Parent–child relationships and child executive functioning at school entry: the importance of fathers

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to examine the unique and interactive contributions of the quality of mothers’ and fathers’ relationships with their toddlers to the prediction of children’s subsequent executive functioning (EF). The sample included 46 low-risk middle-class families. The quality of mother–child and father–child interactions was assessed independently during separate interactive sequences at 18 months. Child EF problems were reported by teachers in kindergarten. The results indicated that only father–child interactions made a unique contribution to the prediction of children’s EF, and no interaction effect was observed. Kindergarteners who benefited from higher quality interactions with their fathers in toddlerhood were considered by their teachers to present fewer EF problems in everyday school situations. These results appeared to be somewhat more pronounced in father–son than father–daughter dyads. Overall, the results suggest that fathering and father–child relationships may deserve more empirical attention than they have received thus far in the EF literature.

KEYWORDS:

• Kindergarten
• school entry
• cognitive development
• executive functioning
• mother–child interactions
• father–child interactions

Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge Chantal Mongeau, Émilie Rochette, Natasha Ballen, Isabelle Demers, Natasha Whipple, Jessica Laranjo, Stéphanie Bordeleau, Véronique Jarry-Boileau, Marie Deschênes, Marie-Ève Bélanger, Andrée-Anne Bouvette-Turcot, Christine Gagné, Célia Matte-Gagné, Gabrielle Lalonde, Marie-Soleil Sirois, Émilie Tétreault, Rachel Perrier, Élizabel Leblanc, Élodie Larose-Grégoire, and Nadine Marzougui for their help with data collection. Special thanks go to the participating families of the Grandir Ensemble project who generously opened their homes to us.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Annie Bernier is professor of developmental psychology at the University of Montreal. She is especially interested in the early caregiving environment as a predictor of children’s executive development.

Sarah Hertz received her master’s degree in Psychology at the University of Montreal. She is interested in comparing the father–child relationship and the mother–child relationship as they affect a child’s development.

Catherine Cimon-Paquet is completing her master’s degree in Psychology at the University of Montreal. She is particularly interested in the role of the family context in children’s social, cognitive, and physiological development.

Sophie Regueiro is currently pursuing her PhD studies in neuropsychology at the University of Montreal. She is interested in the impact of the quality of parent–child relationships on the development of children’s executive functioning.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research [MOP-119390], the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada [410-2010-1366], and le Fonds Québécois de Recherche sur la Société et la Culture [2012-RP-144923].