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Parent–Child Interaction as a Power Contest
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Parent–Child Interaction as a Power Contest Daphne Blunt Bugental and Keith Happaney University of California, Santa Barbara
We explored parental use of child derogation as a means of power assertion. Parents interacted with children (own and unrelated) after a judgment task in which competitive ideation was primed or unprimed. Evaluations included (a) face-to-face verbal derogation versus praise and (b) judgments of children’s task performance. When primed, fathers with low perceived power (as measured by the Parent Attribution Test) were more likely than other fathers to derogate the performance of both related and unrelated children. Similar trends were found for mothers. Results were interpreted as suggesting that parents with low perceived power use child derogation as a means of attempted power repair.
We ordinarily think of parent–child interaction as a setting that affords the opportunity for socialization and protection of dependent children from harm. Under the best of circumstances, parents use their superior power within such relationships to serve adaptive, caregiving goals (Dix, 1992). When they assert their authority or power, it serves the shared long-term interests of both parents and children. Under other circumstances, however, parental use of power may be thought of as acting in the service of their own goals (Dix, 1992; Hastings & Grusec, 1998). In this case, the interaction between parents and children may be reframed as a power contest (e.g., Kuczysnski & Kochanska, 1990). The relationship is then perceived as a competitive zero-sum game in which there are “winners” and “losers.” In some cases, such contests escalate to include the use of physically abusive or punitive tactics. In other cases, contests may involve derogatory communication patterns. In this study, we are concerned with the kinds of parents and the kinds of settings that foster parental use of social derogation tactics—tactics that have implications for psychological maltreatment (McGee & Wolfe, 1991). Schematic Organization of Social Relationships Across disciplines, there has been an increasing interest in social cognitions as organizers of emotions, motives, and behavioral routines within close relationships. Direct all correspondence to: Daphne Blunt Bugental, Department of Psychology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9660 ⬍[email protected]⬎. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 21(3): 267–282 Copyright 2000 Elsevier Science Inc. ISSN: 0193-3973 All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. 267
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Within the developmental literature, such constructs have typically been framed as “working models” of relationships, developed in initial attachment relationships with parents (Bowlby, 1980). Such working models are thought to influence interpersonal expectations, as well as behavioral and affective reactions to subsequent relationships. In the social cognition literature, there has been increasing interest in the notion of “relationship schemas” (e.g., Baldwin, 1992). Such schemas represent knowledge structures that are acquired as a function of repeated experiences within relationships (Higgins & King, 1981). Subsequently, such knowledge structures are accessed as a guide to future relationships and may be activated automatically without the need for conscious awareness or cognitive effort (Bargh & Tota, 1988). Although early views of social schemas focused on the cognitive components of social schemas, there has been an emergent awareness of the extent to which such social schemas also include affective components (e.g., Fiske & Pavelchak, 1986). More broadly, schemas may be thought of in terms of their motivational as well as their cognitive components. For example, Bargh, Chen, and Burrows (1996) demonstrated that the priming of specific social schemas not only serves to activate relevant ideation, it also activates schema-consistent motives and behavioral routines. In this paper, we are particularly concerned with the activation of motives and behavioral routines that are consistent with power-based caregiving schemas.
Power-Based Schemas In studying the role of cognitions in family relationships, we have focused attention on those caregivers who see themselves as “power disadvantaged” within their relationship with children (Bugental, Blue, & Cruzcosa, 1989). Such parents perceive themselves as relatively powerless despite the obvious fact that they actually do have greater control and authority than their children. Although it is certainly true that influence processes run in two directions between parents and children, parents ultimately have greater control over resources and greater fate control than children. Thus a perceived reversal of power represents an anomaly that is particularly revealing of interpretive distortions. As an anecdotal example, there are physically powerful parents who describe themselves as victims of their young children. We are concerned here with the paradox of those parents who attribute exceptional power to children and who easily engage in “defensive” activity within their family interactions. On a long-term basis, parents with low perceived power are more likely than other parents to be abusive or coercive (e.g., Bugental et al., 1989). Within shortterm interactions, they are highly reactive (emotionally, autonomically, cognitively, and behaviorally) to the possibility of lost control; for example, they are exceptionally reactive to children who may be interpreted as challenging them or to situations that may constrain their authority (e.g., Bugental et al., 1993; Bugental, Blue & Lewis, 1990; Bugental & Shennum, 1984). In short, we have observed that negative or defensive parental reactions occur as an interactive function of the power perceptions of adults and the eliciting characteristics of caregiving settings.
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Social Repair Attempts by the Powerless Consistent with interest in the motivational properties of schemas, we ask here whether the activation of a low power schema also activates “power repair” routines. For example, do those who lack perceived power make use of communication strategies that carry the possibility of (at least temporarily) repairing or bolstering their fragile sense of power or authority? Support for the expectation of reparative activity comes from the literature on interpersonal power. That is, those who see themselves as lacking power or control are particularly likely to engage in heavyhanded power-assertive control tactics (Kipnis, 1976; Raven & Kruglanski, 1970). In addition, such individuals are more easily triggered to think in terms of threat or the need for defense. For example, Fiske and her colleagues (e.g., Fiske, Morling, & Stevens, 1996) have directed attention to the hypervigilance of those who perceive themselves as powerless in their social relationships. In our past research, we have made use of a variety of experimental settings that have involved interactions between parents and unrelated children—an approach that allows causal inferences to be drawn about the direction of effects. We focus here on the reactions of high- versus low-power parents to their own children as well as to unrelated children. Predictions: Power Repair through Derogation of Others In this study we ask how parents with high versus low perceived power respond when thoughts of competition are made salient for them. Parents with a low sense of their own power, when primed to think in terms of competition with their children, were expected to make greater use of derogation tactics than were other parents. McGee and Wolfe (1991) proposed that such tactics represent a subtype of psychological maltreatment. Specifically, they defined this subtype as involving “actions that deprecate the child, including verbal derogation (e.g., insulting, publicly humiliating)” (p. 7). As a priming manipulation, we placed parents in a situation in which they were either asked to compare themselves with their children, or else they were asked to complete a nonsocial comparison task. Social comparison activity of the type used here creates a situation of uncertainty; that is, it activates issues of personal and interpersonal importance without generating answers. As suggested by social cognition theory (e.g., Hastie, 1984; Wong & Weiner, 1981), ambiguous events foster attributional search (Bugental, 1992; Bugental, Lyon, Krantz, & Cortez, 1997). As a result of the differential ideation accessed, parents with high versus low perceived power can be expected to differ in their response style. In past research, we have observed that low-power parents respond with increased use of punitive force (Bugental, Johnston, New, & Silvester, 1998). We extend these findings by exploring the possibility that low-power parents also respond with tactics directed to devaluing or derogating children. To the extent that biased power perceptions represent generalized schemas, lowpower parents would be expected to derogate both their own and unrelated children. Alternatively, if power perceptions represent child-specific schemas, low-power parents would be expected to derogate their own child but not an unrelated child.
