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Adolescent Mothers and Child Abuse Potential: An Evaluation of Risk Factors

NCJ Number
165021
Journal
Child Abuse and Neglect Volume: 20 Issue: 11 Dated: (November 1996) Pages: 1031-1047
Author(s)
T L Dukewich; J G Borkowski; T L Whitman
Date Published
1996
Length
17 pages
Annotation
A longitudinal study of 75 adolescent mothers and their children in Indiana and South Carolina sought to determine the maternal and child factors that place adolescent mothers at risk for abusing their children.
Abstract
The mothers had an average age of 17.3 years at the time their first child was born. Data were collected prenatally, 6 months postnatally, and 1 year postnatally. The research focused on four risk factors: social supports, maternal psychological adjustment, maternal preparation for parenting, and child temperament. It also considered maternal psychological predisposition for aggressive coping, as measured by perceptions of stress and endorsements of punitive parenting, and maternal abuse potential. Results revealed that preparation for parenting, a construct that included knowledge and attitudes about children's development, was the strongest direct predictor of the potential for child abuse. However, the effects of this predictor were also partially mediated by the mother's psychological predisposition for aggressive coping. Similarly, the effects of the child's temperament on the potential for abuse were mediated by the mother's predisposition for aggressive coping. Although the research did not permit causal conclusions, aggressiveness in the parenting style reported by many teenage mothers appeared to be more important in the etiology of child abuse than the level of stress perceived in the environment. Tables and 35 references (Author abstract modified)

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