Early socialization of hostile attribution bias: The roles of parental attributions, parental discipline, and child attributes

The goal of this study was to examine child and parent predictors of children's hostile attribution bias (HAB) with a particular focus on exploring the associations between parents’ early attribution of child misbehavior and children's HAB in the transition to school age. Participants were...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social development (Oxford, England) England), 2019-08, Vol.28 (3), p.549-563
Main Authors: Lee, Sujin, Chang, Hyein, Ip, Ka I., Olson, Sheryl L.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Ambiguity
Attributes
Attribution
Behavior problems
Bias
Child discipline
Childrearing practices
Children
Children & youth
Cognition
Conduct disorder
Corporal punishment
Discipline
hostile attribution bias
Intelligence tests
Misconduct
Mothers
parental attribution
parenting
Parents & parenting
Power
preschool
Punishment
Self regulation
Socialization
Temperament
Theory of mind
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Summary:The goal of this study was to examine child and parent predictors of children's hostile attribution bias (HAB) with a particular focus on exploring the associations between parents’ early attribution of child misbehavior and children's HAB in the transition to school age. Participants were 241 children (118 girls) of middle‐income families who were at risk for school‐age conduct problems. Multi‐method, multi‐informant data were collected on maternal attributions of child misbehavior, parental use of corporal punishment, and child attributes (i.e., verbal IQ, effortful control, theory of mind, and emotional understanding) at 3 years, and child HAB in ambiguous situations at 6 years. Results indicated that mothers’ internal explanations for children's misconduct may either reduce or increase children's later HAB depending on the specific content of attributions, such that mothers’ belief that children misbehave because of their internal state (i.e., emotional state or temperament) was associated with lower levels of child HAB, whereas attributing power‐based motives (i.e., manipulative, controlling intentions) in children was associated with higher levels of HAB. The findings are discussed with respect to appreciating the complexity of parents’ explanations for children's behavior, and considering parental cognition as a potential target for early identification and prevention of child HAB and related problems.
ISSN:0961-205X
1467-9507
DOI:10.1111/sode.12349