Relationship between mothers’ parenting anxiety and parenting behavior for their early childhood children: Mediating effect of parenting stress and coparenting

Objectives The purposes of this study were to investigate the relationship between mothers’ parenting anxiety and parenting behavior(positive parenting behavior, negative parenting behavior) for their early childhood children. Methods To verify this research problem, data were analyzed on 290 mothers who were raising at least one children between 2 and 6 years old across the country. For the collected data, descriptive statistics, adequacy correlation analysis, hierarchical regression analysis, and sequential dual mediating effect analysis were performed using SPSS 26.0 and Macro v4.0. Results First, parenting anxiety, parenting stress, and coparenting of early childhood mothers all showed significant correlation with parenting behavior. Second, as a result of verifying the individual mediating effect, parenting stress showed a complete mediating effect and coparenting a partial mediating effect. Third, the dual mediating effects of parenting stress and coparenting were completely mediated, and at this time, it was verified that the influence of coparenting was greater than parenting stress. Conclusions By confirming the meaiating role of parenting stress and coparenting in the relationship between parenting anxiety and parenting behavior, empirical evidence has been established regarding the psychological variables influencing parenting behavior and the significance of coparenting.