EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Mindful parenting and preschoolers’ digital overuse: exploring the roles of executive function and gender differences

Ju Huang, Xin Chen, Dandan Wu, Ruifeng Liu, Sha Xie and Xinli Chi

Children and Youth Services Review, 2025, vol. 176, issue C

Abstract: The present study explored bidirectional relationships among mindful parenting (MP), child executive function (EF), and child digital overuse (DO) by using a longitudinal method. A total of 1,244 Chinese preschooler (50.3 % boys; age: M = 3.90 years, SD = 0.78) were assessed at two time points, one year apart. Using cross-lagged panel analysis, we found that MP positively predicted EF (β = 0.11, p < 0.001) and negatively predicted DO (β = −0.074, p < 0.05) in children over time, but the reverse was not significant. Additionally, there were bidirectional and negative associations between EF and DO (βEF-T1→DO-T2 = −0.079, p < 0.05; βDO-T1→EF-T2 = −0.082, p < 0.01) in preschooler. Child’s EF significantly mediated the relationship between MP and child’s DO (β = −2.00, p < 0.05, 95 %CI: −0.42, −0.06), with the mediating effect of child executive function at T2 being stronger than at T1. Nevertheless, these findings may not apply to all preschoolers, as our study observed potential gender differences in these associations. Specifically, for boys, there are bidirectional and negative associations between EF and DO (βEF-T1→DO-T2 = −0.14, p < 0.01; βDO-T1→EF-T2 = −0.12, p < 0.01). However, MP neither predicts boys’ EF nor their DO. In contrast, for girls, MP predicts both girls’ EF (β = 0.15, p < 0.01) and their DO (β = −0.11, p < 0.01), though no bidirectional association between EF and DO existed. The implications for the current study are also discussed.

Keywords: Mindful parenting; Executive function; Digital overuse; Gender difference; Cross-lagged panel analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740925003238
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:176:y:2025:i:c:s0190740925003238

DOI: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2025.108440

Access Statistics for this article

Children and Youth Services Review is currently edited by Duncan Lindsey

More articles in Children and Youth Services Review from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().

 
Page updated 2025-07-15
Handle: RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:176:y:2025:i:c:s0190740925003238