Parenting

There is a complex interplay between poverty and the sensitivity, responsiveness, and quality of parenting behaviors.

Stress from poverty may strain family relationships and disrupt parenting in a variety of ways:

  • distracted, disengaged, and impaired parenting
  • parents withdrawn from children –> likely to be depressed
  • increased risk of child maltreatment and abuse –> children vulnerable to medical and psychiatric illness
The “Family Stress Model (FSM)” provides a useful framework for understanding how parental stress affects the children’s lives and overall family functioning (2).

Economic hardship exacerbates child and later adolescent development through various pathways. As discussed during lecture, less sensitive and responsive parenting can lead to insecure attachments and failure to develop a stable internal working model for future healthy relationships. 

One of the most important buffers against the adverse effects of parenting is positive parenting which focuses on:

  • exhibiting “care, affection, acceptance, and support to the child’s needs” (4)
  • encourages prosocial behavior in children
  • positive peer relationships in adolescence
  • overall psychological well-being in adulthood, including a sense of “happiness, life satisfaction, and low psychological distress” (3). 

It is important to note that parenting in poverty is different, not deficient. Working-class parents prioritize meeting the child’s needs and looking after their well-being; they aim for their children to be healthy and happy (1). Moreover, low-income parents have been found to have an increased commitment to be “good parents” while in the context of being constrained by resources; children are the “focal point” of the family (1).

  1. Cooper, K. (2020). Are poor parents poor parents? the relationship between poverty and parenting among mothers in the UK. Sociology, 55(2), 349–383. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038520939397
  2. Masarik, A. S., & Conger, R. D. (2017). Stress and child development: A review of The family stress model. Current Opinion in Psychology, 13, 85–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2016.05.008
  3. Rohner, R. P., & Britner, P. A. (2002). Worldwide mental health correlates of parental acceptance-rejection: Review of cross-cultural and intracultural evidence. Cross-Cultural Research, 36(1), 16–47. https://doi.org/10.1177/106939710203600102
  4. Sobowale, K., & Ross, D. A. (2018). Poverty, parenting, and psychiatry. Biological Psychiatry, 84(5). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2018.07.007