Parental Psychological Flexibility and Children’s Behavior Problems in Rural Areas in Northeast China: The Mediation of Children’s Emotion Regulation

Xiaoling Ren (), Xiaoying Ren, Zhonglian Yan, Songhan Lu and Xiaohan Zhou
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Xiaoling Ren: School of Education, Beihua University, Jilin 132013, China
Xiaoying Ren: Jinxue Primary School, Yanji 133099, China
Zhonglian Yan: Faculty of Education, Northeast Normal University, Changchun 130024, China
Songhan Lu: School of Education, Beihua University, Jilin 132013, China
Xiaohan Zhou: School of Education, Beihua University, Jilin 132013, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 23, 1-14

Abstract: Children’s behavior problems are not conducive to their sustainable development. Therefore, it is of great value to explore the mechanism of relevant influencing factors on the behavior problems of rural preschoolers. This study aimed to reveal the direct effect of parental psychological flexibility on children’s behavior problems and the mediating effect of children’s emotion regulation. Based on simple random sampling, 355 caregivers (male = 31.25 years, SD = 9.78; 74.08% females; 9.01% bachelor degree) were recruited from eight rural kindergartens in three provinces in northeast China. With questionnaires, caregivers reported their parental psychological flexibility and assessed their children’s emotion regulation and behavior problems. SPSS 25.0 software was used for statistical data analysis. The results support our hypotheses, suggesting that parental psychological flexibility, emotional stability, and emotional regulation negatively predicted children’s externalizing and internalizing behavior problems. Meanwhile, emotional stability and regulation partially mediated the relationship between parental psychological flexibility and children’s externalizing and internalizing behavior problems. These findings provide a new perspective for preventing and intervening in preschoolers’ behavior problems.

Keywords: parental psychological flexibility; children’s emotion regulation; children’s behavior problems; rural preschoolers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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