Relations Between Parenting Behavior and SES in a Clinical Sample: Validity of SES Measures

Abstract

Two common methods of measuring socioeconomic status (SES) were examined in relation to observed parenting behaviors in a clinical sample of 89 mothers of 3- to 6-year-olds referred for treatment of oppositional defiant disorder. Families were 74% Caucasian, 9% African American, 5% Hispanic, 1% Asian, and 11% Biracial. Most children were male (75%). Parenting behaviors were measured with the Dyadic Parent–Child Interaction Coding System (DPICS) categories of prosocial talk and negative talk. Analyses were conducted with SES measured in two ways: (a) the Hollingshead Four-Factor Index of Social Status (HI) was correlated with parenting behaviors; and (b) family income, parent education (5 categories), and parent occupation (5 categories) were used to predict parent behavior. SES was significantly positively related to maternal prosocial talk. When SES was operationalized as income, occupation, and education, the model predicted three times more variance in maternal prosocial talk than the HI alone. SES was not related to maternal negative talk by either measure of SES.

KEYWORDS:

• behavioral observation
• education
• Hollingshead Index
• income
• measurement
• methodology
• occupation
• parent-child interaction
• parenting
• socioeconomic status

This project was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (Grant RO1 MH60632). The authors thank William Perlstein, Michael Perri, Brenda Weins, and the members of the Child Study Lab for their contributions to this research. This research is based on a master's thesis by Corissa L. Callahan, supervised by Sheila M. Eyberg.

Notes

Note. n = 89; % PRO = percentage of maternal talk that is prosocial talk; % NTA = percentage of maternal talk that is negative talk.

*p < .05; **p < .01.

†Percentage PRO and percentage NTA were square root transformations of the original value.

¹HI was also significantly related to parental praise, r(N = 89) = .25, p < .05.

²When the same model was used to predict parental praise only, the results were similar, R ² = .31, F(9,79) = 3.86, p < .01.