Parental Stress and Child Temperament

Abstract

Parenting is often stressful, and stress makes effective parenting more difficult. Evidence shows that stress is associated with ineffective (e.g., harsh and inconsistent) parenting and poor child adjustment, but not for all parent–child pairs and not through clearly identified processes. This chapter considers mediating and moderating processes linking parental stress and child temperament to important qualities of parent–child interactions. We selectively review the substantial literature on parental stress and add a relatively novel focus on parental sleep deficits, which can be both causes and effects of parents’ experiences of stress. We also focus on child temperament, which can contribute to parental stress and can, to some extent, be shaped by parental stress through daily parent–child interactions. Parents of young children, especially children with difficult temperament, commonly experience sleep disruptions. Evidence also suggests that other chronic psychosocial stressors can similarly reduce the duration and quality of parents’ sleep. We suggest that parents’ poor sleep, especially in interaction with other risk factors and stressors, could set the stage for ineffectual and negative reactions to child misbehavior and hostility, which could then, in course, exacerbate parent stress.