children's coping strategies and coping efficacy: relations to parent socialization, child...

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Children’s coping strategies and copingefficacy: Relations to parent socialization,child adjustment, and familial alcoholism

CYNTHIA L. SMITH, NANCY EISENBERG, TRACY L. SPINRAD,LAURIE CHASSIN, AMANDA SHEFFIELD MORRIS, ANNE KUPFER,JEFFREY LIEW, AMANDA CUMBERLAND, CARLOS VALIENTE,and OI-MAN KWOKArizona State University

AbstractThe relations of children’s coping strategies and coping efficacy to parent socialization and child adjustment wereexamined in a sample of school-age children that included families in which some of the grandparents and0orparents had an alcoholism diagnosis. Parents and older children reported on the children’s coping strategies; parentsreported on their parenting behavior; and teachers reported on children’s externalizing and internalizing problems.Measures of parent socialization were associated with parents’ and children’s reports of active coping strategies andparents’ reports of both support-seeking coping and coping efficacy. Some of these relations were moderated byfamilial alcohol status. Children higher in parent-reported active0support-seeking coping and coping efficacy wererated lower in teacher-reported externalizing and internalizing adjustment problems. The findings were consistentwith the view that active0support-seeking coping and coping efficacy mediated the association of parentsocialization to children’s psychological adjustment and that this relation was sometimes moderated by parentalalcohol status.

Children’s constructive coping strategies arebelieved to buffer the effects of stressful ex-periences ~Compas, Connor-Smith, Saltzman,Thomsen, & Wadsworth, 2001!, and conse-quently, foster psychological well-being ~Grantet al., 2003!. Consistent with this view, sometypes of coping have been linked to psycho-logical adjustment, although other less con-

structive modes of coping have been associatedwith poor psychological outcomes ~Compaset al., 2001; Eisenberg, Fabes, & Guthrie, 1997;Sandler, Tein, & West, 1994!. Thus, it is im-portant to understand the factors that contrib-ute to the development of different modes ofcoping, especially for at-risk children.

One factor of potential significance in thisregard is parental socialization practices suchas parental support and discipline consis-tency, which have been associated with indi-vidual differences in both children’s copingand adjustment ~Grant et al., 2003; Power, inpress; Skinner & Edge, 2002!. In the currentstudy, we hypothesized that parental socializa-tion would be associated with children’s cop-ing strategies and efficacy and that children’scoping and efficacy would, in turn, be relatedto their psychological adjustment. In addition,because the aforementioned relations may varydepending on risk factors present within fam-

Cynthia L. Smith is now at the Department of HumanDevelopment, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State Uni-versity. Amanda Sheffield Morris is now at the Depart-ment of Psychology, University of New Orleans. JeffreyLiew and Oi-man Kwok are now at the Department ofEducational Psychology, Texas A&M University. This re-search was supported by a grant from the National Insti-tute of Drug Abuse ~DA05227; Laurie Chassin, PrincipleInvestigator, Nancy Eisenberg, Co-Principal Investigator!.

Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Cyn-thia L. Smith, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and StateUniversity, Department of Human Development, 366Wallace Hall ~0416!, Blacksburg, VA 24061; E-mail:[email protected].

Development and Psychopathology 18 ~2006!, 445–469Copyright © 2006 Cambridge University PressPrinted in the United States of AmericaDOI: 10.10170S095457940606024X

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ilies, we examined these relations in a sampleof children from homes at risk for parent al-coholism. Children of alcoholics ~COAs! tendto exhibit elevated levels of a range of nega-tive outcomes ~West & Prinz, 1987!, includingproblems with adjustment, both externalizingand internalizing ~Chassin, Barrera, & Mont-gomery, 1997; Chassin, Pitts, DeLucia, & Todd,1999; El-Sheikh & Buckhalt, 2003; Harter,2000; Puttler, Zucker, Fitzgerald, & Bingham,1998!, impulsivity, and difficulties in regulat-ing emotion and behavior ~e.g., Brook, Tseng,& Cohen, 1996; Colder & Chassin, 1997; Ei-den, Edwards, & Leonard, 2004; Giancola,Moss, Martin, Kirisci, & Tarter, 1996; Peter-son & Pihl, 1990!. Due to the role of regula-tion in coping ~Eisenberg et al., 1997!, COAswould be expected to have deficits in copingskills ~Eisenberg et al., 1997!, and suboptimalparenting would be expected to contribute tothese deficits ~Chassin et al., 1997!.

Children’s Coping

Compas et al. ~2001! defined coping “as con-scious volitional efforts to regulate emotion,cognition, behavior, physiology, and the envi-ronment in response to stressful events orcircumstances” ~p. 89!. Within the coping re-search, one common approach has been toclassify coping according to two broad dimen-sions, such as problem-focused versus emotion-focused coping ~Lazarus & Folkman, 1984!;however, these broad categories have been crit-icized for being too simplistic and for poten-tially making it difficult to detect associationsbetween coping and outcomes ~Carver, Scheier,& Weintraub, 1989!. In response to such crit-icisms, Ayers, Sandler, West, and Roosa ~1996!used 11 theoretically and empirically definedcoping categories to identify ~with confirma-tory factor analyses! a four-factor model ofcoping that fit the data better than two-factormodels of coping, a finding that has been rep-licated in different samples of children ~Ayerset al., 1996; Sandler et al., 1994!. The modelconsists of four conceptually distinct copingfactors: active coping ~cognitive decision mak-ing, direct problem solving, seeking under-standing, positive thinking, and optimistic

thinking!, avoidant coping ~avoidant actions,repression, and wishful thinking!, support-seeking coping ~support for actions and sup-port for feelings!, and distraction ~physicalrelease of emotions and distracting actions!.Although findings in various laboratories dif-fer somewhat, empirical data and conceptualreviews support the view that coping is multi-dimensional in nature ~Compas et al., 2001;Skinner, Edge, Altman, & Sherwood, 2003!.

In addition, investigators studying copingin children and youth have assessed both sit-uational coping ~coping in response to spe-cific stressors! and dispositional coping ~amore global measure of everyday coping!.General coping styles are methods of copingthat characterize a person’s reactions to stresseither across different situations or over timewithin a given situation. Individual differ-ences in general coping styles reflect a ten-dency to respond in a particular way whenconfronted with stressful circumstances ~Com-pas, 1987!, and these differences influencethe use of coping strategies in specific stress-ful situations ~Ayers et al., 1996!. In the presentstudy, we used a global measure of coping asopposed to a measure of coping in responseto a specific stressor because we hypoth-esized that family alcoholism and parent so-cialization would have effects on children’sgeneral styles of coping.

Another construct of importance within thecoping literature is children’s coping efficacy.Coping efficacy is a global belief that one candeal with situational demands and the emo-tions aroused by situations and, therefore, isthe child’s subjective evaluation that he or shecan successfully deal with stressful situationsnow and in the future ~Sandler, Tein, Mehta,Wolchik, & Ayers, 2000!. Coping efficacy isbelieved to influence children’s coping effortsand the use of various coping strategies, andthe two are viewed as reciprocally related. Assuggested by Sandler et al. ~2000!, if children’scoping efforts are successful, their sense ofefficacy will increase, and they will be morelikely to use that coping strategy in the future.However, if children’s coping efforts are metwith negative outcomes, they may be less likelyto use that strategy in the future and may feela sense of helplessness and hopelessness, which

446 C. L. Smith et al.

would be expected to be associated with inter-nalizing problems ~e.g., Harter, 1999!.

Although very few investigators have ex-amined the relations of parental alcohol statusto children’s coping or coping efficacy ~Chas-sin et al., 1997; Sher, 1991!, children of alco-holic parents have been found to use lessoptimal coping strategies in adulthood ~Hus-song & Chassin, in press!. As already noted,deficits in COAs’ executive functioning andrelated aspects of regulation ~e.g., Eiden et al.,2004; Peterson & Pihl, 1990! are likely to bereflected in the quality of COAs’ coping. Thus,our first hypothesis was that children fromhomes with an alcoholic history would useless active, support-seeking, and distractioncoping and more avoidant coping and havelower levels of coping efficacy.

