Effects of Parental Styles on Children’s Dental Fear in Jeonju

The aim of this study was to investigate difference of child’s dental fear and agreement between parent/child dyads according to parental rearing style. The subjects were 801 children aged 8 and 11-year old and their parents in Jeonju city. The parents were asked to answer a questionnaire which included four parental rearing style and the Children’s Fear Survey Schedule Dental Subscale(CFSS-DS) at home. Also, the CFSS-DS was completed by 8 and 11 years old children in a classroom. Authoritative, permissive, authoritarian and neglectful parenting styles were 53.4%, 45.8%, 0.2% and 0.6% respectively. Authoritative and permissive parents reported 5.7 and 7.5 points higher than dental fear scores reported by their children. At 8 years old, children of authoritative parents were significantly 3.9 points higher than them of permissive parents(p = 0.002). Also, parent/child dyads showed moderate agreement assessing dental fear at aged 8. Parenting styles are related to children’s dental fear, and especially 8-year-old girls in authoritative parenting styles have the highest dental fear. However, as age increased, the impact of parental styles on children’s dental fear decreased.