• Human Ecology Research
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• v.59 no.1
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• pp.1-11
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• 2021

This study investigated the impact of solution-focused thinking on marital satisfaction via mediating roles of father involvement in childcare and marital conflict. A questionnaire survey was conducted among mothers with infants, living in Busan, Daegu and Yangsan, South Korea. Data from 264 mothers were analyzed using several multiple regression analyses and bootstrapping method with SPSS 25.0 and PROCESS macro (model 6) to test the serial double mediation model. The results of this study are as follows. First, mothers' solution-focused thinking had a significant direct and indirect positive influence on marital satisfaction through both father involvement in childcare and marital conflict. Second, the sequential mediating effects of father involvement in childcare and marital conflict were statistically significant in the relationship between solution-focused thinking and marital satisfaction. The model accounted for 60% of the variance in mothers' marital satisfaction. The results highlight the importance of solution-focused thinking that can enhance the marital satisfaction of mothers with infants and act as a resource for increasing father involvement in childcare and decreasing marital conflict. Based on the results, it is necessary to include solution-focused thinking, father involvement in childcare, and marital conflict as key elements in the intervention to improve marital satisfaction of mothers with infants.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.207-226
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of parenting beliefs and maternal gatekeeping on father's parenting involvement. The participants were comprised of 459 Korean and Chinese couples with children whose ages ranged from 3 to 5 years old. The subjects completed questionnaires on the BCPRS (Beliefs Concerning the Parental Role Scale), the PRI (Parental Regulation Inventory), and the parenting involvement sub-scale of the productive father's parenting scale. The main results were as follows. First, in the father's parenting involvement sub-scale, Korean fathers showed a higher value compared to Chinese fathers. Second, Korean mothers had non-traditional parenting beliefs than the Chinese mothers had. Third, in regards to maternal gatekeeping, Chinese mothers more frequently controlled father's parenting than Korean mothers. Fourth, it was found that parenting beliefs and maternal gatekeeping in both countries had a significant influence in father's parenting involvement.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.145-162
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• 2022

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the differences in parental involvement and parenting stress according to the father's personality type. Methods: The subjects of this study were 302 fathers with children aged three to five living in Seoul, and a survey was conducted on their Big Five personality types, parental involvement, and parenting stress.The collected data were analyzed using K-means cluster analysis and covariance analysis. Results: In this study, fathers' personality types were classified into four types: 'sincerity, friendship, openness'(21.5%), 'neuroticism'(27.8%), 'sincerity'(29.4%), and 'low sincerity'(21.1%). These are the exact same Fathers in the 'sincere, friendly, open' group showed higher parental involvement and lower parental stress, while fathers in the 'neurotic' group showed lower parenting involvement and higher parenting stress. Conclusion/Implications: There was a difference in parental involvement and parenting stress according to the father's personality type.Based on these results, it is expected that the understanding of the father's personality will be come clearer and the foundation for constructing a program related to parenting which considers personality types will be established.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.63-82
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• 2021

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of children's age and their fathers' childrearing involvement on the social morality of young children. Methods: The data were gathered from parents who had 3-5 year old children enrolled in daycare centers and from their daycare teachers. The parents answered questions about their children's socio-demographic background and the father's childrearing involvement. And the teachers rated children's social morality. The data from a total of 245 questionnaires were analyzed by SPSS 25.0. Results: First, there was a statistically significant difference between young children's morality score and convention score. Young children's morality scores were higher than their convention scores. Second, children's age was a significant influential factor on both their moral and conventional social morality. Third, father's care-discipline had the only impact on children's conventional social morality. That is, children's social morality was higher when their fathers gave them more care and guidance. Forth, an interaction effect between children's age and father's development-support on children's conventional social morality was found. Conclusion/Implications: The results from this study suggest that a differentiated approach is needed according to the types of childrearing involvement of fathers in order to improve children's social morality.

• Human Ecology Research
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• v.54 no.6
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• pp.621-629
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• 2016

This study investigated the moderating effects of marital fondness and admiration as well as the father's involvement in child rearing on the association between parenting stress and marital satisfaction for a comparison of unemployed and employed mothers. The subjects were 159 unemployed mothers and 103 employed mothers with children under 3 years of age. The major findings of this study were as follows. First, unemployed mothers who had a lower level of marital fondness and admiration were dissatisfied with their marriage when they had higher parenting stress. Marital fondness and admiration are necessary for unemployed mothers in their transition period to parents. Especially, it is important for fathers to understand challenging conditions and encourage and support the spouse. However, there was no moderating effect of the father's involvement in child rearing in the association between parenting stress and marital satisfaction. Second, employed mothers who had a lower level of father's involvement in child rearing were dissatisfied with their marriage when they had higher parenting stress. The father's involvement in child rearing is necessary for employed mothers in their transition period to parents. Furthermore, it is important to implement policies at the national level to support childcare hours for balanced work and life. However, there was no moderating effect of marital fondness and admiration for the association between parenting stress and marital satisfaction.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.191-213
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship pattern among paternal parenting behaviors, father involvement, parenting stress, and parenting self- efficacy. The subjects were 299 fathers of 3 to 4 year-old children at 2 child care centers and 11 kindergartens in Seoul and the Gyunggi-do area. Fathers responded to a modified version of Parenting Daily Hassles(Crinc & Greeberg, 1990), a re vised version of Parenting Sense of Competence(Gibaud-Wallston & Wandersman, 1978), and questionnaires including questions about parenting behaviors(Park, 2000) and father involvement developed by authors. Stepwise regression analyses showed that fathers' cognitive efficacy of parenting and the frequency of play involvement on weekdays significantly explained paternal 'warmth encouragement'. Also, cognitive efficacy and the frequency and time amount of play involvement on weekdays significantly explained paternal 'setting up the limitations'. Meanwhile, fathers' emotional efficacy and the amount of play time involvement on weekdays significantly explained paternal 'over-protection permission'. Finally, the cognitive and emotional efficacy of rearing and parenting stress significantly explained paternal 'rejection non-intervention'.