Coping, Parent Socialization,and Familial Alcoholism

Although there are relatively few studies con-cerning the relations of parenting with effec-tive coping strategies ~Kliewer, Sandler, &Wolchik, 1994!, in general, it has been arguedthat parental supportive rather than punitiveinteractions with children promote construc-tive coping ~e.g., Eisenberg, Fabes, & Mur-phy, 1996; Kliewer, Fearnow, & Miller, 1996;Power, in press; Skinner & Edge, 2002!. Skin-ner and Edge ~2002! have argued that healthyself-systems for children’s coping should de-velop if parents are supportive, provide appro-priate discipline techniques to create structuredand predictable contexts, and respect childrenwhile allowing freedom of expression. In suchfamilial environments, children are likely tohave positive relationships with their parents;therefore, children may be more likely to seekparental support and to listen to parents’ sug-gestions for how to cope with stressors, a pro-cess that may allow more adaptive styles ofcoping to develop. As argued by Eisenberg,Cumberland, and Spinrad ~1998!, children whoexperience emotionally positive parenting dur-ing stressful situations are less likely than thosewith less positive parents to maintain an opti-mal level of arousal for learning constructiveways of regulating their emotion and behav-ior. Furthermore, parents in these types of fam-

ilies may be more likely to model constructivecoping strategies.

There is some support for these predictions.Wolchik, Wilcox, Tein, and Sandler ~2000!found that children’s reports of parental accep-tance and consistency of discipline were neg-atively related to their reported stress pertainingto their parents’ recent divorce. Perhaps chil-dren with supportive, consistent parents wereless likely than their peers to feel stressed by arecent divorce because their parents’behaviorsallowed them to develop effective coping strat-egies. In addition, Hardy, Power, and Jaedicke~1993! found that relatively supportive parentshad children with a greater variety of copingstrategies. In a more direct test of the relationbetween parenting and child coping, Wolfradt,Hempel, and Miles ~2003! found that Germanhigh school students’ ratings of paternal andmaternal warmth were associated with the useof more active coping. Similarly, Kliewer et al.~1996! found that children’s perceptions of ma-ternal acceptance were positively related to theiruse of active coping and support-seeking cop-ing strategies, and paternal acceptance was pos-itively related to boys’support-seeking coping.Thus, in general, supportive and consistent par-enting has been related to coping strategies dis-played by children, although the associationsbetween parent socialization and child copingmay differ for maternal versus paternal parent-ing behaviors.

A component of supportive parental social-ization is reflected in parents’ reactions to theirchildren’s displays of negative emotion whendealing with stressful situations. It has beenargued that responding to children’s negativeemotions in a supportive manner can promoteeffective coping, whereas negative parentalreactions have the potential to underminechildren’s coping ~Eisenberg et al., 1997; Gott-man, Katz, & Hooven, 1997; Skinner & Edge,2002!. Eisenberg, Fabes, Carlo, and Karbon~1992! found that parents’ reports of support-ive responses to children’s negative emotions,which included helping their children deal withthe emotions or with the emotional problem,were associated positively with children’s con-structive coping with real-life negative emo-tion. In contrast, parents’ negative reactions tochildren’s negative emotions, such as punitive

Children’s coping 447

responses or responses that devalued thechildren’s emotions, tended to be related neg-atively to children’s adaptive coping. More-over, Eisenberg et al. ~1996! found that parents’punitive or minimizing reactions to theirchildren’s negative emotions were negativelycorrelated with teacher-reported constructivecoping ~i.e., high support-seeking coping,problem-solving coping, cognitive restructur-ing, and low cognitive avoidance! and posi-tively related to mother-reported avoidantcoping. Conversely, the degree to which moth-ers reported responding in a positive, support-ive manner to children’s negative emotionswas positively related to their own and teach-ers’ reports of children’s constructive coping~including support-seeking, cognitive restruc-turing, and problem-solving coping, as well aslow aggressive coping!.

To our knowledge, there is virtually no re-search on the socialization correlates of cop-ing efficacy; however, it seems reasonable topredict that children also feel more effica-cious if their parents are supportive and ifparents respond to children’s emotions withsuggestions for solving the child’s problemrather than with punitive or minimizing reac-tions. Consistent with this idea, Brook et al.~2002! found that adolescents’adaptive coping,a construct highly similar to coping efficacy,was positive related to paternal support, childcenteredness, and availability, but not with fa-thers’ having firm rules for their adolescents.

Unlike in most prior studies, in the presentstudy, children’s coping and coping efficacywere assessed with both parents’ and children’sreports. Our second set of hypotheses exam-ined the relation of these conceptually distinctcoping strategies and coping efficacy to bothmaternal and paternal supportive parenting andconsistency of discipline. We expected active,support-seeking, and distraction coping, as wellas coping efficacy, to be positively associatedwith both maternal and paternal supportivebehavior and consistency of discipline, whereasavoidant coping was predicted to be nega-tively associated. Because in the past research-ers have found that maternal parentingbehaviors related to children’s coping morefrequently than paternal parenting ~Klieweret al., 1996; Ruchkin, Eisemann, & Hagglof,

1999!, we examined maternal and paternal par-enting separately and expected stronger rela-tions for maternal socialization.

For multiple reasons, we expected parentalsocialization to be associated with inferior cop-ing for COAs. Alcoholic parents probably tendto be poor models of effective coping giventhe link between alcoholism and poor emotionregulation ~e.g., Sher, 1991!. Alcoholic par-ents likely have experienced nonsupportiveparenting themselves ~e.g., Barnes, Reifman,Farrell, & Dintcheff, 2000!, which they maymodel in their own child rearing. In addition,parental alcoholism can be a strong potentialstressor in children’s lives and can influencethe quality of parental caregiving and theparent–child relationship ~Chassin et al., 1997;Eiden, Edwards, & Leonard, 2002!. Parents,who are struggling with alcoholism, or thosedealing with an alcoholic partner, may tend toprovide suboptimal parenting due to dimin-ished capacities and psychological or materialresources. In fact, adolescent COAs report re-ceiving less parental warmth ~Barnow, Schuc-kit, Lucht, John, & Freyberger, 2002!, whichmight compromise the development of theircoping skills. In addition, Eiden et al. ~2004!found that fathers’ warmth over the secondyear of life mediated the association betweenfathers’alcoholism and children’s effortful con-trol ~i.e., regulation!. Even if mothers are notalcoholic themselves, having an alcoholicspouse has been associated with deficits inparenting through the effects of paternal alco-holism on maternal depression and antisocialbehavior ~Eiden & Leonard, 2000; also seeEiden & Leonard, 1996!. Therefore, our thirdhypothesis was that parents in families withalcoholism would be less supportive and con-sistent in their parenting than would parentswithout alcoholism.

Familial alcoholism may also moderate therelation of parental socialization to the qualityof children’s coping and their coping efficacy.El-Sheikh and Buckhalt ~2003! found supportfor buffering effects of parenting on the rela-tion between parental drinking and child out-comes. Therefore, our fourth hypothesis wasthat, in families with alcoholism, positive par-enting may serve as a buffer against otherfactors ~e.g., family stress and conflict! that


might undermine the development of copingskills. Supportive and consistent parenting be-haviors would be expected to be more stronglyassociated with adaptive coping and copingefficacy in families with a history of parentalcoholism than in families without such ahistory because these parenting behaviors mayserve as a protective factor.

Even though parenting behaviors may func-tion as a protective factor for children in fam-ilies with a history of alcoholism, supportiveand consistent parenting may also mediate theassociation of familial alcoholism to children’scoping. El-Sheikh and Buckhalt ~2003! foundsupport for parenting playing both a moderat-ing and a mediating role when examining therelations between parent alcoholism and childoutcomes. Whereas moderation highlights thepotential protective function of parent social-ization, mediation analyses help to define thepathways through which a history of family al-coholism may exert effects. As a result, paren-tal behaviors were examined as mediators ofthe association of familial alcoholism to childcoping. We hypothesized that a history offamily alcoholism would be associated with pa-rental supportive and consistent parenting be-haviors, which would in turn be associated withchildren’s coping strategies and coping efficacy.

