Maternal parenting practices and behavioural tendencies among toddlers in Tirana, Albania: Maternal warmth as a potential moderator

Abstract

The aims of this article are to explore the links between maternal parenting practices and child behavioural outcomes, as well as to investigate maternal warmth as a potential moderator of the relationship between mother-reported child maltreatment and child problematic behavioural outcomes specifically. Cross-sectional data were obtained from a representative sample of 328 mothers and 59 nursery teachers of two-to-three-year-old children recruited through eight randomly selected public nurseries in Tirana. Results from the multiple regressions showed that mother-reported total child behavioural difficulties were positively associated with child maltreatment and negatively associated with maternal warmth. Mother-reported child prosociality was further positively associated with positive parenting. Contrastingly, there were no significant effects of either mother-reported child maltreatment or maternal warmth on nursery teacher assessed behavioural problems, as well as no significant effect of mother-reported positive parenting on nursery teacher-reported child prosociality. The results further showed that high levels of maternal warmth enhanced the effect that child maltreatment had on child behavioural problems, as assessed by both mothers and nursery teachers. These findings suggest the need for the implementation of parent training programmes in the Albanian society to help mothers develop consistent, positive parenting practices.