionados por questões diversas - deficiência de desenvolvimento, ajustamento comportamental e emocional da criança talentosa e/ou superdotada, crianças diagnosticadas com obesidade, ansiedade, problemas de aprendizagem, de comportamento e de conduta - e foram unânimes em constatar ótimos resultados para pais e filhos; d) vários estudos correlacionais enfocam as questões das diferenças relativas à culturas e etnias, sendo sugerido que o estilo parental autoritativo de Baumrind (1966), considerado como o mais adequado a partir de estudos com norte americanos descendentes de europeus, não poderia ser considerado desta forma em outros contextos. Conclusão: através da revisão sistemática integrativa percebemos que os estudos com foco nas práticas que afetam o desenvolvimento investigam continuamente as práticas disciplinares coercitivas, que as práticas relacionadas à saúde voltam-se para problemáticas e demandas atuais e que a tipologia dos estilos parentais de Baumrind vem sendo questionada e investigada para melhor utilização em diversas culturas e etnias. / Introduction: Families have changed, and, therefore, so have parent-child relationships. This has raised constant questions regarding the parents role in their childrens education. Goal: Perform a systematic search and critical review of the literature on parenting styles and practices, aiming at pointing out guidelines to assist researchers, psychologists, and parents. Method: Integrative systematic literature review. We used the following guiding question What has been studied and published on parenting styles and practices that could guide researchers, psychologists, and parents? We chose parenting style AND parenting practices as keywords, and SciELO, PsycINFO, Science Direct and Web of Science as databases. We chose journal articles published between early 2006 and late 2010, and studies on practices with children aged 2 to 12 years. The complete body of research comprised 67 full-text articles to be analyzed. We used Microsoft Access to create a database that permitted to perform group analyses of the material from several tables created automatically and according to the researchers preference. Later, an exhaustive reading of the articles was performed aimed at analyzing their contributions. Results: We realized that the vast majority of the articles (61.8%) were originally from the United States, and that the number of publications has increased over the years, mostly quantitative and cross-sectional studies. The sample size ranged considerably, with most articles (60.3%) working with 200 participants or less; as to the children involved, boys and girls appear with virtually the same participation. The larger part of the studies (39.7%) had children and their parents for participants, and was usually (50%) performed at school. We observed that most articles characterized the sample regarding socioeconomic factors (69.1%) as well ethnic groups (89.7%). The Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire is the most often used (16%) instrument, and the most cited authors were Baumrind (1966, 1971), followed by Maccoby and Martin (1983), and Darling and Steinberg (1983). After reading the material several times, we defined three themes: a) set of practices that affect child development (34% of articles); b) educational practices and health (28% of articles); c) context affecting parenting practices (38% of articles). The description of the body of research grouped according to the theme shows that: a) coercive parenting practices are common, including physical punishment, and they are associated with problems involving adjustment, behavior, emotional adjustment, and low self-esteem; b) several focus on the increasing rates of childhood obesity, which suggest that inadequate practices, related with authoritarian, negligent and indulgent styles promote childhood obesity; c) parent training programs were motivated by several different issues impaired development, behavioral and emotional adjustment of talented and/or gifted children, children diagnosed with obesity, anxiety, and learning, behavior, and conduct disorders and were unanimous in reporting excellent results for parents and children; several correlational studies focus on issues regarding cultural and ethnical differences, suggesting that the authoritarian parenting style proposed by Baumrind (1966), considered the most appropriate according to studied with North-Americans of European descent, could not be considered as such in different contexts. Conclusion: through an integrative systematic review we realized that studies focused on practices affecting child development continuously investigate coercive disciplinary practices, that health practices aim at current issues and demands, and that the typology of Baumrinds parenting styles is being questioned and investigated to improve its use among different cultures and ethnicities.