Coping and Children’s Adjustment

In general, although not in all settings, sometypes of coping have been associated with pos-itive developmental outcomes for children,whereas others have not ~Compas et al., 2001;Kliewer et al., 1994; Sandler et al., 2000!.Active coping has been positively related toadjustment, whereas disengagement modes ofcoping ~e.g., avoidance! tend to be negativelyrelated ~Compas et al., 2001!. Sandler et al.~1994! found that avoidant coping was posi-tively associated with levels of depression,anxiety, and conduct problems when assessedconcurrently. Active coping also predictedlower depression 5.5 months later, and distrac-tion coping strategies predicted later lower lev-els of both depression and anxiety. In addition,children’s coping efficacy has been positivelyassociated with active coping and negativelyassociated with avoidant coping, and has me-

diated the association between quality ofchildren’s coping and their adjustment, suchthat higher coping efficacy was negatively as-sociated with internalizing and externalizingproblems ~Sandler et al., 2000!. Children with-out coping skills and a sense of efficacy inregard to their use are likely to experiencehigh levels of negative emotions and, there-fore, may be at risk for display externalizingbehaviors because they lack strategies for deal-ing with stress and negative emotions.

Our next set of hypotheses examined rela-tions between children’s coping and adjust-ment. Based on prior research and theorizingon the regulation of emotion versus behavior~Eisenberg, Fabes, Guthrie, & Reiser, 2000!,we expected some aspects of coping, particu-larly coping believed to modulate the experi-ence of emotional distress ~e.g., distractioncoping!, as well as internal feelings of copingefficacy, to be particularly related to low lev-els of internalizing problems ~which involveemotional distress!. Active coping was ex-pected ~and has been found; Compas et al.,2001! to relate to lower levels of both inter-nalizing and externalizing problems becauseit is likely to affect both the internal experi-ence of emotion and its outward expression.We tentatively hypothesized that support-seeking coping would be negatively associ-ated with both types of problem behaviors,whereas avoidance coping would be nega-tively related primarily to externalizing behav-iors ~because it would result in avoidingconflictual interactions!, although avoidancemight also be positively related to internaliz-ing because it may not provide an effectiveway of dealing with distress. Because COAsare at risk for both internalizing and external-izing problems, exploring the links betweencoping and adjustment is of particular rele-vance to examining factors contributing toCOAs’ risk for problem behaviors.

Children’s Coping as a Mediator of theRelation of Parent Socializationto Children’s Adjustment

Whereas research on the association betweenparent socialization and children’s coping islimited and only suggestive, data pertaining


to the relation of parent socialization tochildren’s adjustment is abundant and fairlyconsistent. In general, parenting behavior thatis high in warmth and support and consistentin regard to discipline, as well as low in harsh-ness and rejection, has been related to lowerlevels of both internalizing and externalizingadjustment problems ~e.g., Conger et al., 1993;Grant et al., 2003; Lengua, Wolchik, Sandler,& West, 2000; Patterson, 2002!. Although someinvestigators ~e.g., Grant et al., 2003! haveargued that negative parenting mediates therelation between stress and children’s adjust-ment, it also may be the case that children’scoping is a mediator of the relation betweenparent socialization and children’s adjust-ment. Coping is viewed as involving emotion-related regulation ~e.g., Compas et al., 2001;Eisenberg et al., 1997!, and the latter hasbeen found to mediate the relation of parent-ing to adjustment ~e.g., Brody & Ge, 2001;Eisenberg et al., 2001, 2003; Gottman et al.,1997!. Moreover, Sher ~1991! speculated thatchildren’s coping is a potential mediator ofthe relation of parental alcoholism to children’sadjustment, and Eiden et al. ~2004! foundthat paternal warm mediated the relation offathers’ alcoholism to 2-year-olds’ effortfulcontrol ~regulation!. Therefore, our final hy-pothesis was that children’s coping strategiesand coping efficacy would mediate the pat-terns of associations between parenting andchildren’s adjustment. We expected that theparents’ consistent and supportive behaviorswould be positively associated with theirchildren’s adaptive coping, and this adaptivecoping would, in turn, be associated with thechildren’s positive adjustment. In cases inwhich parental alcohol status moderated theassociation between parenting behaviors andcoping or coping efficacy, we examined dif-ferences in coping0coping efficacy as a medi-ator of the relation of parenting to adjustmentin the alcoholic and nonalcoholic families.

Method

Participants

The parents of the children in this study wereparticipants in an ongoing longitudinal study

examining the effects of parental alcoholismon Hispanic and Euro-American children’s de-velopment. The initial sample ~i.e., the par-ents! included an at-risk group of adolescents~generation 2 @G2# ! who had at least one par-ent ~generation 1 @G1# ! with an alcoholismdiagnosis and a comparison group in whichneither parent ~in G1! was diagnosed as alco-holic. The present study involved a follow-upto the initial study after approximately 15 yearsand included those adolescents ~G2! and sib-lings who now, as adults, had children ~gener-ation 3 @G3# ! between 5 and 13 years of age atthe time of the follow-up assessment.

The original sample of COAs was re-cruited from court records of arrests for driv-ing under the influence, health maintenancerecords, and community telephone screening.Interviews were conducted to determine if oneof the adolescents’ ~G2! biological and custo-dial parents ~G1! met the diagnostic criteriafor alcoholism. A demographically matchedcontrol group was recruited using reverse tele-phone directories to locate control familieswithin the same neighborhood. The controlsample was matched on ethnicity, family struc-ture, the target adolescent’s ~G2! age, and so-cioeconomic status obtained from propertyvalues. In addition, interviews were con-ducted to ensure that neither of the adoles-cents’ parents ~G1! met the diagnosis criteriafor alcoholism. Additional information aboutthe original recruitment procedure and repre-sentativeness of the sample can be found inChassin, Barrera, Bech, and Kossak-Fuller~1992!, Chassin, Flora, and King ~2004!, andChassin et al. ~1999!.

Participants ~G2! from the original samplewere contacted about the follow-up assess-ment. Those participants with children ~G3!and their spouses ~if available! were inter-viewed in their homes. Information obtainedat the home assessment included a diagnostictest of alcoholism status, as well as informa-tion on their parenting behavior with their ownchildren. In addition to the home assessment,primary caregiving parents were invited tobring their children for a laboratory assess-ment, where they reported on their children’scoping skills, coping efficacy, and parentalreactions to children’s negative emotions. Par-


ents were given $70 for the home interviewsand $15 for each set of questionnaires aboutthe children’s behaviors that the parents com-pleted; families were given $50 for each lab-oratory assessment completed.

Data from participants who completed thelaboratory assessment were used in the cur-rent investigation. This consisted of 180 fam-ilies, including 293 children ~M age � 7.43,SD � 2.27; 148 girls, 145 boys!. Parents in-volved reported on up to four children ~50%of the families had one child participating inthe study, 40% had two children, 7% had threechildren, and 3% had four children!. Therewere 286 parent questionnaires collected inthe laboratory ~254 were completed by moth-ers, 25 by fathers, 7 by maternal figures in-cluding grandmothers and stepmothers; sevenof the children participating were missing par-ent questionnaire data primarily due to com-puter errors in the questionnaire surveysoftware!. Of the 293 children participatingin the laboratory assessment, 251 mothers and185 fathers completed the parenting mea-sures collected in the home ~159 childrenhad both maternal and paternal reports ofparenting collected in the home, 92 hadonly maternal reports, 26 had only paternalreports, and 16 parents of the children par-ticipating in the laboratory assessment didnot complete the parenting measures in thehome!.

