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Parenting Influences on Latino Children’s Social Competence in the First Grade: Parental Depression and Parent Involvement at Home and School

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Abstract

Although it is widely accepted that parental depression is associated with problems with children’s socioemotional adjustment, the pathways by which parental depression influences children’s adjustment, particularly in low-income Latino children are not fully understood. In our investigation of 1,462 low-income Latino children in the first grade and their Spanish- and English-dominant parents, a factor analysis revealed three main pathways of possible influence of parent involvement in children’s social development: emotional involvement and educational involvement at home and at school. The findings from multigroup structural equation modeling revealed that whereas the first two pathways mediated the effect of parental depression on child social competence for Spanish-dominant parents, only emotional involvement explained parental depression effects for English-dominant parents. Parent educational involvement at school did not mediate parental depression effects for either Spanish- or English-dominant Latino parents. Discussion and implications of findings with respect to research, practice, and policy with Latinos follow.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Stephen Quintana and David Kaplan for reading earlier drafts of this paper. We would also like to express our appreciation to the families who participated in the Children, Families and Schools Project. Research funded by R01HD051762-01A2 (Adam Gamoran) from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Counseling Psychology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 301 Education Building, 1000 Bascom Mall, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Carmen R. Valdez, Simon Goldberg & Brian Padilla

  2. Department of Sociology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA

    Vansa Shewakramani

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  1. Carmen R. Valdez
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Correspondence to Carmen R. Valdez.

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Valdez, C.R., Shewakramani, V., Goldberg, S. et al. Parenting Influences on Latino Children’s Social Competence in the First Grade: Parental Depression and Parent Involvement at Home and School. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev 44, 646–657 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-013-0358-x

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