Community Differences in the Association Between Parenting Practices and Child Conduct Problems

Abstract

Various hypotheses were identified regarding the manner in which community context might influence the association between two dimensions of parenting—control and corporal punishment—on child conduct problems. The authors used hierarchical linear modeling with a sample of 841 African American families to test these hypotheses. Consistent with the evaporation hypothesis, the results indicated that the deterrent effect of caretaker control on conduct problems becomes smaller as deviant behavior becomes more widespread within a community. The findings for corporal punishment supported the normative parenting argument. Although there was a positive relationship between caretaker corporal punishment and child conduct problems in communities where physical discipline was rare, there was no association between the two variables in communities where physical discipline was widely prevalent. These results suggest that a particular parenting strategy may be more effective in some neighborhood environments than others. The theoretical implications of this view are discussed.