Of the families participating in the labora-tory assessment, 85 of the families were fromthe group in which at least one grandparenthad an alcohol diagnosis and 95 were from theoriginal control group. In addition, 11% of theG2 mothers and 35% of the G2 fathers werediagnosed as alcoholic ~14 mothers and 5 fa-thers who came into the laboratory receivedan alcoholism diagnosis!. Given that all grand-parents ~G1! were either Euro-American orHispanic, the children of mixed heritage werepartly of these backgrounds. Sixty-four per-cent of the children participating in the labo-ratory visit were Euro-American, 30% wereHispanic, 2% were listed as African Ameri-can, 4% were listed as “other,” and less than1% was reported as American Indian. Primarycaregivers who came to the laboratory re-ported on both maternal and paternal educa-

tion: 7 and 14%, respectively, had less than ahigh school diploma, 31 and 33% had a highschool diploma or equivalent, 37 and 31% hadsome college education, 13 and 8% earned a2-year college degree, 9 and 10% had a col-lege degree, and 3 and 5% had postbacheloreducation.

Because the older children in the samplecould provide self-reports of their coping,children aged 8 and older ~55 girls, 41 boys;M age � 10.17 years, SD � 1.56! were inter-viewed in the home about their coping skills~the avoidant subscale of the coping check-list and half the active coping subscale!. Atthe laboratory assessment, children who were7 years old or older ~59 girls, 51 boys; Mage � 9.93 years, SD � 1.62! completed thescales ~with assistance! on the coping check-list that were not completed at the home as-sessment ~support-seeking, distraction, and theremaining items on the active coping sub-scale!, as well as a scale assessing copingefficacy. Coping scale items were divided be-tween the two assessments to the limit thenumber of questions presented at one time sothat the children’s attention was not taxed.The coping questions were only to be admin-istered to children ages 8 and older; however,we were able to have children ages 7 andolder answer them when they came to thelaboratory.

In addition to the information collected atthe home and laboratory assessments, parentswere asked to provide consent to contact ateacher who was very familiar with their child.Teachers were mailed a packet of question-naires and mailed back the completed forms.Teachers completed questionnaires for 232children.

Families who completed the laboratory visitwere compared to families who did not par-ticipate in the laboratory assessment ~eitherby declining participation in this wave of thedata collection @for variables collected at theprevious wave of data collection# or by declin-ing participation in the laboratory visit!. Nodifferences were found in ethnicity, parent ed-ucation, or grandparent alcoholism. Childrenwith a nonalcoholic G2 parent, however, weremore likely to participate in the laboratorysession, x2 ~1, N � 300!� 8.41, p , .01.


Measures

Alcoholism measures

Grandparent (G1) diagnosis. Grandparents’lifetime alcoholism diagnosis was defined asalcohol abuse or dependence using DSM-IIIcriteria, and was obtained from a computer-ized version of the Diagnostic Interview Sched-ule, Version III ~CDIS-III; Robins, Helzer,Croughan, & Ratcliff, 1981!. For noninter-viewed grandparents, alcoholism diagnoseswere based on Family History Research Diag-nostic Criteria ~Endicott, Anderson, & Spitzer,1975!, using information from their spouses’reports.

Parent (G2) diagnosis. At this assessment,lifetime alcohol abuse and dependence diag-noses were obtained using CDIS-III ~Robinset al., 1981!. Diagnoses were given if the re-spondent met DSM-III-R lifetime criteria foreither abuse or dependence of alcohol. A com-posite score of parent alcohol status was cre-ated and included two groups: those with atleast one parent having an alcoholism diagno-sis, and cases in which neither parent received

an alcohol diagnosis. Both parents had an al-coholism diagnosis in 6% of the families.

Coping measures

The children and their parents completed mea-sures of coping and efficacy of coping. De-scriptive information for the children’s copingmeasures, including the number of partici-pants for each scale, is presented in Table 1.

Coping strategies. The Children’s CopingStrategies Checklist—Revision 1 ~CCSC-R1;Program for Prevention Research, 1993, 1999!was used to assess children’s coping strat-egies. The children and parents were asked torate how often ~1 � never, 4 � most of thetime! the children used a particular strategy tosolve their problems or to make themselvesfeel better when they had problems. The itemsreflected four dimensions of coping efforts~active, avoidance, support-seeking, and dis-traction strategies!.

The active coping strategies dimension in-cluded six five-item subscales ~in all exam-ples, “your child” was used in the parent form

Table 1. Means and standard deviations for coping andsocialization measures

Variable n M SD

Child report of copingActive 96 2.63 0.42Avoidant 96 2.61 0.48Support seeking 110 2.44 0.59Distraction 110 2.36 0.58Efficacy 109 2.92 0.48

Parent report of copingActive 280 2.32 0.55Avoidant 281 2.21 0.37Support seeking 283 2.77 0.69Efficacy 282 3.21 0.54

SocializationMaternal discipline consistency 251 3.97 0.64Maternal supportive parenting0CCNES 231 �0.02 0.85Paternal discipline consistency 185 3.93 0.57Paternal supportive parenting 185 4.21 0.50

AdjustmentExternalizing behavior 231 1.67 0.55Internalizing behavior 232 1.66 0.54


of the questionnaire and needed changes forpronouns were made!: ~a! cognitive decisionmaking ~planning or thinking about ways tosolve the problem, for example, “You” @or“Your child,” for parents# “thought about whichthings are best to do to handle the problem”!,~b! direct problem solving ~efforts to improvethe problem situation, for example, “You triedto make things better by changing what youdid”!, ~c! seeking understanding ~efforts tofind meaning in a problem situation or to tryto understand it better, for example, “You triedto figure out why things like this happen”!,~d! positive thinking ~thinking about the goodthings that happened, for example, “You re-minded yourself that overall things are prettygood for you!,” ~e! optimistic thinking ~think-ing about things in the future with a optimisticmanner, for example, “You told yourself thatit would be OK”!, and ~f ! control ~thinkingthat whatever happens can be dealt with, forexample, “You told yourself @himself0herself#that you could handle this problem”!.

The avoidance strategies dimension in-cluded three four-item subscales: ~a! avoidantactions ~efforts to avoid the problem by stay-ing away from it or leaving it, for example,“You avoided it by going to your room”!, ~b!repression ~repressing thinking of problems,for example, “You tried to ignore it”!, and ~c!wishful thinking ~using wishful thinking orimagining the problem was better, for exam-ple, “You wished that bad things wouldn’thappen”!. Support-seeking coping strategiesconsisted of two four-item subscales: ~a! sup-port for actions ~using other people as re-sources to assist in seeking solutions to theproblem situation, such as seeking advice, in-formation, or direct task assistance, for exam-ple, “You talked to someone who could helpyou solve the problem”!, and ~b! support forfeelings ~involving other people in listeningto feelings or providing understanding to helpthe person be less upset, for example, “Youtalked about your feelings with someone whoreally understood”!. Finally, distraction strat-egies consisted of two four-item subscales: ~a!physical release of emotions ~efforts to phys-ically work off feelings with physical exer-cise, play or efforts to physically relax, forexample, “You went bicycle riding”!, and ~b!

distracting actions ~efforts to avoid thinkingabout the problem situation by using distract-ing stimuli, entertainment or some distractingactivity, for example, “You watched TV”!. Theitems for each dimension were averaged tocompute the score for the dimension.

As already noted, children completed theavoidance strategies ~a� .70! and half of theactive coping strategies ~two items from eachsubscale! during the home assessment, andcompleted the other half of the active copingitems ~a for the complete active coping dimen-sion � .82!, as well as the support-seekingand the distraction coping scales ~as � .79and .72! at the laboratory. Self-report data foractive coping were used only for children whocompleted the scales at both the home and inthe lab. Primary caregivers completed the ac-tive, avoidant, and support-seeking copingstrategies scales ~as � .95, .70, and .92! in thelab. Because of time constraints and becausewe were concerned that parents would not re-ally know if school-aged children used distrac-tion, parents did not complete items on thedistraction coping scale.

Coping efficacy. At the laboratory, childrenand their primary caregivers also rated thechildren’s coping efficacy ~Sandler et al., 2000!.This scale consisted of seven items designedto measure the children’s satisfaction with howthey handled problems in the past ~e.g., “Over-all, how satisfied are you @is your child# withthe way you @he0she# handled problems in thelast month?”; 1 � not at all satisfied, 4 � verysatisfied ! and their anticipated effectivenessin handling future problems ~e.g., “In the fu-ture, how good do you think you @your child#will usually be in handling your @his0her# prob-lems?”; 1 � did not work at all, 4 � workedvery well !. The average of the seven itemswas computed ~as � .66 and .90 for childrenand caregivers, respectively!.