This thesis examines the effects of anti-obesity discourses on parenting practices. While academics have paid attention to the political dimensions of anti-obesity policy and related discourses (for example Colls and Evans, 2009, Evans, 2006, 2010, McPhail, 2009, Rawlins, 2009), and others have considered the experiences of feeding and caring for families (for example Curtis and Fisher, 2007, DeVault, 1991 Warin et al, 2008, Valentine, 1999), the way in which anti-obesity policies become enrolled in, and possibly contested through, parenting practices remains largely uncovered. In response to this, the thesis explores the ways in which these anti-obesity policies and discourses are brought into family life, lived, experienced, and made meaningful, contributing to critical obesity geographies and broader literature on bodies, parenting, care, and consumption. The thesis draws on research interviews and focus groups with parents, in which accounts of parenting practices and understandings around body size were explored in light of contemporary UK anti-obesity discourse. Using this research to explore the everyday enaction of parenting knowledges around body size, these parenting enactions are investigated alongside the governance of body size and parenting, developing an account of the ways in which we can see the aims of the state enacted in everyday practices of care (Dyck et al, 2007). By paying attention to everyday practices, this thesis argues that anti-obesity discourse emerges not only through top-down practices of governance, but through mundane and personal relationships of care and engagement with bodies, food, and fat. However, caring practices are demonstrated as existing in multiplicity and the excesses of everyday life in relation to parenting and body size are given space in the thesis to challenge narrow accounts of what it means to be a ‘good’ parent or have a ‘good’ body size; it is argued that we need to take seriously the situated lay knowledges that are developed through everyday practices of care. The thesis contends that such notions of ‘good’ parenting, bodies, and size are enacted through anti-obesity discourse as a particular classed discourse of parenting knowledge and body size, which furthermore, reinforce gendered versions of bodies, parenting, and everyday life.

Strengths-based assessment is providing an alternative to the typical way that psychologists approach mental health in the literature. Social-emotional strengths are multidimensional, positive indicators of mental health that include Social Competence, Self-Regulation, Empathy, and Responsibility. Limited research has been conducted to examine the potential connection between parental involvement in children’s education, specifically in the areas of supporting a child’s learning at home, parental involvement within educational settings, and parenting practices (discipline, Monitoring, use of Praise and Incentives) in connection with social-emotional strengths. With an emphasis on prevention of mental health problems, parents are an important and potentially untapped resource for school-based interventions to promote social-emotional strengths. Multiple informants in strengths-based assessment has also received limited attention in the research, therefore potential differences in parent and teacher ratings of social-emotional strengths were explored. The relationships between parenting variables and social-emotional strengths were examined. The sample included 166 kindergarten children. Teacher ratings of children’s strengths were available for all 166 of these children. Parent ratings of children’s strengths were available for a subset (n = 122) of these 166 children. Participants were from both the U.S. and Canada. Measures used to assess parenting variables included the Parent Involvement Project Questionnaire-Modified, the Fast Track Project Parent-Teacher Involvement Questionnaire, the Parent Practices Interview, Parental Support for Learning Scale, Trust Scale from the Family-School Relationship Survey, and the Social-Emotional Assets and Resilience Scale (SEARS)-Parent, and the SEARS-Teacher short form. All together, parenting variables explained 37% of the variance in Self-Regulation/Responsibility, 29% of the variance in Social Competence, 29% of the variance in Empathy, 37% of the variance in Total Social-Emotional Strengths as rated by parents, and 20% of the variance in Total Strengths as rated by teachers. In terms of individual predictors of the parent-rated strengths sample, Positive Verbal Discipline and gender (female status) were significant positive predictors of Self-Regulation/Responsibility. This indicated that the higher the use of Positive Verbal Discipline, the higher the levels of Self-Regulation/Responsibility. Supportive Parent Involvement, Positive Verbal Discipline, and gender (female status) significantly predicted Social Competence, also in a positive direction. This demonstrated that the higher the level of Supportive Parent Involvement and Positive Verbal Discipline, the higher the level of Social Competence. Parent perception of his/her Time and Energy, Praise and Incentives, and the child’s gender (female status) positively predicted Empathy; Monitoring negatively predicted Empathy. For Time and Energy and Praise and Incentives, this indicated that the higher the level of these parenting variables, the more positively Empathy was rated by parents. Monitoring moved in the opposite direction of Empathy; as Monitoring increased, Empathy decreased. Positive Verbal Discipline and gender (female status) predicted Total Strengths rated by parents in a positive direction; as Positive Verbal Discipline increased, so did Total Parent-Rated Strengths. For teacher ratings of strengths, Trust of the child’s teacher and gender (female status) predicted Total Strengths in a positive direction. This indicated that as Trust of the child’s teacher increased, so did the level of teacher-rated Total Social-Emotional Strengths. Female status was consistently associated with more positive ratings of the social-emotional domains and Total Social-Emotional Strengths. Teachers and parents had moderate levels of association (r = .48) in rating of kindergarten students’ Total Social-Emotional Strengths. In summary, all parenting variables were predictive or associated with social-emotional outcomes except for Appropriate Discipline, and Monitoring had a negative relationship with parent-rated Empathy. Socioeconomic status was also not found to be significantly predictive or associated with social-emotional domains. Parenting practices such as Positive Verbal Discipline and gender were particularly predictive of social-emotional domains. Implications for research and practice are outlined.