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METHOD Sample and Design Parents (N ⫽ 184)1 of school-aged children were recruited from the community to participate in this study. Ads were placed on bulletin boards in public locations (e.g., laundromats, grocery stores); interested parents responded by returning a post card. In a subsequent phone interview, further information was obtained to ascertain the appropriateness of the families (e.g., whether the family included a child in the age group to be studied). Families invited were limited to those in which there were either two parents or one parent and an opposite-sex individual who lived in the home as a parent surrogate. They were asked to bring one of their children. In cases where families included two or more school-aged children, we specified which one we would like them to bring (random selection within age and gender groupings). Parents were also asked to bring along a same-sex, same-age friend of the child. The parent sample included 100 mothers and 84 fathers. Eightysix percent of parents were White, 3% were Asian American, 6% were Latino, 3% were African American, and 1% were Native American. The average education of parents was 15.70 years (SD ⫽ 2.16). Children (100 friend pairs)2 ranged in age from 6 to 10 years. They were approximately evenly divided by gender (45 boy pairs and 55 girl pairs). Their mean age was 8.07 years (SD ⫽ 1.43). Children were divided into an older age grouping (8.5 to 10 years) and a younger age grouping (6 to 8.5 years). The older age grouping included 22 pairs of boys and 27 pairs of girls. The younger age grouping included 24 pairs of boys and 27 pairs of girls. Parents with high versus low perceived power (as measured by the Parent Attribution Test) were randomly assigned to either a priming (priming for thoughts of social comparison) or a no priming condition.3 Measures Parent Attribution Test. In advance of their visit to the lab, parents completed the Parent Attribution Test (PAT; Bugental et al., 1989). The PAT assesses the perceived balance of power or control between parents and children. That is, it is concerned with parents’ subjective causal analysis of caregiving outcomes. This selfreport measure asks parents to rate the importance of potential causes of caregiving outcomes. Questions are framed within a hypothetical interaction (baby-sitting), allowing the instrument to be used with nonparents as well as parents. Items included on the PAT were originally provided by parents (as potential causes of caregiving success or failure) and were grouped into scales on the basis of parental judgments of item similarity. Scales revealed by the initial multidimensional scaling analysis (and confirmed with later factor analyses) included adult control over failure (ACF), child control over failure (CCF), adult control over success, and child control over success. Only the failure scales have been found to predict caregiver responses during demanding or difficult interactions; correspondingly, only the failure scales are used in this study. Examples of items reflecting high attributed control to children involves “child stubbornness” (i.e., an interaction going badly because the child was stubborn and resisted the adults’ efforts) and “child’s lack of effort” (i.e.,
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an interaction going badly because the child made no effort to take an interest in adult’s initiations). Examples of items reflecting high attributed control to parents include “low parental motivation” (i.e., an interaction going badly because of parents’ disinterest) and “parenting strategy” (i.e., an interaction going badly because the parent used the wrong approach). Across samples, the two failure scales (ACF and CCF) have been found to be orthogonal. In this sample, the two scales continued to be uncorrelated (mothers: r ⫽ ⫺.06; fathers, r ⫽ .14). The median ACF score is 4.08 for fathers and 4.00 for mothers. The median CCF score is 3.83 for both mothers and fathers. Test–retest stability (over a 2-month period) for categorizing parents as high versus low ACF is 80%; the stability for categorizing parents as high versus low CCF is 80%. Adults are interpreted as having a low perceived balance of power if they attribute low control to parents (ACF below the median) and high control to children (CCF above the median). In a series of previous studies conducted both in our own lab and the labs of others, parents with a low perceived balance of power have been found to differ in systematic ways from parents who attribute equivalent power to self and children or greater power to self than children (Bugental et al., 1998). As noted earlier, low power scores on the PAT have been found to predict child abuse (e.g., Bradley & Peters, 1991; Bugental et al., 1989), negative parental reactivity to ambiguous or mildly unresponsive child behavior (e.g., Bugental et al., 1990; Bugental et al., 1993), and increasing use of assertive control in response to child fearfulness (Mills, 1998). Parent Attribution Test scores have also been found to be associated with attachment styles as measured by the Adult Attachment Interview (Grusec & Mammone, 1995). The attributional patterns measured by the PAT typically serve as moderators within caregiving relationships. That is, parents with a low perceived balance of power show maladaptive responses if the situation or child pose a potential source of threat or challenge. The PAT has been found to be relatively immune to the effects of self-presentation bias (Bugental et al., 1998). For this reason, responses on this instrument do not appear to be subject to self-management efforts in the service of presenting oneself in a socially desirable fashion. Parent Attribution Test scores have also consistently been found to be unrelated to parental education (used as a marker of socioeconomic status). Finally, PAT scores have been found to be independent of self-reported affect (Lovejoy, Verda, & Hays, 1997) or of general evaluative ratings given to self versus others (Bugental et al., 1997). That is, low perceptions of power do not reflect a general pattern of negative affectivity. Procedure Priming. When parents visited the lab, they were initially asked to complete a rating task in which they responded to adjectives displayed on a computer screen. Those in the priming condition were asked to make comparative judgments of self versus child on a set of 60 evaluative adjectives. For example, parents were asked to judge whether they themselves or one of their children (the child who came with them) were “sadder,” “bossier,” “nicer,” “friendlier,” and so forth. As noted earlier, social comparison manipulations (in the absence of confirming or disconfirming
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feedback) have been found to induce negative affect and a motivation to establish ascendance in future relationships with targets of comparison (e.g., Ingram & Smith, 1988; Weary, Elbin, & Hill, 1987; Wood, Saltzberg, Neale, Stone, & Rachmiel, 1990). Those parents in the no priming condition were asked simply to make structural judgments about the same set of adjectives, for example, “Does this word contain the letter ‘J’?” Interpersonal Interaction. Subsequently, parents were asked to interact (individually) with their own child and with their child’s friend for 5 minutes (separate interactions with child and friend). Children were asked to let their parents know what they had been doing together with their friend (both children had been in an adjoining room engaged in a drawing task and a maze task). Order of interaction was counterbalanced for gender of parent and relatedness of child. Parents were asked simply to engage the child in conversation for 5 minutes. We set out children’s drawings as a potential prompt for conversation. All interactions were videotaped from an adjoining room (parents and children were aware they would be taped at some point during the interaction). Judgment Task. During the period when parents were involved in the priming tasks, children were in an adjoining room completing drawings (of self and parents) and a paper and pencil maze task. After interacting with children, parents were shown the mazes and drawings made by their own child and the unrelated child and were asked to rate them for quality. Debriefing. At the close of the experiment, parents were debriefed regarding the purpose of the study, given financial compensation ($25 each), and asked to sign consent forms for future use of videotaped interactions (initial consents for videotaped participation were signed at the outset of the study). Coding of Parents’ Evaluative Responses to Children Two types of measures were obtained as indicators of parental evaluations of children. One type of measure (verbal evaluation) took place in direct interpersonal response to children. The second type of measure (performance evaluation) took place in the absence of children. Correlations between all measures are shown in Table 1. Verbal Evaluation. Verbalizations directed to children (during the 5-minute interaction period) were coded on two dimensions: negative evaluation of child and positive regard for child4 (coded by a trained judge on a 5-point scale from 0 to 4, where 4 is “definitely true” and 0 is “definitely not true”). Positive regard included any verbal content that explicitly or implicitly provided a positive evaluation of the child. Negative evaluation was operationally defined to include any verbal content that explicitly or implicitly provided a negative evaluation of the child. Ratings made were of two types. The first type involved summary ratings made of entire interactions. The second type involved ratings of opening interactions (the first two messages given by parents). Reliability of scales was assessed by determining the interjudge correlation
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Table 1. Correlation Between Dependent Variables Verbal Derogation Father (child) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Father (friend) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Mother (child) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Mother (friend) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation
Verbal Regard
Drawing Evaluation
Maze Evaluation
—
⫺.23* —
⫺.20 ⫺.03 —
⫺.05 ⫺.03 .04 —
—
⫺.05 —
⫺.05 ⫺.08 —
.06 .02 .02 —
—
⫺.32** —
⫺.09 .20 —
⫺.20* .15 .21* —
—
⫺.25**
⫺.15 .36** —
.00 .14 .13 —
Note: * p ⬍ .05; ** p ⬍ .01.
between two trained graduate students (on a sample of 40 parent–child interactions). Both raters were blind with respect to experimental condition and perceived power of parents. Assessment of interrater reliability in judging evaluative activity directed to children yielded an acceptable r value of .75 for negative evaluations and an r value of .72 for positive evaluations. Performance Evaluation. Parents’ ratings of children’s performance was used as a second measure of their evaluative activity. Parents rated the mazes and drawings completed by each child on 7-point scales (from “very good” to “not good”). Ratings were made when the parent was alone in a room. Ratings of children’s drawings and ratings of children’s maze performances constituted two potential exemplars of evaluative bias. Coding of Affective Responses to Priming Manipulation (Manipulation Check) The priming induction can be expected to generate a negative mood state, a state commonly observed to be associated with the unresolved self-focus that follows such activity (e.g., Ingram & Smith, 1988; Weary et al., 1987). We anticipated that parents primed for competitive ideation would show a shared tendency to experience increases in negative affect. Measures were taken of parents’ changing voice quality as an indication of their affective response to the priming manipulation. In our previous research, we observed that vocal prosody (in particular, voice pleasantness)
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is well-related to other indicators of affect, for example, self-reported affective reactions to children (e.g., Bugental et al., 1990). The measure also has the advantage of nonreactivity. Parents provided speech samples at three points in the study: when they first came to the lab (distal baseline), immediately preceding the experimental induction (proximal baseline), and immediately after the induction. They were asked on each occasion to repeat the uniform phrase, “Okay, over, and out” (a phrase that provides a series of long vowels—sounds that are particularly useful for judging prosodic features of speech). These samples were then judged on two 7-point scales (anchored by “pleasant” and “unpleasant,” and by “strong” and “weak”). The interrater reliability (r) for judgments of the two variables (on a sample of 84 messages) was .59 for voice pleasantness and .63 for voice strength. Child Responsiveness Children’s responsiveness to adults was assessed by the length of their responses to parents’ initial comments during 5-minute interaction periods. RESULTS Overview It was predicted that parents with a low perceived balance of power (in comparison with higher power parents) would show relatively high verbal derogation and relatively low performance evaluation after being primed for social comparison ideation (a potential threat or challenge). Evaluative activity was assessed in response to own children and children’s friends. The highest level of derogation was predicted for low-power parents immediately after the priming manipulation. A follow-up analysis was conducted to determine children’s responsiveness to parents’ derogatory style. Results were analyzed separately for mothers and fathers. Manipulation Check Postinduction changes in vocal power and vocal pleasantness were assessed as a check on the impact of the priming manipulation. These two variables were analyzed separately in analyses of covariance that included priming as a grouping variable and baseline vocal variables as covariates. Separate analyses were conducted for mothers and fathers. No significant effects were found for either sex for vocal power. However, the priming manipulation was found to produce a consistent effect on vocal pleasantness. For fathers, vocal pleasantness declined more after the priming induction (M ⫽ ⫺.65 on a 7-point scale from ⫹3 to ⫺3) than after the control condition (M ⫽ ⫺.26; F(1, 67) ⫽ 4.31, p ⫽ .042). For mothers, a similar trend was observed; that is, their vocal pleasantness declined more after the priming induction (M ⫽ ⫺.55) than after the control condition (M ⫽ ⫺.15; F(1, 81) ⫽ 3.20, p ⫽ .078). Follow-up analyses that included perceived parental power, child gender, or child age as grouping variables failed to reveal any significant interactions (or trends) between priming and grouping variables. The priming manipulation may then be interpreted as a social comparison-based mood induction.