Parenting measures

Parental ~i.e., mothers’ and fathers! consis-tency of rule enforcement0discipline, sup-port, and punishment were assessed duringthe home assessment, and primary caregivers’~usually mothers’! reactions to children’s neg-


ative emotions were assessed at the labora-tory. Descriptive information for the parentingmeasures is also presented in Table 1.

Consistency of rule enforcement and discipline.Both mothers and fathers rated ~1 � stronglydisagree, 5 � strongly agree! their own con-sistency of rule enforcement and disciplineusing eight items adapted from the ParentalBehavior Inventory ~Schaefer, 1965!, five per-taining to the consistency of rule enforcement~e.g., “I soon forgot the rules I had made”!,and three pertaining to the consistency of dis-cipline subscale ~e.g., “I punished my childfor doing something one day but ignored it thenext”; as � .84 for mothers and .77 for fa-thers; also see Curran & Chassin, 1996!.

Parental support. Mothers and fathers rated~1 � little or none, 5 � the most possible!seven items from the Network of RelationsInventory ~Furman & Buhrmeister, 1985! thattap the amount of social support provided bythe parents to their children ~e.g., “How muchcan your child count on you to be there whenhe0she needs you, no matter what?”!. Parentsalso completed two items on a harsh punish-ment scale adapted from the Parent PracticesScale ~Strayhorn & Weidman, 1988!. The scalemeasured the degree to which the parents useharsh punishment with their children ~1�neveror almost never, 5 � many times each day;e.g., “Of all the times that you talk to yourchild about his0her behavior, what fractionare disapproval?”!.

The harsh punishment scale was nega-tively correlated with the parents’ social sup-port scores, rs ~249, 183! � �.31 and �.42,ps , .01, for mothers and fathers. Thus, theitems in the harsh punishment subscale werereverse scored, and the items from the twoscales were averaged to create a summary scoreof parental support ~high social support andlow harsh punishment; as � .77 for mothersand .80 for fathers!.

Coping with Children’s Negative EmotionsScale (CCNES). Primary caregivers com-pleted the CCNES ~Eisenberg et al., 1996,1999; Fabes, Eisenberg, & Bernzweig, 1990!.

The CCNES consists of 12 situations in whichchildren are likely to experience negative af-fect and distress. The primary caregivers rated~1 � very unlikely, 7 � very likely! how likelythey were to respond to their children in sixdifferent ways in each of the 12 situations,resulting in six 12-item subscales: ~a! dis-tressed reactions: the degree to which par-ents experience distress when their childrenexpress negative affect ~e.g., “If my child isgoing over to spend the afternoon at a friend’shouse and becomes nervous or upset becauseI can’t stay there with him0her, . . . I wouldfeel upset and uncomfortable because of mychild’s reaction”; a� .71!; ~b! punitive reac-tions: the degree to which parents respondwith punitive reactions that decrease their ex-posure or need to deal with the negative emo-tions of their children ~e.g., “If my child losessome prized possession and reacts with tears,. . . I would tell him0her that’s what happenswith you’re not careful”; a � .75!; ~c! mini-mization reactions: the degree to which par-ents minimize the seriousness of the situationor devalue the child’s problem or distressfulreaction ~e.g., “If my child is panicky andcan’t go to sleep after watching a scary TVshow, . . . I would tell my child he0she isover-reacting”; a � .85!; ~d! expressive en-couragement: the degree to which parents en-courage their children to express negativeaffect or the degree to which they validatetheir children’s negative emotional states ~e.g.,“If my child is afraid of injections and be-comes quite shaky and teary while waitingfor his0her turn to get a shot, . . . I wouldencourage my child to talk about his0herfears”; a � .89!; ~e! emotion-focused reac-tions: the degree to which parents respondwith strategies that are designed to help thechild feel better ~e.g., “If my child is about toappear in a recital or sports activity and be-comes visibly nervous about people watchinghim0her, . . . I would suggest that my childthink about something relaxing so that his0her nervousness will go away”; a� .80!; and~f ! problem-focused reactions: the degree towhich parents help their children solve theproblem that caused the child’s distress ~e.g.,“If my child falls off his0her bike and breaksit, and then gets upset and cries, . . . I would


help my child figure out a way to get the bikefixed”; a � .73!.

An exploratory factor analysis with vari-max rotation was used to reduce the data fromthe CCNES. Two factors with eigenvalues over1.0 emerged. The first factor accounted for39% of the variance and reflected supportivereactions to children’s distress ~expressive en-couragement, .81, emotion-focused reactions,.89, and problem-focused reactions, .90!. Thesecond factor accounted for 38% of the vari-ance and reflected negative reactions ~distressreactions, .77, punitive reactions, .87, and min-imization reactions, .91!. Based on the find-ings from the factor analysis, two summaryscores, one for the positive subscales and onefor the negative subscales, were created byaveraging the scores on the three subscalesthat loaded together on each factor. The twoindices of parental reactions to children’s neg-ative emotion, supportive reactions and nega-tive reactions, r ~283!� �.38, p, .001, werecombined by taking the mean of the two scales~parental negative responses were reversedscored before creating the composite score!.

Data reduction for maternalsupport measures

The measure of supportive behavior and theCCNES both assess the parents’ support ofeither their children’s behavior or negativeemotions; therefore, a summary score of sup-portive behavior was created. Given that themajority of CCNES questionnaires were com-pleted by mothers, the scores from maternalreport on the CCNES and maternal support-ive behavior measured in the home, whichwere interrelated, r ~229! � .44, p , .01,were standardized and averaged. There werea total of 231 maternal reports of supportiveparenting behaviors once the scores from theCCNES were combined with the home mea-sures of supportive parenting ~eight childrenwere missing parent report on the CCNES,25 cases of the CCNES were completed byfathers, and 29 of the mothers who com-pleted the CCNES in the laboratory did notcomplete the supportive parenting measurescollected in the home!.

Adjustment measures

Externalizing behaviors. To measure external-izing behaviors, teachers completed the 24-item Child Behavior Checklist ~Lochman &Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group,1995!. Teachers were asked to rate how often~1 � never to 4 � often! the children engagedin externalizing behaviors ~e.g., “argues,”“yells at others,” “breaks rules”; a� .95!.

Internalizing behaviors. Teachers completedtwo questionnaires about the children’s inter-nalizing behavior ~see Thomas, Forehand,Armistead, Wierson, & Fauber, 1990, for adiscussion of the validity of teacher reports ofinternalizing behaviors!. The Teacher ReportIndex of Depression ~Cole, Martin, Powers, &Truglio, 1996; Cole, Truglio, & Peeke, 1997!is a 13-item measure in which teachers reporton the frequency ~1 � never to 5 � often! ofdepressive symptoms ~e.g., “Plays or worksalone”; a � .90!. Teachers also completed a16-item anxiety scale, derived from items inAchenbach’s Child Behavior Checklist ~Ken-dall, Henin, MacDonald, & Treadwell, 1998!.Teachers rated how often ~1 � never to 5 �often! the child displayed anxiety symptoms~e.g., “Worrying,” “Nervous, highstrung,tense”; a� .88!. The two internalizing scaleswere highly correlated, r ~229!� .74, p, .01;therefore, the average of the two scales wascomputed and used as a measure of internal-izing behaviors. Descriptive information forthe adjustment variables can be found inTable 1.

Results

Results were examined using a mixed modelsdesign because mothers and fathers reportedon multiple children in families with morethan one child participating. In the mixed mod-els analyses, error coefficients are allowed tovary randomly, and the lack of independencebetween error terms from the same reporter isstatistically controlled ~Bryk & Raudenbush,1992!. A two-level model was used. The datafrom each child were nested within each grand-parent family. Three levels were not used be-cause there was not sufficient variability at


the parent level when nested at the grandpar-ent level. The between child effects were ex-amined while controlling for the within familyeffects. The degrees of freedom were esti-mated using the Satterthwaite approximation~because the computation of degrees of free-dom is complicated and does not correspondeasily to the sample size, we report ns as wellas dfs!.

