Browsing by Subject "parenting"

Objectives. Parenting is known to be associated with children’s conduct problems. Parenting can be divided into negative and positive parenting dimensions, both of which have independent effects on conduct problems. The strength of the association between parenting and a child’s conduct problems is also influenced by the child’s individual traits. One approach focuses on callous unemotional traits that can be defined as lack of guilt and empathy as well as callous use of others. The quality of parenting may affect children differently depending on the level of their callous unemotional traits. In this review it will be examined whether callous unemotional traits work as a moderating factor on the association between conduct problems and parenting. Methods. The literature search was conducted with PubMed -database using search terms parent* and callous unemotional. In addition, the reference lists from articles already found were manually searched. The articles that examined the moderating effect of callous unemotional traits of 4 to 13-year-old children on the association between conduct problems and parenting were selected in the review. Seven articles were picked to the final review. Results and conclusions. The quality of parenting and conduct problems are associated with each other, but the strength of the association is influenced by the child’s callous unemotional traits. Parenting affects children differently based on the level of callous unemotional traits. Parenting had little effect on children high on callous unemotional traits, which is attributed to them being less responsive to punishment and other people’s distress. However, parental warmth affected these children and it is seen as an important protective factor from conduct problems. The negative dimension of parenting was consistently associated with more conduct problem symptoms and positive dimension of parenting with less symptoms on children low on callous unemotional traits. Considering callous unemotional traits in the treatment of conduct problems would be important to better suit interventions for children based on their individual traits.