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Table 2. Overall Evaluative Responses to Children as a Function of Perceived Power and Priming
Priming Yes Yes No No
Fathers
Mothers
Perceived Power
M
(SD)
M
(SD)
High Low High Low
⫺.09a .25a .19 .01
(.42) (.41) (.51) (.58)
⫺.20b .17b ⫺.09 .00
(.51) (.61) (.59) (.35)
Note: All scores are z-scores (high scores reflect positive evaluations). Means followed by common subscripts (within the same column) are significantly different at better than the .05 level of confidence.
Parental Evaluative Activity as a Function of Priming Initial omnibus analyses were conducted to test overall differences in parents’ evaluative responses (transformed to z scores) as a function of priming and power attributions. Primary analyses (conducted separately for mothers and fathers) involved 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 mixed-design analyses of variance that included three grouping variables (priming and the two power variables, i.e., ACF and CCF) and two repeated measures (child relatedness and type of evaluative measure). Evaluative measures included verbal derogation (reverse scored), verbal regard, (positive) evaluation of children’s drawings, and (positive) evaluations of children’s mazes. The predicted interaction between priming and the two power attributions reached significance for fathers (F(1, 71) ⫽ 4.84, p ⫽ .031). In addition, an unpredicted five-way interaction was found between all variables; F(3, 71) ⫽ 3.00, p ⫽ .032. No significant effects were found for mothers. However, the main effect of perceived power approached significance; F(1, 89) ⫽ 3.59, p ⫽ .061. A follow-up analysis was conducted for fathers that provided a test of the predicted pattern of effects for ACF and CCF, that is, the differential reactivity to priming of parents who had a relatively high versus low perceived balance of power. The analysis included two grouping variables (priming and high versus low perceived balance of power) and two repeated measures (child relatedness and evaluative measure). The only effect that reached significance was the predicted interaction between priming and balance of power; F(1, 77) ⫽ 4.59, p ⫽ .035. Means are shown in Table 2. Although the interaction between priming and perceived power did not reach significance for mothers, the same pattern of differential reactivity to priming (as a function of perceived power) was shown for mothers as for fathers. Verbal Evaluation over Valence and Time Follow-up analyses were conducted for the two verbal measures as a function of valence and time (no equivalent time relationships were possible for performance evaluation because these evaluations were made after both interactions5). Analyses made use of mixed-design 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 analyses of variance that included two
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grouping variables (priming and perceived power) and two repeated measures (positive versus negative valence and time). This allowed a comparison of the strength of effects for derogation versus regard and for the differential responses to the first child seen after priming versus the second child seen after priming. For fathers, a significant interaction was found between priming, perceived power, valence of verbal evaluation, and time; F(1, 77) ⫽ 4.82, p ⫽ .031 (as well as for the previously observed interaction between priming and perceived power, F(1, 77) ⫽ 5.26, p ⫽ .025). Means are shown in Table 3. As predicted, fathers with low perceived power—immediately after priming—showed elevated levels of child derogation; no equivalent effect was found for the second interaction. No significant effects were found for verbal regard. An equivalent analysis conducted for mothers did not yield any significant effects. Verbalizations coded as derogatory typically included teasing or defensive or critical questioning of the child, for example: “How come mom’s face is bigger than mine?” (in the drawing) “How come you’re as big as your mom?” (in the drawing) “Do I have to keep these?” (referring to child’s drawings) “Why are you talking like a baby?” “Is that ink all over you?” “Do you think I have a big belly?” (referring to drawing) Questions were of a type that did not easily allow the child to provide an answer. Children’s Responsiveness to Parental Style A follow-up analysis was conducted to determine the extent of children’s responsiveness to parents’ derogatory style or nonderogatory style (as assessed by the duration of their responses to parental messages). Because the highest level of derogation was found during initial interactions after priming, the analysis focused on children’s responses to parents’ opening comments after priming. Parents were divided into those who demonstrated any instance of derogation in their opening comments versus those who did not. One-way analyses of variance (conducted separately for fathers versus mothers) were conducted in which presence or absence of derogation was the grouping variable and children’s response length was the dependent variable. A significant effect was found for fathers; F(1, 71) ⫽ 4.66, p ⫽ .034. Children’s mean response duration was 6.93 seconds in response to derogatory fathers and 16.78 seconds in response to nonderogatory fathers. Effects were not significant for mothers (F ⬍ 1). DISCUSSION Parents were found to show systematic variations in their evaluations of children as an interactive function of their own perceived power and priming for social competition. Parents with low perceived power were more reactive to the “threat”
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Table 3. Father’s Use of Verbal Evaluation Over Time Verbal Derogation Priming
Perceived Power
Yes
High
Yes
Low
No
High
No
Low
M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD)
Verbal Regard
First Dyad
Second Dyad
First Dyad
Second Dyad
⫺.25a (.61) .73abc (1.38) .00b (1.02) ⫺.34c (.82)
⫺.12 (.98) .21 (.99) .39 (1.36) .23 (1.29)
.01 (1.04) .48 (.78) ⫺.39 (1.09) ⫺.23 (1.29)
.19 (.94) ⫺.43 (1.08) ⫺.31 (1.11) .35 (1.22)
Note: All scores are z-scores. Means followed by common subscripts (within the same column) are significantly different at better than the .05 level of confidence.
implications of competitive ideation than were other parents. That is, low-power parents engaged in more verbal derogation of children than did high-power parents after being primed to think in terms of competition or comparison with their children. They showed no such reactions when not primed. This pattern was more pronounced for fathers than for mothers. Children, in turn, gave briefer responses to fathers with a derogatory than to those with a nonderogatory conversational style. The observational setting studied here may be thought of as an analog of parenting interactions under conditions of social stress or threat. The parent who experiences challenges to their power or competence in other settings (e.g., in workbased relationships or spousal relationships) may be thought of as “primed” for thoughts of competition or defense. The stronger effects found here for fathers (as opposed to mothers) may reflect the more pervasive involvement of males in powerbased or competitive relationships. Beginning in middle childhood (Maccoby, 1988), males are socialized into a more competitive style of verbal interaction. Although verbal derogation gambits may be normative in peer settings, they carry more negative implications in parental interactions with children. Even when framed as teasing or kidding, such messages are likely to be interpreted—in particular by young children—as affectively negative (e.g., Bugental, Kaswan, & Love, 1970; Rotenberg, Simourd, & Moore, 1989). The priming effects introduced here only produced significant effects on parents’ responses during interactions that immediately followed the priming induction. As a constraint, the short-term effects may be thought of as limiting the generalization to longer interactions. At the same time, the fact that vulnerable parents only showed derogation immediately after being primed carries inferential benefits. That is, priming for thoughts of competition appeared directly to activate power repair routines. In the absence of priming, parents with low perceived power did not differ from other parents. In short, parents’ representations of themselves as powerless within the caregiving relationship serves as a risk factor. Their derogatory style is
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only activated when they interpret ongoing or recent events as posing a potential challenge. Their subsequent style of interaction may then be thought of as a “preemptive strike.” Indeed, their most negative comments were often their opening statements to children. The combined pattern of child derogation (found here) and physical use of force (found in our past research, Bugental et al., 1989, 1998) is consistent with findings in the social power literature. That is, those who most question their own power are most likely to make use of negative control tactics (Kipnis, 1976; Raven & Kruglanski, 1970). Although supportive evidence will be needed in further research, it suggests differences in coping strategies between parents with different patterns of perceived power. As a qualifier, it should be noted that parents with low perceived power may, under other circumstances, retreat or withdraw from interaction if the situation allows them little opportunity for control. In past research, we have shown that such parents tend to show polarized responses: exaggerated assertion when the setting allows control and appeasement or lack of assertion when the setting limits control (Bugental & Lewis, 1998). In its extreme form, parental derogation overlaps the notion of emotional or verbal abuse. As we know from past research, those parents who are most likely to abuse their children physically are also more likely to abuse them emotionally as well (e.g., Ney, Fung, & Wickett, 1994). The coincidence of types of abuse has also been found in abuse of wives by husbands (Holtzworth-Munroe & Stuart, 1994). In both cases, perpetrators regularly characterize themselves as victims of a physically less powerful other. Such individuals easily reframe their interactions with others as a combat situation in which they need to defend themselves against a powerful opponent. In their minds, their actions are justified by the presumed threat of others. Although the kinds of verbal derogation observed here cannot be viewed as truly abusive, they contain some of the same features that are included in psychological maltreatment. Psychological maltreatment has been defined to include verbal hostility toward, rejection of, and degradation of the child (Brassard, Hart & Hardy, 1993; McGee & Wolfe, 1991), as well as even more extreme behavior (e.g., terrorization, exploitation). The kinds of messages observed here reflect a kind of communication that effectively precludes a response on the part of the child. For example, if a father asks the child why she drew him as fat, it is a no-win situation. It is difficult for children to know how to respond to such messages. Indeed, their replies to such messages were much briefer than their replies to nonderogatory messages. Such interactions may be thought of as inducing embarrassment—in particular, in view of the public nature of the interaction (parents and children knew they would be videotaped). Consistent with more extreme forms of verbal derogation or abuse, such interactions may over time increase the likelihood that children will experience shame in interaction with parents (e.g., Hoglund & Nicholas, 1995). They also increase the likelihood that children will engage in similar kinds of interactions with others. For example, we have observed that children with low perceived power are more likely to engage in verbally aggressive or competitive interactions with their friends than are other children (Bugental & Martorell, 1999).
