Marital conflict and parenting: moderating effects of ethnicity and parent sex

UnrestrictedMarital conflict has been linked with many different dimensions of parent-child relations, but the bulk of existing research has focused on Caucasian families, and many studies have failed to include both mothers and fathers. This study examined parent sex and ethnicity as determinants of parenting and as moderators of relations between marital conflict and parenting. An ethnically diverse sample of 97 couples with preadolescent children reported about their marital conflict. Approximately one year later, the families participated in triadic family discussions, and trained coders evaluated parents' engagement/discipline, parent-child conflict, negative coparenting/boundaries, and attunement. Marital conflict was related to negative coparenting/boundaries, but contrary to expectation, marital conflict was not related to other aspects of parenting. Ethnicity moderated the link between marital conflict and negative coparenting/boundaries, such that there was a stronger link for White than for non-White parents, and a weaker link for African American parents than for non-African American parents. Exploratory analyses also pointed toward a combined moderating effect of ethnicity and parent sex on the connection between marital conflict and parent-child conflict. In addition, there were main effects of ethnicity on some parenting dimensions. These results contribute to the literature by suggesting that the link between marital conflict and some dimensions of parenting may vary by parent gender and ethnicity. Because prior literature examining the impact of marital conflict on parenting has been based on largely White samples, those findings may not apply to families of all ethnic backgrounds. Future research would benefit from inclusion of more ethnically diverse samples, as well as examination of factors that may explain ethnic differences