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Indirect effects, via parental factors, of income harshness and unpredictability on kindergarteners’ socioemotional functioning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2022

Zhi Li Open the ORCID record for Zhi Li [Opens in a new window]  and
Jay Belsky
Zhi Li*
Affiliation:
School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences and Beijing Key Laboratory of Behavior and Mental Health, Peking University, Beijing, China
Jay Belsky
Affiliation:
Department of Human Ecology, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA, United States
*
Corresponding author: Zhi Li, email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Drawing on data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (n = 10,700), we evaluate indirect effects − via parent negative psychology and harsh-inconsistent parenting − of income harshness, unpredictability, and their interaction on kindergarteners’ socioemotional development. Income harshness is operationalized as the typical level of family income-to-needs across four repeated measurements from 9 months to kindergarten and unpredictability as random variation across the same repeated measurements. Results indicate that the effects of greater income harshness and the harshness-X-unpredictability interaction (reflecting more predictable income harshness) on more “problematic” child behavior operated via both parent negative psychology (i.e., greater psychological stress) and harsh-inconsistent parenting. Results underscore the utility of simultaneously investigating effects of income harshness and unpredictability, as well as their interaction and mechanisms of influence.

Keywords

Harsh-inconsistent parentingincome harshnessincome unpredictabilityparent negative psychology
Type
Special Issue Article
Information
Development and Psychopathology , Volume 34 , Issue 2: Special Issue: Dimensions of early experience and adaptive and maladaptive development , May 2022 , pp. 635 - 646
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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