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Health‐Related Parenting Among U.S. Families and Young Children's Physical Health
Author(s) -
Augustine Jennifer March,
Prickett Kate C.,
Kimbro Rachel Tolbert
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of marriage and family
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.578
H-Index - 159
eISSN - 1741-3737
pISSN - 0022-2445
DOI - 10.1111/jomf.12363
Subject(s) - psychology , physical health , developmental psychology , child health , medicine , mental health , pediatrics , psychiatry
Parenting is a constellation of behaviors, yet investigations of the link between parenting and children's health typically focus on singular behaviors. Thus, patterns of health‐related parenting among U.S. families, associations between patterns and children's physical health, and the prevalence of such patterns among different sociodemographic groups remain unknown. Applying latent class analysis to the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study–Birth Cohort (2001; N = 8,550) revealed 6 parenting patterns. The pattern characterized by high levels of television watching was associated with the worst overall health; the pattern characterized by the highest consumption of food and amount of outdoor play was linked to the highest odds of obesity. Children of less‐educated mothers and Black mothers were more likely to experience both of these patterns than the patterns associated with the best child health, but these patterns did not differ for Hispanics (vs. Whites). Income differences only appeared for patterns associated with children's general health.