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Factors predicting psychological distress among parents of pre-school children in Singapore
Author
Chong, Ling Xuan
Supervisor
Poon, Kenneth K.
Abstract
The behaviours of children, parents’ perceived quality of social support, and parental education level is associated to the psychological status of parents. This study investigated factors that predict psychological distress among parents of pre-school children. The factors included were children’s behavioural problems, parents’ perceived quality of social support, and parental education level. This study also investigated the differences in parental psychological distress and parents’ perceived quality of social support among parents of pre-school children with and without greater level of at-risk behavioural problems. This study recruited 246 parents with pre- school children in Singapore. The data analysis was reduced to a sample size of 236 after the removal of 10 participants with multiple incomplete responses in the questionnaire. Participants responded through a set of printed or an electronic version of the questionnaires. Multiple regression analyses indicated that children’s behavioural problems and parental perceived level of social support predicted parental psychological distress. Parental educational level predicted symptoms of parental stress. Parents of pre-school children with a greater level of at-risk behavioural problems reported experiencing a higher level of psychological distress. Parents of pre-school children with a greater level of at-risk behavioural problems also reported a lower perceived level of social support.. This piece of research brings awareness to the psychological distress experienced by parents of preschool children with greater at-risk behaviours as well as the importance of social support in alleviating the level of psychological distress. Future research can consider different methods of data collection to triangulate self-reported parental psychological distress and children behavioural problems.
Date Issued
2019
Call Number
HQ775.8 Cho