Research
The parenting attitudes and the stress of mothers predict the asthmatic severity of their children: a prospective study
1 Institute of Health Science, 6-1 Kasuga Park, Kasuga, Fukuoka, 816-8580 Japan
2 Department of Psychosomatic Medicine, Kyushu University Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Fukuoka, Japan
3 Department of Pediatrics, Fukuoka National Hospital, Fukuoka, Japan
BioPsychoSocial Medicine 2010, 4:12 doi:10.1186/1751-0759-4-12
Published: 7 October 2010Abstract
Objective
To examine relationships between a mother's stress-related conditions and parenting attitudes and their children's asthmatic status.
Methods
274 mothers of an asthmatic child 2 to 12 years old completed a questionnaire including questions about their chronic stress/coping behaviors (the "Stress Inventory"), parenting attitudes (the "Ta-ken Diagnostic Test for Parent-Child Relationship, Parent Form"), and their children's disease status. One year later, a follow-up questionnaire was mailed to the mothers that included questions on the child's disease status.
Results
223 mothers (81%) responded to the follow-up survey. After controlling for non-psychosocial factors including disease severity at baseline, multiple linear regression analysis followed by multiple logistic regression analysis found chronic irritation/anger and emotional suppression to be aggravating factors for children aged < 7 years; for children aged 7 and over, the mothers' egocentric behavior was a mitigating factor while interference was an aggravating factor.
Conclusions
Different types of parental stress/coping behaviors and parenting styles may differently predict their children's asthmatic status, and such associations may change as children grow.