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Limitations and Need for Future Research We have suggested here that the observed responses shown by low-power parents reflected their reactions to a priming manipulation (priming for thoughts of competition or comparison with their children). Because parents only showed more negative affect (but not reduced power) in response to this induction, it is valid to question the implications of our findings. That is, it could be argued that the derogation responses shown by low-power parents reflected their reactions to a negative mood induction. Thus their reactions may have simply reflected their reactions to their own negative affect (e.g., Dix, 1992). This interpretation would suggest that low-power parents respond with distinctive mood repair strategies. It will be useful in future research to determine whether low-power parents show increases in child derogation in response to lost power or to negative affect. Findings obtained here were also limited by the weaker mood effects found for mothers than for fathers. In future research, it will be important to compare parental responses with children after more powerful inductions of competitive ideation. No specific evidence was provided here to support the presence of “effective” repair processes. The only evidence provided for the consequences of parents’ derogatory style was a reduction in children’s duration of response. In other research, we demonstrated that children show attentional disengagement in response to the inconsistent communication style of low-power mothers (Bugental, Lyon, Lin, McGrath, & Bimbela, 1999). It may be that the short-term “benefit” of parents’ derogatory or inconsistent communication styles involves child withdrawal. That is, it signals a temporary power advantage (e.g., Mills, 1998). Over time, however, child unresponsiveness or withdrawal may pose a problem for parents as well as a potential source of emotional damage to the child (Aber & Zigler, 1981). Rival hypotheses were tested with respect to the differential effects of priming and perceived power on the responses shown to related versus unrelated children. That is, the responses shown by low-power parents may be conceptualized as reflecting either their own personal history or their history with a particular child. The fact that fathers with low perceived power demonstrated similar responses to both their own children and their children’s friends suggests a generalized rather than a child-specific response. It is likely that their derogatory style reflected a generalized response to perceived social challenge (from someone in a position of lesser power) rather than a response to a particular child. If these findings are supported in future research, the observed interaction pattern may be thought of as emerging from parents’ own personal history. Another limitation of the study was that the sample used was nonoptimal in terms of risk for child maltreatment. That is, the parents studied were predominantly from middle-class backgrounds and were interested in participating in a study about parenting. In ongoing research (e.g., Rainey & Bugental, 1999), we are studying the same processes in families at very high risk for child maltreatment (predominantly immigrant, low education, low income, isolated families identified by local public health agencies as at risk for child maltreatment). At the same time, we would argue that our knowledge about the risk factors for emotional abuse is not yet welldefined; thus it is premature to rule out “advantaged” families as engaging in this form of child maltreatment.
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CONCLUSIONS Parents with low perceived power, in contrast with other parents, demonstrated evaluative activity that may be thought of as serving a power-defensive function. In response to potential threat, they showed an increase in child derogation. The power repair processes that low-power parents easily put into play may be thought of as acting in a self-fulfilling fashion. That is, their control tactics may produce short-term benefits (e.g., gaining a verbal advantage in interactions with children). However, these tactics are ultimately likely to be unsuccessful and may indeed lead to decreased levels of long-term responsiveness or compliance on the part of children (Bugental et al., 1990, 1999). As a result, parents ultimately receive confirmation of their view of themselves as having less power or control than their children—thus perpetuating their biased perceptions. Acknowledgments: This research was jointly supported by National Science Foundation grant BNS-9021221 and National Institute of Mental Health grant R0119095. We would like to express our appreciation to Gabriela Martorell and Shelly Semingson who provided extensive help in both data collection and data coding. NOTES 1. Two parents scheduled to participate did not. Sixteen fathers (or men in a surrogate role) became unavailable to participate in the study after initial recruitment. In addition, observations were incomplete on some parents because of videotape problems. 2. The discrepancy between number of child pairs and number of parent groupings is accounted for by the presence of families in which one of the parents was not able to participate; that is, there were two children but only one parent. 3. The initial responses of parents to the priming task (e.g., response latencies) is reported elsewhere (Bugental et al., 1997). 4. Other categories were also judged that were not relevant to this study. They included selfevaluations, evaluations of other people (not present), and evaluations of the experimental situation. 5. A follow-up analysis was conducted with performance evaluations to determine whether ratings were influenced by order of parents’ ratings of children. Analyses made use of mixed-design 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 analyses of variance that included two grouping variables (priming and perceived power) and one repeated measure (order). The only significant effects obtained were between priming, variable (evaluations of mazes versus drawings), and order; fathers: F(1, 77) ⫽ 5.97, p ⫽ .017; mothers: F(1, 93) ⫽ 4.40, p ⫽ .039. Different patterns were found for mothers and fathers; in addition, none of the differences observed between means reached statistical significance. Therefore, no interpretation was made of these effects.
REFERENCES Aber, J. L., & Zigler, E. (1981). Developmental considerations in the definition of child maltreatment. In R. Rizley & D. Cicchetti (Eds.), Developmental perspectives on child maltreatment (pp. 1–29). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Baldwin, M. W. (1992). Relational schemas and the processing of social information. Psychological Bulletin, 112, 461–484. Bargh, J. A., Chen, M., & Burrows, L. (1996). Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of trait construct and stereotype activation on action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 230–244.
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Bargh, J. A., & Tota, M. E. (1988). Context-dependent automatic processing in depression: Accessibility of negative constructs with regard to self but not others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 925–939. Bowlby, J. (1980). Attachment and loss: Vol. III. Loss. New York: Basic Books. Bradley, E. J., & Peters, R. D. (1991). Physically abusive and nonabusive mothers’ perceptions of parenting and child behavior. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 61, 455–460. Brassard, M. R., Hart, S. N., & Hardy, D. B. (1993). The Psychological Maltreatment Rating scales, Child Abuse and Neglect, 17, 715–729. Bugental, D. B. (1992). Affective and cognitive processes within threat-oriented family systems. In I. E. Sigel, A. McGillicuddy-DeLisi, & J. Goodnow (Eds.), Parental belief systems: The psychological consequences for children (pp. 219–248). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Bugental, D. B., Blue, J., Cortez, V., Fleck, K., Kopeikin, H., Lewis, J., & Lyon, J. (1993). Social cognitions as organizers of autonomic and affective responses to social challenge. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 94–103. Bugental, D. B., Blue, J. B., & Cruzcosa, M. (1989) Perceived control over caregiving outcomes: Implications for child abuse. Developmental Psychology, 25, 532–539. Bugental, D. B., Blue, J. & Lewis, J. (1990). Caregiver cognitions as moderators of affective reactions to “difficult” children. Developmental Psychology, 26, 631–638. Bugental, D. B., Johnston, C., New, M., & Silvester, J. (1998). Measuring parental attributions: Conceptual and methodological issues. Journal of Family Psychology, 12, 459–480. Bugental, D. E., Kaswan, J. W., & Love, L. R. (1970). Perceptions of contradictory messages conveyed by verbal and nonverbal channels. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 16, 647–655. Bugental, D. B., & Lewis, J. (1998). Interpersonal power repair in response to threats to control from dependent others. In M. Kofta, G. Weary, & G. Sedek (Eds.), Personal control in action: Cognitive and motivational mechanisms (pp. 341–362). New York: Plenum Press. Bugental, D. B., Lyon, J., Krantz, J., & Cortez, V. (1997). Who’s the boss? Differential accessibility of dominance ideation in parent-child relationships. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 1297–1309. Bugental, D. B., Lyon, J. E., Lin, E., McGrath, E. G., & Bimbela, A. (1999). Children “tune out” in response to the ambiguous communication style of powerless adults. Child Development, 70, 214–230. Bugental, D. B., & Martorell, G. (1999). Competition between friends: The joint influence of self, friends, and parents. Journal of Family Psychology, 13, 260–273. Bugental, D. B., & Shennum, W. A. (1984). “Difficult” children as elicitors and targets of adult communication patterns: An attributional-behavioral transactional analysis. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 49 (1, Serial No. 205). Dix, T. (1992). Parenting on behalf of the child: Empathic goals in the regulation of responsive parenting. In I. E. Sigel, A. V. McGillicuddy-DeLisi, & J. J. Goodnow (Eds.), Parental belief systems: The psychological consequences for children (2nd ed., pp. 319–346). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Fiske, S. T., Morling, B., & Stevens, L. E. (1996). Controlling self and others: A theory of anxiety, mental control, and social control. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 115–123. Fiske, S. T., & Pavelchak, M. A. (1986). Category-based versus piecemeal-based affective responses: developments in schema-triggered affect. In R. M. Sorrentino, & E. T. Higgins (Eds.), Motivation and cognition (pp. 167–203). NY: Guilford. Grusec, J. E., & Mammone, N. (1995). Features and sources of parents’ attributions about themselves and their children. In N. Eisenberg (Ed.), Review of personality and social psychology (Vol. 15, pp. 49–73). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Hastie, R. (1984). Causes and effects of causal attribution. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46, 44–56. Hastings, P. D., & Grusec, J. E. (1998) Parenting goals as organizers of responses to parent-child disagreement. Developmental Psychology, 34, 465–479. Higgins, E. T., & King, G. A. (1981). Accessibility of social constructs: Information-processing consequences of individual and contextual variability. In N. Cantor & J. F. Kihlstrom (Eds.), Personality, cognition, and social interaction (pp. 69–121). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