Descriptive analyses

Analyses were conducted examining the rela-tions between demographic factors and thevariables of interest in the present study ~childcoping, parent socialization, and child adjust-ment!. The demographic variable was a fixedeffect in the mixed model predicting child cop-ing or parent socialization. Because there wereso few minority children who were not at leastpart Hispanic, Euro-American children werecompared with minority status children.

The only significant association betweenchild age and children’s reported coping orcoping efficacy was a negative relation of ageto avoidant coping, B � �.01, t ~94; n � 96!��2.68, p , .01. In addition, parents reportedthat older children used more active and avoid-ant coping and less support-seeking coping,B � .004, .002, �.004, ts ~243, 277, 257; ns �280, 281, 283!� 3.60, 3.01, and �2.53, ps ,.01. Parents reported that boys used less ac-tive coping and support-seeking coping com-pared to girls, Bs � �.14 and �.15, ts ~252and 260; ns � 280 and 283! � �2.41 and�1.97, ps , .02 and .05. Parents of Euro-American children reported that their childrenused less active coping and were lower in cop-ing efficacy than did parents of minority chil-dren, B � .17 and .18, ts ~183 and 158; ns �280 and 282! � 2.16 and 2.36, ps , .03 and.02. When examining differences in the parentsocialization measures, mothers reported lesssupportive parenting with older than with youn-ger children, B � �.01, t ~180; n � 231! ��3.74, p, .01, and with boys than with girls,B � �.23, t ~203; n � 231!� �2.33, p, .02.Finally, teachers reported that Euro-American,compared to minority children, were higher inanxiety, B � �.24, t ~71; n � 232! � �3.25,p , .01.

Relations between parents’ and children’sreports of children’s coping

Mixed models were used to examine the rela-tion of child-reported coping to parent-reportedcoping. Child- and parent-reported activecoping, support-seeking coping, and copingefficacy were at least marginally positivelyassociated, B � .21, .20, .15, ts ~92, 104, 103;ns � 94, 107, 106! � 3.05, 2.53, 1.83, ps ,.01, .01, .07. Child- and parent-reported avoid-ant coping scales were not associated, B �.01, t ~92; n � 94!� .13, ns.1

Familial alcohol status andchildren’s coping

To examine differences in children’s copingrelated to parent alcohol status, the alcoholstatus of the parent was coded as having atleast one alcoholic parent or not. Mixed modelanalyses were used where child coping waspredicted from parent alcohol status, which

1. Parents also completed 24 items from the COPE scale~Carver et al., 1989! to measure of their own copingbehaviors. Three composite scores were computed andincluded active coping and planning ~9 items; a� .77and .79 for mothers and fathers, respectively!, cogni-tive coping ~9 items; a� .83 and .68 for mothers andfathers, respectively!, and avoidance ~6 items; a� .63and .57 for mothers and fathers, respectively!. Mater-nal active coping was negatively associated with child-reported distraction and positively associated withparent-reported child active coping, support seeking,and coping efficacy, Bs � �.22, .34, .49, .27, ts ~86,205, 204, 185; ns � 89, 219, 221, 220!� �1.89, 5.02,5.61, 3.97, ps , .06, .01, .01, .01; maternal avoidantcoping was positively associated with child-reporteddistraction and parent-reported child avoidant coping,Bs � .42, .15, ts ~77, 216; ns � 89, 219!� 3.75, 3.22,ps, .01, .01; and maternal cognitive coping was neg-atively associated with child-reported avoidant copingand positively associated with parent-reported activecoping, support-seeking, and coping efficacy, Bs ��.17, .16, .21, .12, ts ~65, 199, 200, 174; ns � 82, 219,221, 220! � �1.83, 2.54, 2.51, 1.87, ps , .07, .01,.01, .06. Paternal active coping was positively associ-ated with parent-reported child active coping, avoid-ant, support-seeking, and efficacy, Bs � .22, .10, .17,.15, ts ~165, 153, 162, 176; ns �177, 178, 178, 179!�2.80, 1.72, 1.78, 1.86, ps , .01, .09, .08, .06; paternalavoidant coping was negatively associated with bothchild- and parent-reported coping efficacy, Bs � �.23,�.16, ts ~61, 120; ns � 67, 179! � �2.04, �1.96,ps , .05, .05.


was a fixed effect in the models along withchild age as a control factor due to the latter’sassociation with coping ~child age was in-cluded as a control factor in the rest of theanalyses!. The only significant finding wasthat parents’ reports of children’s avoidant cop-ing were higher in families with a parent alco-holism diagnosis, B � .10, t ~180; n � 271!�2.12, p � .04. The mixed models were alsocomputed separately for boys and girls. Thesignificant association between parent-reportedavoidant coping and parent alcohol status wasnot significant for girls, B � .06, t ~132; n �135! � .86, ns, but was significant for boys,B � .16, t ~96; n � 136! � 2.27, p � .03. Noother significant associations were found.

Differences in child coping related to grand-parent alcohol status were also examined. Thealcohol status of the grandparent was coded ashaving at least one alcoholic grandparent ornot. Parents of children in the grandparentalcoholic group reported lower scores onchildren’s coping efficacy compared to par-ents of children in the grandparent controlgroup, B � �.17, t ~102; n � 282! � �2.32,p , .02. When the mixed models were exam-ined separately for boys and girls, the signifi-cant association between parent-reported childefficacy and grandparent alcohol status wasnot significant for boys, B � �.05, t ~87; n �

141!� �.47, ns, but was significant for girls,B � �.31, t ~75; n � 141!� �3.14, p � .01.

Children’s coping, parent socialization,and familial alcohol status

Relations of parenting to children’s copingstrategies. Mixed models were computed toexamine the relation of children’s coping strat-egies to parent socialization. Parent socializa-tion measures and child age ~as a controlvariable! were the fixed effects predictingchildren’s coping ~see Table 2!.

Because of the number of analyses, we em-phasize general patterns of findings. Children’sreports of active coping were at least margin-ally related to three of the four measures ofparenting. Specifically, they were positivelyassociated with maternal discipline consis-tency, maternal and paternal supportiveparenting. There were few significant rela-tions between parenting and children’s reportsof avoidant, support-seeking, or distractioncoping.

Similar to the findings for children’s re-ports of coping, parents’ reports of children’sactive coping were positively related withmothers’ reports of consistent discipline andsupportive parenting and fathers’ reports ofsupportive parenting. Moreover, all of the par-

Table 2. Mixed model results for children’s coping strategies relatedto parent socialization, controlling for child age

Maternal Paternal

DisciplineConsistency

Supportive0CCNES

DisciplineConsistency Supportive

B n B n B n B n

Child report copingActive .18* 90 .13** 80 .04 60 .23* 60Avoidant �.19* 90 �.07 80 �.03 60 �.04 60Support seeking .07 101 .07 90 �.08 69 .05 69Distraction �.04 101 �.12† 90 .04 69 .17 69

Parent report copingActive .27** 241 .34** 229 .04 178 .25** 178Avoidant �.01 241 .02 229 �.01 178 .06 178Support seeking .18* 243 .35** 230 �.01 179 .33** 179

†p , .10. *p , .05. **p , .01.


enting variables except fathers’ reports of con-sistent discipline were related to reports ofchildren’s support-seeking coping, and the find-ings generally held for both genders. Therewere relatively few relations between parents’reports of children’s avoidant coping and theparent socialization variables. When across-reporter associations between mothers’ reportof children’s coping ~excluding any fathers’reports! and fathers’ report of discipline con-sistency and supportive parenting were exam-ined, controlling for child age, mothers’ reportsof active coping and support-seeking copingwere still positively associated with fathers’report of supportive parenting, Bs � .24 and.34, ts ~151 and 147; ns �158 and 159!� 2.73and 3.31, ps , .01.

