Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Psychiatry. Jan 19, 2025; 15(1): 100068
Published online Jan 19, 2025. doi: 10.5498/wjp.v15.i1.100068
Relationship between parenting stress and behavioral and emotional problems in preschool children: A mediation effect analysis
Zhi-Wei Fu, Yue-Jing Li, Ran Yu, Rui-Qing Guo, Li-Xia Gao, Sheng-Xia Zhao
Zhi-Wei Fu, Yue-Jing Li, Ran Yu, Rui-Qing Guo, Li-Xia Gao, Sheng-Xia Zhao, Department of Children's Health, Shijiazhuang Maternity and Child Healthcare Hospital, Shijiazhuang 050000, Hebei Province, China
Author contributions: Zhao SX designed research; Fu ZW performed research; Li YJ, Yu R and Gao LX contributed new reagents or analytic tools; Guo RQ analyzed data; Fu ZW wrote the paper.
Supported by the Shijiazhuang Science and Technology Research and Development Program, No. 221460383.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Shijiazhuang Maternal and Child Health Hospital Institutional Review Board, No. 202205.
Informed consent statement: All subjects understood and agreed to the study protocol and voluntarily signed the informed consent form.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement—checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement—checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Sheng-Xia Zhao, MS, Chief Nurse, Department of Children's Health, Shijiazhuang Maternity and Child Healthcare Hospital, No. 396 Youyi Street, Qiaoxi District, Shijiazhuang 050000, Hebei Province, China. 18032925759@163.com
Received: August 26, 2024
Revised: September 30, 2024
Accepted: November 13, 2024
Published online: January 19, 2025
Processing time: 114 Days and 0.1 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Emotional reactions, such as anxiety, irritability, and aggressive behavior, have attracted clinical attention as behavioral and emotional problems in preschool-age children.

AIM

To investigate the current status of family rearing, parental stress, and behavioral and emotional problems of preschool children and to analyze the mediating effect of the current status of family rearing on parental stress and behavioral/emotional problems.

METHODS

We use convenience sampling to select 258 preschool children in the physical examination center of our hospital from October 2021 to September 2023. The children and their parents were evaluated using a questionnaire survey. Pearson's correlation was used to analyze the correlation between child behavioral and emotional problems and parental stress and family rearing, and the structural equation model was constructed to test the mediating effect.

RESULTS

The score for behavioral/emotional problems of 258 preschool children was (27.54 ± 3.63), the score for parental stress was (87.64 ± 11.34), and the score for parental family rearing was (31.54 ± 5.24). There was a positive correlation between the behavioral and emotional problems of the children and the “hostile/mandatory” parenting style; meanwhile, showed a negative correlation with the “support/ participation” parenting style (all P < 0.05). The intermediary effect value between the family upbringing of parents in parental stress and children's behavior problems was 29.89%.

CONCLUSION

Parental family upbringing has a mediating effect between parental stress and behavioral and emotional problems of children. Despite paying attention to the behavioral and emotional problems of preschool-age children, clinical medical staff should provide correct and reasonable parenting advice to their parents to promote the mental health of preschool-age children.

Keywords: Preschool children; Parenting stress; Children's behavioral and emotional problems; Family rearing; Mediating effect

Core Tip: With the acceleration of the pace of modern society, parents are facing increasing psychological pressure and life burden, which may affect children's physical and mental health through different mechanisms. Preschool is a critical period for children's psychological and behavioral development, and parents' emotions and behaviors will directly affect children's emotional regulation, social ability and behavioral performance. This study suggests a mediating role between parental stress and behavioral and emotional problems in preschool children. This further provides a theoretical basis for the design of education, psychological intervention and family support strategies.