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Hogland, C. L., & Nicholas, K. B. (1995). Shame, guilt, and anger in college students exposed to abusive family backgrounds. Journal of Family Violence, 10, 141–157. Holtzworth-Munroe, A., & Stuart, G. L. (1994). Typologies of male batterers and the differences among them. Psychological Bulletin, 116, 487–497. Ingram, R. E., & Smith, T. W. (1988). Depression and internal versus external focus of attention. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 8, 139–152. Kipnis, D. (1976). The powerholders. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Kuczynski, L., & Kochanska, G. (1990). Development of children’s noncompliance strategies from toddlerhood to age 5. Developmental Psychology, 26, 398–408. Lovejoy, M. C., Verda, M. R., & Hays, C. R. (1997). Convergent and discriminant validity of measures of parenting efficacy and control. Journal of Clinical Child Psychology, 26, 366–376. Maccoby, E. E. (1988). Gender as a social category. Developmental Psychology, 24, 755–765. McGee, R. A., & Wolfe, D. A. (1991). Psychological maltreatment: Toward an operational definition. Development and Psychopathology, 3 (Special Issue: Defining psychological maltreatment), 3–18. Mills, R. S. (1998). Paradoxical relations between perceived power and maternal control. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 44, 523–537. Ney, P. G., Fung, T., & Wickett, A. R. (1994). The worst combinations of child abuse and neglect. Child Abuse and Neglect, 18, 705–714. Rainey, B. L., & Bugental, D. B. (1999, April). Reduced maternal depression as a mediator of the benefits of home visitation. Paper presented at the meetings of the Western Psychological Association, Irvine, CA. Raven, B. H., & Kruglanski, A. W. (1970). Conflict and power. In P. Swingle (Ed.), The structure of conflict (pp., 69–110). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. Rotenberg, K. J., Simourd, L., & Moore, D. (1989). Children’s use of a verbal-nonverbal consistency principle to infer truth from lying. Child Development, 60, 309–322. Weary, G., Elbin, S., & Hill, M. G. (1987). Attributional and social comparison processes in depression. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 605–610. Wong, P. T. P., & Weiner, B. (1981). When people ask “why” question, and the heuristics of attributional search. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 40, 650–663. Wood, J. V., Saltzberg, J. A., Neale, J. M., Stone, A. A., & Rachmiel, T. B. (1990). Self-focused attention, coping responses, and distressed mood in everyday life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58, 1027–1036.
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Parent–Child Interaction as a Power Contest Daphne Blunt Bugental and Keith Happaney University of California, Santa Barbara
We explored parental use of child derogation as a means of power assertion. Parents interacted with children (own and unrelated) after a judgment task in which competitive ideation was primed or unprimed. Evaluations included (a) face-to-face verbal derogation versus praise and (b) judgments of children’s task performance. When primed, fathers with low perceived power (as measured by the Parent Attribution Test) were more likely than other fathers to derogate the performance of both related and unrelated children. Similar trends were found for mothers. Results were interpreted as suggesting that parents with low perceived power use child derogation as a means of attempted power repair.
We ordinarily think of parent–child interaction as a setting that affords the opportunity for socialization and protection of dependent children from harm. Under the best of circumstances, parents use their superior power within such relationships to serve adaptive, caregiving goals (Dix, 1992). When they assert their authority or power, it serves the shared long-term interests of both parents and children. Under other circumstances, however, parental use of power may be thought of as acting in the service of their own goals (Dix, 1992; Hastings & Grusec, 1998). In this case, the interaction between parents and children may be reframed as a power contest (e.g., Kuczysnski & Kochanska, 1990). The relationship is then perceived as a competitive zero-sum game in which there are “winners” and “losers.” In some cases, such contests escalate to include the use of physically abusive or punitive tactics. In other cases, contests may involve derogatory communication patterns. In this study, we are concerned with the kinds of parents and the kinds of settings that foster parental use of social derogation tactics—tactics that have implications for psychological maltreatment (McGee & Wolfe, 1991). Schematic Organization of Social Relationships Across disciplines, there has been an increasing interest in social cognitions as organizers of emotions, motives, and behavioral routines within close relationships. Direct all correspondence to: Daphne Blunt Bugental, Department of Psychology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9660 ⬍[email protected]⬎. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 21(3): 267–282 Copyright 2000 Elsevier Science Inc. ISSN: 0193-3973 All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. 267
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Within the developmental literature, such constructs have typically been framed as “working models” of relationships, developed in initial attachment relationships with parents (Bowlby, 1980). Such working models are thought to influence interpersonal expectations, as well as behavioral and affective reactions to subsequent relationships. In the social cognition literature, there has been increasing interest in the notion of “relationship schemas” (e.g., Baldwin, 1992). Such schemas represent knowledge structures that are acquired as a function of repeated experiences within relationships (Higgins & King, 1981). Subsequently, such knowledge structures are accessed as a guide to future relationships and may be activated automatically without the need for conscious awareness or cognitive effort (Bargh & Tota, 1988). Although early views of social schemas focused on the cognitive components of social schemas, there has been an emergent awareness of the extent to which such social schemas also include affective components (e.g., Fiske & Pavelchak, 1986). More broadly, schemas may be thought of in terms of their motivational as well as their cognitive components. For example, Bargh, Chen, and Burrows (1996) demonstrated that the priming of specific social schemas not only serves to activate relevant ideation, it also activates schema-consistent motives and behavioral routines. In this paper, we are particularly concerned with the activation of motives and behavioral routines that are consistent with power-based caregiving schemas.
Power-Based Schemas In studying the role of cognitions in family relationships, we have focused attention on those caregivers who see themselves as “power disadvantaged” within their relationship with children (Bugental, Blue, & Cruzcosa, 1989). Such parents perceive themselves as relatively powerless despite the obvious fact that they actually do have greater control and authority than their children. Although it is certainly true that influence processes run in two directions between parents and children, parents ultimately have greater control over resources and greater fate control than children. Thus a perceived reversal of power represents an anomaly that is particularly revealing of interpretive distortions. As an anecdotal example, there are physically powerful parents who describe themselves as victims of their young children. We are concerned here with the paradox of those parents who attribute exceptional power to children and who easily engage in “defensive” activity within their family interactions. On a long-term basis, parents with low perceived power are more likely than other parents to be abusive or coercive (e.g., Bugental et al., 1989). Within shortterm interactions, they are highly reactive (emotionally, autonomically, cognitively, and behaviorally) to the possibility of lost control; for example, they are exceptionally reactive to children who may be interpreted as challenging them or to situations that may constrain their authority (e.g., Bugental et al., 1993; Bugental, Blue & Lewis, 1990; Bugental & Shennum, 1984). In short, we have observed that negative or defensive parental reactions occur as an interactive function of the power perceptions of adults and the eliciting characteristics of caregiving settings.
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Social Repair Attempts by the Powerless Consistent with interest in the motivational properties of schemas, we ask here whether the activation of a low power schema also activates “power repair” routines. For example, do those who lack perceived power make use of communication strategies that carry the possibility of (at least temporarily) repairing or bolstering their fragile sense of power or authority? Support for the expectation of reparative activity comes from the literature on interpersonal power. That is, those who see themselves as lacking power or control are particularly likely to engage in heavyhanded power-assertive control tactics (Kipnis, 1976; Raven & Kruglanski, 1970). In addition, such individuals are more easily triggered to think in terms of threat or the need for defense. For example, Fiske and her colleagues (e.g., Fiske, Morling, & Stevens, 1996) have directed attention to the hypervigilance of those who perceive themselves as powerless in their social relationships. In our past research, we have made use of a variety of experimental settings that have involved interactions between parents and unrelated children—an approach that allows causal inferences to be drawn about the direction of effects. We focus here on the reactions of high- versus low-power parents to their own children as well as to unrelated children. Predictions: Power Repair through Derogation of Others In this study we ask how parents with high versus low perceived power respond when thoughts of competition are made salient for them. Parents with a low sense of their own power, when primed to think in terms of competition with their children, were expected to make greater use of derogation tactics than were other parents. McGee and Wolfe (1991) proposed that such tactics represent a subtype of psychological maltreatment. Specifically, they defined this subtype as involving “actions that deprecate the child, including verbal derogation (e.g., insulting, publicly humiliating)” (p. 7). As a priming manipulation, we placed parents in a situation in which they were either asked to compare themselves with their children, or else they were asked to complete a nonsocial comparison task. Social comparison activity of the type used here creates a situation of uncertainty; that is, it activates issues of personal and interpersonal importance without generating answers. As suggested by social cognition theory (e.g., Hastie, 1984; Wong & Weiner, 1981), ambiguous events foster attributional search (Bugental, 1992; Bugental, Lyon, Krantz, & Cortez, 1997). As a result of the differential ideation accessed, parents with high versus low perceived power can be expected to differ in their response style. In past research, we have observed that low-power parents respond with increased use of punitive force (Bugental, Johnston, New, & Silvester, 1998). We extend these findings by exploring the possibility that low-power parents also respond with tactics directed to devaluing or derogating children. To the extent that biased power perceptions represent generalized schemas, lowpower parents would be expected to derogate both their own and unrelated children. Alternatively, if power perceptions represent child-specific schemas, low-power parents would be expected to derogate their own child but not an unrelated child.
