Father’s parenting attitude and teacher-child relationships: Mediating role of children’s self-regulation ability

Abstract

We examined father’s parenting attitudes in association with teacher-child relationships and the mediating role of young children’s self-regulation ability in this relationship. Participant fathers (n = 211), age range (below 30 to over 41 years of age) and teachers (n = 7), years of teaching experience (3 to 12 years) completed surveys of father-child pairs for 211 primary school children, with the teachers completing the children’s self-regulation survey. Results following path analysis indicated that higher scores on the father’s positive parenting attitudes were associated with stronger teacher-child relationships. The children’s teachers reported that self-regulation ability fully mediated fathers’ positive parenting attitudes to be stronger. These findings suggest a need for educators to engage with father parents to enhance children’s self-regulation ability, and thus strengthen teacher-child relationships.

Keywords:

• positive parenting attitudes
• teacher-child relationships
• self-regulation ability
• father
• children

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the children, parents, and teachers who participated in this study.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflicts of interest are reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Philosophy and Social Science Project of the Zhejiang Provincial Office under Grant No. 23NDJC292YB, Scientific Research Project of Zhejiang Education Department under Grant No. Y202248426, and the Shaoxing Educational Science Planning Project under Grant No. SGJ2022011.