There has been an upward trend in obesity among African American (AA) adolescents over the last 2 decades. While parenting characteristics (e.g., styles and practices) are linked to adolescent eating habits and weight status, related research has focused on European American children from 2-parent middle-class households or economically disadvantaged AA children from single mother households. The purpose of this quantitative secondary data analysis was to investigate the relationship between parenting characteristics on the weight status of adolescents aged 12 to 17 years (n = 325) among a broader population of AA mothers and fathers residing both inside and outside of the home. The social cognitive theory, widely used in obesity intervention research, was the framework used to explore parental behaviors that contribute to adolescent weight status and health. The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 was used to examine the relationship between parenting characteristics on adolescent weight status, as measured by body mass index (BMI) percentile. Statistical analysis included the Kruskal-Wallis Test, Mann-Whitney U, Spearman rho correlation, and hierarchical multiple regression. Results indicated no significant relationships between parenting characteristics and adolescent BMI percentiles as determined by Kruskal-Wallis and multiple regression analysis when controlled for sociodemographic variables. Study findings indicate that variables beyond parenting practices, such as urban/rural residence, must be considered to explain BMI and weight status among AA adolescents. Largely, this study increased knowledge on AA parenting characteristics and promotes education and social awareness of the continued weight epidemic that plagues AA children in the United States.

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Yes / To identify maternal factors that influence physical activity behaviour in 2 year old children.

If the educational agenda No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act is to be successful, teachers, parents and children from all cultural backgrounds have to be involved in the implementation process. This idea of NCLB Act clearly identified with the purpose of this study, which was focused on the evaluation of the parenting practices of Nigerian immigrant parenting practices in preparing their children for college. Five basic parenting theoretical approaches were employed by the researcher to gather, collect and analyze the data. The researcher interviewed and observed the environment of sixteen Nigerian immigrant parents on how they prepare their children for college. One school administrator and one school teacher were interviewed to evaluate their own perception of how Nigerian immigrant parents prepare their children for college. The major results of the findings were proactive parenting strategies. These included Cultural Orientation; Immigrant Experience; Surviving in the United States; Strong Parental Background; Early Childhood Education; Early Emphasis on Education; Close Interest in Children; Regular Supervision of Children; Preservation of Indigenous Culture; Supportive Family Collaboration; Strong Involvement in School Activities; Involvement in Community Organizations; Comparing of the Cultural Values in the United States and Nigeria; and Early Emphasis on Education. The study provided specific recommendations to assist teachers and school administrators in providing support to Nigerian immigrant parents as they prepare their children for college. Suggestions for additional research were provided. The concluding statement hinged on the idea that there are several factors that Nigerian immigrant parents consider beyond the conventional levels in preparing their children for college. Ultimately, proactive parenting is an innovative strategy that demonstrated that all children benefited maximally from the motivation of parents, expertise of teachers and the resources in the environment.