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METHOD Sample and Design Parents (N ⫽ 184)1 of school-aged children were recruited from the community to participate in this study. Ads were placed on bulletin boards in public locations (e.g., laundromats, grocery stores); interested parents responded by returning a post card. In a subsequent phone interview, further information was obtained to ascertain the appropriateness of the families (e.g., whether the family included a child in the age group to be studied). Families invited were limited to those in which there were either two parents or one parent and an opposite-sex individual who lived in the home as a parent surrogate. They were asked to bring one of their children. In cases where families included two or more school-aged children, we specified which one we would like them to bring (random selection within age and gender groupings). Parents were also asked to bring along a same-sex, same-age friend of the child. The parent sample included 100 mothers and 84 fathers. Eightysix percent of parents were White, 3% were Asian American, 6% were Latino, 3% were African American, and 1% were Native American. The average education of parents was 15.70 years (SD ⫽ 2.16). Children (100 friend pairs)2 ranged in age from 6 to 10 years. They were approximately evenly divided by gender (45 boy pairs and 55 girl pairs). Their mean age was 8.07 years (SD ⫽ 1.43). Children were divided into an older age grouping (8.5 to 10 years) and a younger age grouping (6 to 8.5 years). The older age grouping included 22 pairs of boys and 27 pairs of girls. The younger age grouping included 24 pairs of boys and 27 pairs of girls. Parents with high versus low perceived power (as measured by the Parent Attribution Test) were randomly assigned to either a priming (priming for thoughts of social comparison) or a no priming condition.3 Measures Parent Attribution Test. In advance of their visit to the lab, parents completed the Parent Attribution Test (PAT; Bugental et al., 1989). The PAT assesses the perceived balance of power or control between parents and children. That is, it is concerned with parents’ subjective causal analysis of caregiving outcomes. This selfreport measure asks parents to rate the importance of potential causes of caregiving outcomes. Questions are framed within a hypothetical interaction (baby-sitting), allowing the instrument to be used with nonparents as well as parents. Items included on the PAT were originally provided by parents (as potential causes of caregiving success or failure) and were grouped into scales on the basis of parental judgments of item similarity. Scales revealed by the initial multidimensional scaling analysis (and confirmed with later factor analyses) included adult control over failure (ACF), child control over failure (CCF), adult control over success, and child control over success. Only the failure scales have been found to predict caregiver responses during demanding or difficult interactions; correspondingly, only the failure scales are used in this study. Examples of items reflecting high attributed control to children involves “child stubbornness” (i.e., an interaction going badly because the child was stubborn and resisted the adults’ efforts) and “child’s lack of effort” (i.e.,
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an interaction going badly because the child made no effort to take an interest in adult’s initiations). Examples of items reflecting high attributed control to parents include “low parental motivation” (i.e., an interaction going badly because of parents’ disinterest) and “parenting strategy” (i.e., an interaction going badly because the parent used the wrong approach). Across samples, the two failure scales (ACF and CCF) have been found to be orthogonal. In this sample, the two scales continued to be uncorrelated (mothers: r ⫽ ⫺.06; fathers, r ⫽ .14). The median ACF score is 4.08 for fathers and 4.00 for mothers. The median CCF score is 3.83 for both mothers and fathers. Test–retest stability (over a 2-month period) for categorizing parents as high versus low ACF is 80%; the stability for categorizing parents as high versus low CCF is 80%. Adults are interpreted as having a low perceived balance of power if they attribute low control to parents (ACF below the median) and high control to children (CCF above the median). In a series of previous studies conducted both in our own lab and the labs of others, parents with a low perceived balance of power have been found to differ in systematic ways from parents who attribute equivalent power to self and children or greater power to self than children (Bugental et al., 1998). As noted earlier, low power scores on the PAT have been found to predict child abuse (e.g., Bradley & Peters, 1991; Bugental et al., 1989), negative parental reactivity to ambiguous or mildly unresponsive child behavior (e.g., Bugental et al., 1990; Bugental et al., 1993), and increasing use of assertive control in response to child fearfulness (Mills, 1998). Parent Attribution Test scores have also been found to be associated with attachment styles as measured by the Adult Attachment Interview (Grusec & Mammone, 1995). The attributional patterns measured by the PAT typically serve as moderators within caregiving relationships. That is, parents with a low perceived balance of power show maladaptive responses if the situation or child pose a potential source of threat or challenge. The PAT has been found to be relatively immune to the effects of self-presentation bias (Bugental et al., 1998). For this reason, responses on this instrument do not appear to be subject to self-management efforts in the service of presenting oneself in a socially desirable fashion. Parent Attribution Test scores have also consistently been found to be unrelated to parental education (used as a marker of socioeconomic status). Finally, PAT scores have been found to be independent of self-reported affect (Lovejoy, Verda, & Hays, 1997) or of general evaluative ratings given to self versus others (Bugental et al., 1997). That is, low perceptions of power do not reflect a general pattern of negative affectivity. Procedure Priming. When parents visited the lab, they were initially asked to complete a rating task in which they responded to adjectives displayed on a computer screen. Those in the priming condition were asked to make comparative judgments of self versus child on a set of 60 evaluative adjectives. For example, parents were asked to judge whether they themselves or one of their children (the child who came with them) were “sadder,” “bossier,” “nicer,” “friendlier,” and so forth. As noted earlier, social comparison manipulations (in the absence of confirming or disconfirming
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feedback) have been found to induce negative affect and a motivation to establish ascendance in future relationships with targets of comparison (e.g., Ingram & Smith, 1988; Weary, Elbin, & Hill, 1987; Wood, Saltzberg, Neale, Stone, & Rachmiel, 1990). Those parents in the no priming condition were asked simply to make structural judgments about the same set of adjectives, for example, “Does this word contain the letter ‘J’?” Interpersonal Interaction. Subsequently, parents were asked to interact (individually) with their own child and with their child’s friend for 5 minutes (separate interactions with child and friend). Children were asked to let their parents know what they had been doing together with their friend (both children had been in an adjoining room engaged in a drawing task and a maze task). Order of interaction was counterbalanced for gender of parent and relatedness of child. Parents were asked simply to engage the child in conversation for 5 minutes. We set out children’s drawings as a potential prompt for conversation. All interactions were videotaped from an adjoining room (parents and children were aware they would be taped at some point during the interaction). Judgment Task. During the period when parents were involved in the priming tasks, children were in an adjoining room completing drawings (of self and parents) and a paper and pencil maze task. After interacting with children, parents were shown the mazes and drawings made by their own child and the unrelated child and were asked to rate them for quality. Debriefing. At the close of the experiment, parents were debriefed regarding the purpose of the study, given financial compensation ($25 each), and asked to sign consent forms for future use of videotaped interactions (initial consents for videotaped participation were signed at the outset of the study). Coding of Parents’ Evaluative Responses to Children Two types of measures were obtained as indicators of parental evaluations of children. One type of measure (verbal evaluation) took place in direct interpersonal response to children. The second type of measure (performance evaluation) took place in the absence of children. Correlations between all measures are shown in Table 1. Verbal Evaluation. Verbalizations directed to children (during the 5-minute interaction period) were coded on two dimensions: negative evaluation of child and positive regard for child4 (coded by a trained judge on a 5-point scale from 0 to 4, where 4 is “definitely true” and 0 is “definitely not true”). Positive regard included any verbal content that explicitly or implicitly provided a positive evaluation of the child. Negative evaluation was operationally defined to include any verbal content that explicitly or implicitly provided a negative evaluation of the child. Ratings made were of two types. The first type involved summary ratings made of entire interactions. The second type involved ratings of opening interactions (the first two messages given by parents). Reliability of scales was assessed by determining the interjudge correlation
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Table 1. Correlation Between Dependent Variables Verbal Derogation Father (child) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Father (friend) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Mother (child) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation Mother (friend) Verbal Derogation Verbal Regard Drawing Evaluation Maze Evaluation
Verbal Regard
Drawing Evaluation
Maze Evaluation
—
⫺.23* —
⫺.20 ⫺.03 —
⫺.05 ⫺.03 .04 —
—
⫺.05 —
⫺.05 ⫺.08 —
.06 .02 .02 —
—
⫺.32** —
⫺.09 .20 —
⫺.20* .15 .21* —
—
⫺.25**
⫺.15 .36** —
.00 .14 .13 —
Note: * p ⬍ .05; ** p ⬍ .01.