• Child Studies in Asia-Pacific Contexts
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.27-45
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• 2014

The present study investigated the developmental pattern of Korean mothers' depressive symptoms from a week prior to birth through four months postpartum in a nationally represented survey sample in Korea, using a Latent Growth Curve model. Mother-reported four factors-maternal self-efficacy in parenting, father's participation in childcare, a number of hours mothers worked per week, child's emotional temperament-were examined as the predictors of depressive symptoms over time in the context of Korean culture. Effects of maternal depressive trajectories on their infants' developmental outcomes at the first year were also examined. Findings were as follows: First, mothers' reports of depressive symptoms decreased at the first month after birth and then increased again during the first 4 months postpartum. Second, mothers' perceived low spousal involvement in childcare, low parental self-efficacy, and their infants' difficult temperament at four-month old had significantly positive relations to the initial level of maternal depressive symptoms whereas the low spousal involvement in childcare and low maternal self-efficacy factors significantly predicted the changes of trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms. Third, the trajectories, in turn, predicted warm and responsive maternal parenting style at the fourth month. Subsequently, the parenting style had a significant longitudinal impact on the development of children's communication, problem-solving, and personal-social abilities. Based on these findings, awareness, preventive and interventional programs might be built to facilitate Korean mothers suffering severe postpartum depressive symptoms and further promote optimal early development of Korean children.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.47-68
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• 2021

Objective: This study investigated direct and indirect influences of fathers' parenting involvement on maternal parenting competence by exploring pathways between fathers' parenting involvement, maternal inner strength, and maternal parenting competence. Methods: A total of 329 mothers with 3-year-old children responded to online survey questionnaires, which included questions about fathers' parenting involvement, maternal inner strength, and maternal parenting competence. The data was analyzed by Pearson's correlation coefficients and Structural Equation Modeling. Results: It was observed that maternal inner strength perfectly mediated the association between father's parenting involvement and maternal parenting competence. More concretely, a direct effect of fathers' parenting involvement on maternal parenting competence was not found. It was also found that fathers' parenting involvement effects maternal parenting competence indirectly. The effect of fathers' parenting involvement on maternal inner strength was the greatest among all associations between fathers' parenting involvement, maternal inner strength, and maternal parenting competence. Conclusion/Implications: These findings have insights for research and practice, which emphasize the important considerations that enhancing maternal inner strength and the power of fathers' parenting involvement on maternal inner strength should be emphasized in order to improve maternal parenting competence.

• Korean Journal of Childcare and Education
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.115-136
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to examine the main and interaction effects of fathers' parenting and their play participation on emotional regulation of preschoolers. The participants of this study consisted of 269 preschoolers (M: 61.4 months, SD: 15.3) located in Seoul and Gyeong-gi province. The results of regression analysis revealed that; 1) Father's parenting (such as rational instruction, friendly attitude) positively predicted child's emotion regulations. 2) The interaction effects of fathers' parenting (such as parenting participation, reaction, rational instruction, friendly attitude) with their constructive play participation predicted children's emotion regulations. Namely, fathers with higher constructive play participation showed higher emotion regulations of preschoolers under father's parenting participation, reaction, rational instruction and friendly attitude. 3) The interaction effects between fathers' functional play participation and father's parenting participation predicted children's emotion regulations. Findings indicate that fathers play a role in improving children's emotion regulation by parenting. Moreover, its effects appeared more apparently when fathers participated with constructive and functional play methods. In conclusion, it is suggested that fathering and the level of play involvement may be key variables for developing young children's emotion regulation.

• Human Ecology Research
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• v.59 no.3
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• pp.297-310
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• 2021

This study examined the social wellbeing of working mothers of preschool children with the aim of identifying relationships between social wellbeing and influencing factors, focusing on the individual, relationship, and work environment of the mothers. Data on 390 working mothers were used for this study. The data were analyzed using the SPSS 18.0 program and descriptive statistics. Pearson's correlation analyses and hierarchical regression analyses were performed. The results show that social wellbeing has significantly positive correlations with education, monthly household income, number of children, age of the first child(8 and over), social capital for childcare, division of childcare, maternal role values, spouse's beliefs about paternal parenting involvement, and family-supportive work environment, as well as significantly negative correlations with weekly working hours, sociological ambivalence, spouse's beliefs about father's breadwinner role and gender-role values, job overload, and gender-role attitudes of coworkers. In addition, hierarchical regression revealed that spouse's beliefs about paternal parenting involvement and a family-supportive work environment were significantly positive predictors of working mothers'social wellbeing, whereas working mothers'sociological ambivalence toward their roles, job overload, and gender-role attitudes of coworkers were significantly negative predictors of working mothers'social wellbeing. These results point to ways of changing education and policy to improve the social wellbeing of working mothers.