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J Child Fam Stud (2010) 19:2329 DOI 10.1007/s10826-009-9339-x
ORIGINAL PAPER
Parental Inconsistency: A Third Cross-Cultural Research on Parenting and Psychological Adjustment of Children
Marwan Dwairy
Published online: 27 November 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009
Abstract Inconsistency in parenting is a factor that may inuence childrens mental health. A questionnaire, measuring three parental inconsistencies (temporal, situational, and father-mother inconsistency) was administered to adolescents in nine countries to assess its association with adolescents psychological disorders. The results show that parental inconsistency varies across cultures. Temporal inconsistency is not correlated with the other two inconsistencies. Temporal and fathermother inconsistencies, but not the situational inconsistency, were associated with adolescents psychological disorders. The associations between parental inconsistency and psychological disorders differed across cultures.
Keywords Inconsistency Ambivalence Predictability
Parenting Culture Mental health
Introduction
In studies carried out in western countries, authoritarian and controlling parenting was consistently associated with the childrens psychological maladjustment (Baumrind 1991; Bigner 1994; Forward 1989; Maccoby and Martin 1983; Whiteld 1987). Many studies in non-western cultures fail to nd such signicant association (Chao 2001; Leung et al. 1998; Randolph 1995; Rohner and Pettengill 1985). A regional research study, conducted in eight Arab countries, found that authoritarian parenting is minimally associated with Arab adolescents mental health and that
the inconsistent pattern, mixing authoritarian and permissive parenting, was associated with psychological disorders and low connectedness between adolescents and their families (Dwairy et al. 2006).
Dwairy et al. (2006) suggested an inconsistency hypothesis to explain their results. Based on this hypothesis, inconsistency between authoritarian parenting and the liberal culture in the west, rather than authoritarianism per se, constitutes the main reason behind the negative impact of authoritarian parenting in western society. This inconsistency is supposed to evoke ambivalence and childrens feelings of being treated unjustly by their authoritarian parents. Consistency between authoritarian parenting and the authoritarian culture prevalent among Arabs or in other collective cultures neutralizes or diminishes the negative impact of authoritarian parenting in these cultures.
The literature contains a great deal of support for the association between inconsistency and psychological mal-adjustment of children. Freud (1914/1953) had associated ambivalence with psychological conict and neuroticism. Hersov (1960) mentioned that inconsistency between maternal and paternal parenting styles may increase separation anxiety and school phobia. Patterson (1982) postulated that inconsistent parenting is...