between two trained graduate students (on a sample of 40 parent–child interactions). Both raters were blind with respect to experimental condition and perceived power of parents. Assessment of interrater reliability in judging evaluative activity directed to children yielded an acceptable r value of .75 for negative evaluations and an r value of .72 for positive evaluations. Performance Evaluation. Parents’ ratings of children’s performance was used as a second measure of their evaluative activity. Parents rated the mazes and drawings completed by each child on 7-point scales (from “very good” to “not good”). Ratings were made when the parent was alone in a room. Ratings of children’s drawings and ratings of children’s maze performances constituted two potential exemplars of evaluative bias. Coding of Affective Responses to Priming Manipulation (Manipulation Check) The priming induction can be expected to generate a negative mood state, a state commonly observed to be associated with the unresolved self-focus that follows such activity (e.g., Ingram & Smith, 1988; Weary et al., 1987). We anticipated that parents primed for competitive ideation would show a shared tendency to experience increases in negative affect. Measures were taken of parents’ changing voice quality as an indication of their affective response to the priming manipulation. In our previous research, we observed that vocal prosody (in particular, voice pleasantness)
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is well-related to other indicators of affect, for example, self-reported affective reactions to children (e.g., Bugental et al., 1990). The measure also has the advantage of nonreactivity. Parents provided speech samples at three points in the study: when they first came to the lab (distal baseline), immediately preceding the experimental induction (proximal baseline), and immediately after the induction. They were asked on each occasion to repeat the uniform phrase, “Okay, over, and out” (a phrase that provides a series of long vowels—sounds that are particularly useful for judging prosodic features of speech). These samples were then judged on two 7-point scales (anchored by “pleasant” and “unpleasant,” and by “strong” and “weak”). The interrater reliability (r) for judgments of the two variables (on a sample of 84 messages) was .59 for voice pleasantness and .63 for voice strength. Child Responsiveness Children’s responsiveness to adults was assessed by the length of their responses to parents’ initial comments during 5-minute interaction periods. RESULTS Overview It was predicted that parents with a low perceived balance of power (in comparison with higher power parents) would show relatively high verbal derogation and relatively low performance evaluation after being primed for social comparison ideation (a potential threat or challenge). Evaluative activity was assessed in response to own children and children’s friends. The highest level of derogation was predicted for low-power parents immediately after the priming manipulation. A follow-up analysis was conducted to determine children’s responsiveness to parents’ derogatory style. Results were analyzed separately for mothers and fathers. Manipulation Check Postinduction changes in vocal power and vocal pleasantness were assessed as a check on the impact of the priming manipulation. These two variables were analyzed separately in analyses of covariance that included priming as a grouping variable and baseline vocal variables as covariates. Separate analyses were conducted for mothers and fathers. No significant effects were found for either sex for vocal power. However, the priming manipulation was found to produce a consistent effect on vocal pleasantness. For fathers, vocal pleasantness declined more after the priming induction (M ⫽ ⫺.65 on a 7-point scale from ⫹3 to ⫺3) than after the control condition (M ⫽ ⫺.26; F(1, 67) ⫽ 4.31, p ⫽ .042). For mothers, a similar trend was observed; that is, their vocal pleasantness declined more after the priming induction (M ⫽ ⫺.55) than after the control condition (M ⫽ ⫺.15; F(1, 81) ⫽ 3.20, p ⫽ .078). Follow-up analyses that included perceived parental power, child gender, or child age as grouping variables failed to reveal any significant interactions (or trends) between priming and grouping variables. The priming manipulation may then be interpreted as a social comparison-based mood induction.
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Table 2. Overall Evaluative Responses to Children as a Function of Perceived Power and Priming
Priming Yes Yes No No
Fathers
Mothers
Perceived Power
M
(SD)
M
(SD)
High Low High Low
⫺.09a .25a .19 .01
(.42) (.41) (.51) (.58)
⫺.20b .17b ⫺.09 .00
(.51) (.61) (.59) (.35)
Note: All scores are z-scores (high scores reflect positive evaluations). Means followed by common subscripts (within the same column) are significantly different at better than the .05 level of confidence.
Parental Evaluative Activity as a Function of Priming Initial omnibus analyses were conducted to test overall differences in parents’ evaluative responses (transformed to z scores) as a function of priming and power attributions. Primary analyses (conducted separately for mothers and fathers) involved 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 mixed-design analyses of variance that included three grouping variables (priming and the two power variables, i.e., ACF and CCF) and two repeated measures (child relatedness and type of evaluative measure). Evaluative measures included verbal derogation (reverse scored), verbal regard, (positive) evaluation of children’s drawings, and (positive) evaluations of children’s mazes. The predicted interaction between priming and the two power attributions reached significance for fathers (F(1, 71) ⫽ 4.84, p ⫽ .031). In addition, an unpredicted five-way interaction was found between all variables; F(3, 71) ⫽ 3.00, p ⫽ .032. No significant effects were found for mothers. However, the main effect of perceived power approached significance; F(1, 89) ⫽ 3.59, p ⫽ .061. A follow-up analysis was conducted for fathers that provided a test of the predicted pattern of effects for ACF and CCF, that is, the differential reactivity to priming of parents who had a relatively high versus low perceived balance of power. The analysis included two grouping variables (priming and high versus low perceived balance of power) and two repeated measures (child relatedness and evaluative measure). The only effect that reached significance was the predicted interaction between priming and balance of power; F(1, 77) ⫽ 4.59, p ⫽ .035. Means are shown in Table 2. Although the interaction between priming and perceived power did not reach significance for mothers, the same pattern of differential reactivity to priming (as a function of perceived power) was shown for mothers as for fathers. Verbal Evaluation over Valence and Time Follow-up analyses were conducted for the two verbal measures as a function of valence and time (no equivalent time relationships were possible for performance evaluation because these evaluations were made after both interactions5). Analyses made use of mixed-design 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 analyses of variance that included two
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grouping variables (priming and perceived power) and two repeated measures (positive versus negative valence and time). This allowed a comparison of the strength of effects for derogation versus regard and for the differential responses to the first child seen after priming versus the second child seen after priming. For fathers, a significant interaction was found between priming, perceived power, valence of verbal evaluation, and time; F(1, 77) ⫽ 4.82, p ⫽ .031 (as well as for the previously observed interaction between priming and perceived power, F(1, 77) ⫽ 5.26, p ⫽ .025). Means are shown in Table 3. As predicted, fathers with low perceived power—immediately after priming—showed elevated levels of child derogation; no equivalent effect was found for the second interaction. No significant effects were found for verbal regard. An equivalent analysis conducted for mothers did not yield any significant effects. Verbalizations coded as derogatory typically included teasing or defensive or critical questioning of the child, for example: “How come mom’s face is bigger than mine?” (in the drawing) “How come you’re as big as your mom?” (in the drawing) “Do I have to keep these?” (referring to child’s drawings) “Why are you talking like a baby?” “Is that ink all over you?” “Do you think I have a big belly?” (referring to drawing) Questions were of a type that did not easily allow the child to provide an answer. Children’s Responsiveness to Parental Style A follow-up analysis was conducted to determine the extent of children’s responsiveness to parents’ derogatory style or nonderogatory style (as assessed by the duration of their responses to parental messages). Because the highest level of derogation was found during initial interactions after priming, the analysis focused on children’s responses to parents’ opening comments after priming. Parents were divided into those who demonstrated any instance of derogation in their opening comments versus those who did not. One-way analyses of variance (conducted separately for fathers versus mothers) were conducted in which presence or absence of derogation was the grouping variable and children’s response length was the dependent variable. A significant effect was found for fathers; F(1, 71) ⫽ 4.66, p ⫽ .034. Children’s mean response duration was 6.93 seconds in response to derogatory fathers and 16.78 seconds in response to nonderogatory fathers. Effects were not significant for mothers (F ⬍ 1). DISCUSSION Parents were found to show systematic variations in their evaluations of children as an interactive function of their own perceived power and priming for social competition. Parents with low perceived power were more reactive to the “threat”
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Table 3. Father’s Use of Verbal Evaluation Over Time Verbal Derogation Priming
Perceived Power
Yes
High
Yes
Low
No
High
No
Low
M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD)
Verbal Regard
First Dyad
Second Dyad
First Dyad
Second Dyad
⫺.25a (.61) .73abc (1.38) .00b (1.02) ⫺.34c (.82)
⫺.12 (.98) .21 (.99) .39 (1.36) .23 (1.29)
.01 (1.04) .48 (.78) ⫺.39 (1.09) ⫺.23 (1.29)
.19 (.94) ⫺.43 (1.08) ⫺.31 (1.11) .35 (1.22)
Note: All scores are z-scores. Means followed by common subscripts (within the same column) are significantly different at better than the .05 level of confidence.
