Estilo parental desde la perspectiva de los padres: Adaptación argentina del Inventario de Estilos Parentales de Power

MINZI, MARÍA PAULA; MESURADO, BELÉN

Interdisciplinaria

Centro Interamericano de Investigaciones Psicologicas y Ciencias Afines

Lugar: Buenos Aires; Año: 2022 vol. 39 p. 299 - 310

0325-8203

Diana Baumrind (1966) proposed three primary parenting styles: the authoritarianstyle, the permissive style, and the authoritativestyle. Almost two decades later, Maccobyand Martin (1983) theoretically added a fourth(negligent) parenting style. Parental styles arebased on variations in the levels of the parentaldimensions of sensitivity (warmth, affection),parental demand (parental control) andautonomy granted (Richaud, Lemos & VargasRubilar, 2013). It has been suggested that thefindings related to broad parenting styles arenot always easy to interpret (Stewart & Bond,2002) and that Baumrind’s three-categoryparenting style typology can be usefully disaggregatedinto parenting dimensions (Darlingand Steinberg, 1993). A dimensional approachcan be particularly valuable in allowing anindependent assessment of parenting anddiscipline (Locke & Printz, 2002).One of these dimensional models is that ofPower (2002), which includes 11 dimensionsof which the first three: Sensitivity, Inconsistencyand Follow-up through discipline, evaluatea general dimension of the relationshipof parents with their children, as perceived byparents. These three basic dimensions correspondto those of Baumrind described above:sensitivity (warmth, affection), autonomygranted (permissiveness) and parental demand(parental control), respectively. Power’sParenting Styles Inventory (PDI) assessesparenting styles from a parent’s perspective.It is a self-report that, as we said, assesses 11dimensions of parents’ attitudes and behaviorstowards their children. It has 57 items organizedinto 11 scales, each of which evaluatesdifferent dimensions of parent-child relationships.The first three scales, which include13 items, measure a “general dimension”(Support / care, Inconsistency and Follow-upthrough discipline / control). The followingscales assess different types of control and aredistinguished from the general dimensions, in that they focus on disciplinary practicesin response to the child’s misbehavior. ThePDI-S is a shortened version, which retainsthe most valid and reliable components ofthe original PDI. The PDI-S can be used withparents of children between 3 and 12 yearsold, and was developed from the PDI (Slater& Power, 1987).Given the importance of having anadequate instrument to assess parental stylefrom the parents’ perspective, the objective ofthis study is to adapt the Inventory of ParentalDimensions in its short version (Power, 2002)to the Argentine population.The 13 items included in the evaluationof the General Dimension, were translated,which includes the dimensions: Support /care, Inconsistency and Follow-up throughdiscipline / control). The translated Inventorywas administered to an intentional sampleof 771 adults, 535 women and 236 men,between 26 and 63 years of age (Me = 38.56SD = 4.76), middle class (Stratum II of theGraffar / Méndez Castellanos Scale), of thenon-clinical population, and parents of childrenwho attended pre-school in 12 privateschools in different provinces of Argentina(Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Mendoza, SantaFe and Tucumán). The Confirmatory FactorAnalysis showed that the three-dimensionaltheoretical model, proposed by the authorsof the original test, satisfactorily adjusted tothe data, indicating an adequate consistencyof the test structure. In addition, reliabilitywas analyzed as internal consistency evaluatedthrough McDonald’s omega, obtainingthe following values: Support / care =.74;Follow-up through discipline / control =.70and Inconsistency =.74. Finally, given thatthe Inventory has been studied with an extensivesample, drawn from several Argentineprovinces, the results obtained are generalizableto almost the entire country