Relations of parenting to children’s copingefficacy. Because several of the associationsdiffered by child gender, relations betweenchildren’s coping efficacy and parent social-ization are presented for the total sample aswell as separately for girls and boys ~seeTable 3!. Children’s reports of coping efficacywere at least marginally positively related toseveral parenting variables, but more relationswere found for boys. Boys’ reports of efficacywere at least marginally positively related tomothers’ reports of consistent discipline andsupportive parenting. Girls’ reported efficacy

was marginally positively related to fathers’reports of supportive parenting.

Parents’ reports of children’s coping effi-cacy were positively related to maternal con-sistent discipline and supportive parenting, aswell as paternal supportive parenting ~but notconsistent discipline!. This pattern of findingswas clearest for supportive parenting and find-ings did not differ much across child gender.The association for father-reported supportiveparenting was retained when only mothers’reports of coping efficacy were used in theanalyses, B � .18, t ~139; n � 159! � 2.09,p , .04.

Familial alcohol status and parental social-ization. To examine differences in parent so-cialization ~maternal and paternal consistencyof discipline and supportive behaviors! re-lated to parent0grandparent alcohol status,mixed model analyses were used where par-ent socialization was predicted from parent orgrandparent alcohol status ~coded as either hav-ing one alcoholic parent0grandparent or not!.Parent0grandparent alcohol status was a fixedeffect in the models along with child age, whichwas entered as a control factor. No significantassociations were found between parent so-cialization and either parent or grandparentalcohol status.

Table 3. Mixed model results for children’s coping efficacy related to parentsocialization, presented separately by child gender and controlling for child age

Maternal Paternal

DisciplineConsistency

Supportive0CCNES

DisciplineConsistency Supportive

B n B n B n B n

Child report efficacyTotal sample .17* 100 .10† 89 .11 69 .19† 69Girls .05 54 .01 48 .07 38 .28† 38Boys .32** 46 .13† 41 .21 31 .09 31

Parent report efficacyTotal sample .12* 241 .27** 229 �.07 180 .21** 180Girls .13 117 .28** 110 .01 88 .24* 88Boys .10 124 .24** 119 �.12 92 .21† 92

†p , .10. *p , .05. **p , .01.


Moderation by parental alcohol status. Mixedmodel analyses were computed to examinemoderation between parental alcohol status andparental socialization when predicting copingand coping efficacy. Although child-reportedefficacy related somewhat differently to par-enting for boys and girls, we used only thetotal sample in these analyses to reduce thenumber of analyses. Composite scores werealso created for maternal parenting behaviorscombining maternal consistency of disciplineand supportive parenting: the measures werecorrelated, r ~229! � .35, p , .001. Becausedifferent patterns of associations were foundbetween children’s coping and the two mea-sures of paternal parenting, paternal consis-tency of discipline and supportive parentingwere not combined.

Interaction terms were created by center-ing continuous variables and multiplying par-ent alcohol status by the index of parentalsocialization ~Aiken & West, 1991; Cohen,Cohen, West, & Aiken, 2003!. The coping vari-able was the dependent variable, and childage, the parent socialization variable, parentalcohol status, and the interaction between par-ent socialization and parent alcohol status wereentered as fixed effects.

Two ~out of nine analyses! significant inter-action terms were found when examining ma-ternal parenting variables and children’s copingand coping efficacy, and 4 ~out of 18! of theinteraction terms were significant for paternalparenting variables. Parent alcohol statusmoderated the associations between maternalsupportive0consistent parenting and child-reported coping efficacy and parent-reportedsupport-seeking coping, Bs for the interactionterms � �.35 and �.31, ts ~74 and 219; ns �85 and 224!� �2.23 and �2.08, ps, .03 and.04. Parent alcohol status moderated the asso-ciations between paternal consistency of dis-cipline and children’s reports of support-seekingcoping, distraction coping, and coping effi-cacy, Bs � �.72, �.83, and �.55, ts ~61, 62,62; ns�67!��2.04, �2.32, and �2.08, ps,.05, .02, and .04, respectively, and also mod-erated the association between paternal sup-portive parenting and child-reported copingefficacy, B��.62, t ~62; n�67!��2.96, p,.01. When examining moderation between par-

enting and grandparent alcohol status, only oneout of the 27 interaction terms was significant,and this finding was marginal.

Significant interactions terms for socializa-tion were probed following procedures fromAiken and West ~1991! and Cohen et al. ~2003!.Paternal consistent discipline was negatively as-sociated with children’s reports of both support-seeking and distraction coping for the alcoholicgroup, Bs � �.71 and �.67, ts ~61 and 62!��2.15 and �2.02, ps , .04 and .05, but wasnot associated with child-reported support-seeking or distraction coping for the nonalco-holic group, Bs � .01 and .16, ts ~58 and 56!�.11 and 1.21, ns. Maternal supportive0consistentparenting, paternal consistent discipline, and pa-ternal support were positively associated withchildren’s reports of efficacy for the nonalco-holic groups, Bs� .27, .18, .38, ts ~79, 62, 62!�2.99, 1.91, 3.28, ps, .01, .06, .01, but not forthe alcoholic groups, Bs � �.08, �.37, �.25,ts ~78, 62, 62!� �.54, �1.49, �1.39, ns. Ma-ternal supportive0consistent parenting was alsopositively related to parent-reported support-seeking coping for the nonalcoholic group, B�.52, t ~193! � 6.03, p , .01, but not for thealcoholic group, B � .21, t ~210!� 1.60, ns.

Parent socialization as a mediator. Mixedmodel analyses were computed to examineparent socialization as a mediator of the rela-tion between familial alcoholism and children’scoping. As recommended by MacKinnon,Lockwood, Hoffman, West, and Sheets ~2002!,mediation was considered to be significant if,in the first set of analyses, familial alcoholismpredicted parent socialization, and if, in thesecond set of analyses, parent socialization~the mediator! predicted child coping ~the de-pendent variable! when familial alcoholismwas also entered as a fixed effect ~child agewas included as a control factor!. Familial al-cohol status did not predict parental socializa-tion ~as reported above!; therefore, mediationmodels could not be examined.

Children’s coping, parent socialization,and child adjustment

In the next set of analyses, we examined ifcoping mediated the relation between parent-


ing and children’s adjustment. To examine theseissues, we first examined relations between cop-ing and adjustment. Next, when relations werefound, coping was examined as a mediator ofthe relation between parenting and children’sadjustment. Mixed model analyses were com-puted to examine if children’s coping poten-tially mediated the relation between parentalsocialization and teachers’ report of children’sadjustment ~MacKinnon et al., 2002!. Again,mediation was considered to be significant if,in the first set of analyses, socialization pre-dicted child coping, and if, in the second set ofanalyses, child coping ~the mediator! predictedchild adjustment ~the dependent variable!whensocialization was also entered as a fixed effect~child age was included as a control factor!. Asin the previous analyses, the total sample forchild-reported coping efficacy was used in theseanalyses. Given the similar pattern of findingsbetween parental socialization and parents’ re-ports of children’s active and support-seekingcoping, reports of these coping strategies, whichwere substantially correlated, r ~278!� .57, p,.001, were combined by summing the mean ofthe two scores.

Children’s coping and adjustment. Children’sself-reports of coping efficacy were nega-

tively associated with teachers’ reports of thechildren’s internalizing behaviors ~see Table 4!.Parents’ reports of children’s active0support-seeking coping were negatively associated withteachers’ reports of both externalizing and in-ternalizing problems. Parental report of childefficacy was also negatively associated withteachers’reports of child internalizing problems.