implications of competitive ideation than were other parents. That is, low-power parents engaged in more verbal derogation of children than did high-power parents after being primed to think in terms of competition or comparison with their children. They showed no such reactions when not primed. This pattern was more pronounced for fathers than for mothers. Children, in turn, gave briefer responses to fathers with a derogatory than to those with a nonderogatory conversational style. The observational setting studied here may be thought of as an analog of parenting interactions under conditions of social stress or threat. The parent who experiences challenges to their power or competence in other settings (e.g., in workbased relationships or spousal relationships) may be thought of as “primed” for thoughts of competition or defense. The stronger effects found here for fathers (as opposed to mothers) may reflect the more pervasive involvement of males in powerbased or competitive relationships. Beginning in middle childhood (Maccoby, 1988), males are socialized into a more competitive style of verbal interaction. Although verbal derogation gambits may be normative in peer settings, they carry more negative implications in parental interactions with children. Even when framed as teasing or kidding, such messages are likely to be interpreted—in particular by young children—as affectively negative (e.g., Bugental, Kaswan, & Love, 1970; Rotenberg, Simourd, & Moore, 1989). The priming effects introduced here only produced significant effects on parents’ responses during interactions that immediately followed the priming induction. As a constraint, the short-term effects may be thought of as limiting the generalization to longer interactions. At the same time, the fact that vulnerable parents only showed derogation immediately after being primed carries inferential benefits. That is, priming for thoughts of competition appeared directly to activate power repair routines. In the absence of priming, parents with low perceived power did not differ from other parents. In short, parents’ representations of themselves as powerless within the caregiving relationship serves as a risk factor. Their derogatory style is
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only activated when they interpret ongoing or recent events as posing a potential challenge. Their subsequent style of interaction may then be thought of as a “preemptive strike.” Indeed, their most negative comments were often their opening statements to children. The combined pattern of child derogation (found here) and physical use of force (found in our past research, Bugental et al., 1989, 1998) is consistent with findings in the social power literature. That is, those who most question their own power are most likely to make use of negative control tactics (Kipnis, 1976; Raven & Kruglanski, 1970). Although supportive evidence will be needed in further research, it suggests differences in coping strategies between parents with different patterns of perceived power. As a qualifier, it should be noted that parents with low perceived power may, under other circumstances, retreat or withdraw from interaction if the situation allows them little opportunity for control. In past research, we have shown that such parents tend to show polarized responses: exaggerated assertion when the setting allows control and appeasement or lack of assertion when the setting limits control (Bugental & Lewis, 1998). In its extreme form, parental derogation overlaps the notion of emotional or verbal abuse. As we know from past research, those parents who are most likely to abuse their children physically are also more likely to abuse them emotionally as well (e.g., Ney, Fung, & Wickett, 1994). The coincidence of types of abuse has also been found in abuse of wives by husbands (Holtzworth-Munroe & Stuart, 1994). In both cases, perpetrators regularly characterize themselves as victims of a physically less powerful other. Such individuals easily reframe their interactions with others as a combat situation in which they need to defend themselves against a powerful opponent. In their minds, their actions are justified by the presumed threat of others. Although the kinds of verbal derogation observed here cannot be viewed as truly abusive, they contain some of the same features that are included in psychological maltreatment. Psychological maltreatment has been defined to include verbal hostility toward, rejection of, and degradation of the child (Brassard, Hart & Hardy, 1993; McGee & Wolfe, 1991), as well as even more extreme behavior (e.g., terrorization, exploitation). The kinds of messages observed here reflect a kind of communication that effectively precludes a response on the part of the child. For example, if a father asks the child why she drew him as fat, it is a no-win situation. It is difficult for children to know how to respond to such messages. Indeed, their replies to such messages were much briefer than their replies to nonderogatory messages. Such interactions may be thought of as inducing embarrassment—in particular, in view of the public nature of the interaction (parents and children knew they would be videotaped). Consistent with more extreme forms of verbal derogation or abuse, such interactions may over time increase the likelihood that children will experience shame in interaction with parents (e.g., Hoglund & Nicholas, 1995). They also increase the likelihood that children will engage in similar kinds of interactions with others. For example, we have observed that children with low perceived power are more likely to engage in verbally aggressive or competitive interactions with their friends than are other children (Bugental & Martorell, 1999).
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Limitations and Need for Future Research We have suggested here that the observed responses shown by low-power parents reflected their reactions to a priming manipulation (priming for thoughts of competition or comparison with their children). Because parents only showed more negative affect (but not reduced power) in response to this induction, it is valid to question the implications of our findings. That is, it could be argued that the derogation responses shown by low-power parents reflected their reactions to a negative mood induction. Thus their reactions may have simply reflected their reactions to their own negative affect (e.g., Dix, 1992). This interpretation would suggest that low-power parents respond with distinctive mood repair strategies. It will be useful in future research to determine whether low-power parents show increases in child derogation in response to lost power or to negative affect. Findings obtained here were also limited by the weaker mood effects found for mothers than for fathers. In future research, it will be important to compare parental responses with children after more powerful inductions of competitive ideation. No specific evidence was provided here to support the presence of “effective” repair processes. The only evidence provided for the consequences of parents’ derogatory style was a reduction in children’s duration of response. In other research, we demonstrated that children show attentional disengagement in response to the inconsistent communication style of low-power mothers (Bugental, Lyon, Lin, McGrath, & Bimbela, 1999). It may be that the short-term “benefit” of parents’ derogatory or inconsistent communication styles involves child withdrawal. That is, it signals a temporary power advantage (e.g., Mills, 1998). Over time, however, child unresponsiveness or withdrawal may pose a problem for parents as well as a potential source of emotional damage to the child (Aber & Zigler, 1981). Rival hypotheses were tested with respect to the differential effects of priming and perceived power on the responses shown to related versus unrelated children. That is, the responses shown by low-power parents may be conceptualized as reflecting either their own personal history or their history with a particular child. The fact that fathers with low perceived power demonstrated similar responses to both their own children and their children’s friends suggests a generalized rather than a child-specific response. It is likely that their derogatory style reflected a generalized response to perceived social challenge (from someone in a position of lesser power) rather than a response to a particular child. If these findings are supported in future research, the observed interaction pattern may be thought of as emerging from parents’ own personal history. Another limitation of the study was that the sample used was nonoptimal in terms of risk for child maltreatment. That is, the parents studied were predominantly from middle-class backgrounds and were interested in participating in a study about parenting. In ongoing research (e.g., Rainey & Bugental, 1999), we are studying the same processes in families at very high risk for child maltreatment (predominantly immigrant, low education, low income, isolated families identified by local public health agencies as at risk for child maltreatment). At the same time, we would argue that our knowledge about the risk factors for emotional abuse is not yet welldefined; thus it is premature to rule out “advantaged” families as engaging in this form of child maltreatment.
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CONCLUSIONS Parents with low perceived power, in contrast with other parents, demonstrated evaluative activity that may be thought of as serving a power-defensive function. In response to potential threat, they showed an increase in child derogation. The power repair processes that low-power parents easily put into play may be thought of as acting in a self-fulfilling fashion. That is, their control tactics may produce short-term benefits (e.g., gaining a verbal advantage in interactions with children). However, these tactics are ultimately likely to be unsuccessful and may indeed lead to decreased levels of long-term responsiveness or compliance on the part of children (Bugental et al., 1990, 1999). As a result, parents ultimately receive confirmation of their view of themselves as having less power or control than their children—thus perpetuating their biased perceptions. Acknowledgments: This research was jointly supported by National Science Foundation grant BNS-9021221 and National Institute of Mental Health grant R0119095. We would like to express our appreciation to Gabriela Martorell and Shelly Semingson who provided extensive help in both data collection and data coding. NOTES 1. Two parents scheduled to participate did not. Sixteen fathers (or men in a surrogate role) became unavailable to participate in the study after initial recruitment. In addition, observations were incomplete on some parents because of videotape problems. 2. The discrepancy between number of child pairs and number of parent groupings is accounted for by the presence of families in which one of the parents was not able to participate; that is, there were two children but only one parent. 3. The initial responses of parents to the priming task (e.g., response latencies) is reported elsewhere (Bugental et al., 1997). 4. Other categories were also judged that were not relevant to this study. They included selfevaluations, evaluations of other people (not present), and evaluations of the experimental situation. 5. A follow-up analysis was conducted with performance evaluations to determine whether ratings were influenced by order of parents’ ratings of children. Analyses made use of mixed-design 2 ⫻ 2 ⫻ 2 analyses of variance that included two grouping variables (priming and perceived power) and one repeated measure (order). The only significant effects obtained were between priming, variable (evaluations of mazes versus drawings), and order; fathers: F(1, 77) ⫽ 5.97, p ⫽ .017; mothers: F(1, 93) ⫽ 4.40, p ⫽ .039. Different patterns were found for mothers and fathers; in addition, none of the differences observed between means reached statistical significance. Therefore, no interpretation was made of these effects.
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