Coping as a mediator between parent social-ization and teacher report of adjustment. Onlythe coping measures that were significantlyassociated with teachers’ report of adjust-ment ~child-reported and parent-reported cop-ing efficacy, as well as parent-reported active0support-seeking coping! were included in theanalyses because mediation requires an asso-ciation between the mediator and the depen-dent variable when the independent variableis controlled ~and findings with suppressioneffects for the mediator would be difficult toexplain!. The composite of parent-reportedactive0support-seeking coping, as well as thecomposite socialization measures of maternalsupportive0consistent discipline2 and pater-

2. Maternal supportive parenting was near significantlynegatively associated with teacher-reported child ex-ternalizing behavior, B � �.08, t ~125; n � 185! �

Table 4. Mixed model results for teachers’ reportof adjustment related to child coping,controlling for child age

Teacher Report

Externalizing Internalizing

B n B n

Child report copingActive �.08 78 �.13 79Avoidant �.03 78 �.03 79Support seeking .13 91 �.12 92Distraction �.04 91 �.16 92Efficacy .03 90 �.28** 91

Parent report copingActive0support seeking �.15** 223 �.22** 224Avoidant .04 223 .01 224Efficacy �.07 224 �.14* 225

*p , .05. **p ,.01.


nal supportive discipline, were used in theanalyses, and child age was controlled for inthe analyses. Table 5 presents the results fromthe mediation analyses.3 Only analyses inwhich potential mediation was found for ei-ther internalizing or externalizing problemsare included in Table 5.

Children with mothers who were moresupportive0consistent in their parenting andwith fathers who were more supportive re-ported experiencing more coping efficacy.When both child-reported efficacy and ma-ternal supportive0consistent parenting wereentered as predictors of teacher-reported inter-nalizing problems, child-reported coping effi-cacy remained a significant negative predictor~which indicated that child-reported copingefficacy could have mediated the associationbetween maternal parenting and low levels ofinternalizing problems!. Child-reported cop-ing efficacy also remained a significant pre-dictor of child internalizing problems whenpaternal supportive parenting was included asa predictor with child efficacy.

Parental reports of children’s coping werealso found to mediate the relation betweenparental socialization and teacher-reported

�1.70, p, .09. None of the other parent socializationmeasures was significantly associated with child ex-ternalizing or internalizing. However, mediation doesnot require that the predictor and outcome variable bedirectly correlated ~MacKinnon et al., 2002!.

3. The number of maternal reports of supportive behav-ior decreased when the measure of supportive behav-ior in the home was combined with supportive behaviormeasured by the CCNES. However, the mediation analy-ses were similar when the maternal behavior compos-ite included the measure of supportive behavior fromthe home assessment ~and not the CCNES! combinedwith maternal discipline consistency.

Table 5. Mixed model analyses examining child coping as a mediator between parentsocialization and teachers’ report of adjustment, controlling for child age

Teacher Report

Externalizing Internalizing

b n b n

1. Maternal support0consistentr efficacy~child report! .22* 74 .23* 75

2. Maternal support0consistent, efficacy~child report!r adjustment

�.03 ~parenting!.08 ~efficacy! 74

.05 ~parenting!�.43** ~efficacy! 75

1. Paternal supportr efficacy ~child! .25* 57 .25* 582. Paternal support, efficacy~child report!r adjustment

�.18 ~parenting!.26† ~efficacy! 57

�.03 ~parenting!�.36* ~efficacy! 58

1. Maternal support0consistentr active0support seeking ~parent report! .47** 183 .47** 184

2. Maternal support0consistent, active0support seeking ~parent report!r adjustment

�.01 ~parenting!�.20* ~coping! 183

.08 ~parenting!�.26** ~coping! 184

1. Paternal supportr active0support seeking~parent report! .25* 140 .25* 141

2. Paternal support, active0support seeking~parent report!r adjustment



1. Maternal support0consistentr efficacy~parent report! .35** 184 .35** 185

2. Maternal support0consistent, efficacy~parent report!r adjustment

�.06 ~parenting!�.07 ~efficacy! 184

.04 ~parenting!�.23** ~efficacy! 185

1. Paternal supportr efficacy ~parent report! .24** 140 .23** 1412. Paternal support, efficacy~parent report!r adjustment

�.09 ~parenting!�.02 ~efficacy! 140

�.10 ~parenting!�.18* ~efficacy! 141

†p , .10. *p , .05. **p ,.01.


child adjustment ~see Table 5!. Children withmothers higher in supportive0consistent par-enting and fathers higher in supportive parent-ing were rated by parents as higher in active0support-seeking coping. Furthermore, indica-tive of mediation, children higher in parent-reported active0support-seeking coping wererated by teachers as lower on both externaliz-ing and internalizing behaviors, even whenthe aforementioned parent socialization vari-ables were included in the respective analy-ses. The findings were similar when parents’reports of children’s coping efficacy were ex-amined as mediators of the association be-tween both maternal supportive0consistentparenting and paternal supportive parentingand teacher-reported internalizing problems.Parent-reported child efficacy, however, didnot even marginally mediate the relation ofmaternal supportive0consistent parenting orpaternal support to children’s externalizingproblems.

Because the relations of maternal sup-portive0consistent parenting, paternal consis-tency of discipline, and paternal support tochild-reported coping efficacy were moder-ated by parental alcohol status, and becausechild-reported efficacy was also negatively re-lated to teacher-reported internalizing ~but notexternalizing! problems, we examined differ-ences between the alcoholic and nonalcoholicfamilies in the mediated relation of each so-cialization measure to internalizing problemswith child-reported coping efficacy as the me-diator. In the first analysis, in which the maineffects of parenting, alcohol group, and theinteraction term were used to predict themediator, maternal supportive0consistent par-enting, paternal discipline consistency, andpaternal supportive behavior both at least mar-ginally predicted child-reported coping effi-cacy ~in separate analyses!, Bs � .31, .20, and.40, ts ~65, 51, and 51!� 3.23, 1.89, and 3.25,ps , .01, .06, and .01; Bs � �.32, �.52, and�.83, and importantly, the interaction termswere at least marginally significant, ts ~62, 51,and 51! � �1.84, �1.70, and �2.85, ps ,.07, .10, and .01. In the next step, when theinteraction between parent alcohol status andmaternal supportive0consistent parenting, pa-ternal consistency, or paternal support was en-

tered with the main effects of the socializationvariable and familial alcoholism, child-reportedcoping efficacy remained a significant or mar-ginally significant predictor of teacher-reportedinternalizing, Bs � �.46, �.28, and �.41, ts~65, 50, and 46!� �3.16, �1.74, and �2.34,ps , .01, .09, and .02, for coping efficacy;Bs � .11, �.15, and .08, ts ~65, 50, and46! � .85, �1.18, and .46, ns, for parenting;Bs � �.17, .48, and �.37, ts ~63, 50, and50!� �.82, 1.31, and �.93, ns, for the inter-action term. The number of participants forthese analyses was 71 for maternal supportive0consistent parenting and 56 for both paternaldiscipline and support. Across the mixed modelanalyses, support was strongest for paternalsupportive behavior and near significant ~inat least one equation! for maternal or pater-nal consistency. Thus, it is plausible thatchild-reported efficacy mediated the relationsbetween maternal parenting and paternal con-sistency of discipline and support ~especiallythe latter! to low levels of internalizing prob-lems and that this relation was moderated byparental alcohol status. Recall that in the pre-viously reported moderation analyses, mater-nal supportive0consistent parenting, paternalconsistent discipline, and paternal support werepositively associated with children’s reportsof efficacy for the nonalcoholic groups, butnot for the alcoholic groups.

We also examined differences between thealcoholic and nonalcoholic families in themediated relation of maternal supportive0consistent parenting to both externalizing andinternalizing with parent-reported active0support-seeking coping as the mediator. Thefirst criterion for mediation was met; maternalsupportive0consistent parenting significantlypredicted parent-reported active0support-seeking coping, Bs � .53 and .53, ts ~168 and168! � 7.56 and 7.57, ps , .01; Bs � �.30and �.29, and, most importantly, the inter-action terms, ts ~172 and 174! � �2.40 and�2.38, ps , .02. In the next step, when theinteraction between parent alcohol status andmaternal supportive0consistent parenting wasentered with the main effects of the social-ization variable and familial alcoholism,parent-reported active0support-seeking cop-ing remained a significant predictor of both


teacher-reported externalizing and internaliz-ing, Bs � �.18 and �.26, ts ~157 and 171!��2.02 and �2.99, ps, .05 and .01, for active0support-seeking coping; Bs � .01 and .04, ts~142 and 166!� .07 and .46, ns, for maternalparenting; Bs � �.05 and .12, ts ~140 and167! � �.33 and .84, ns, for the interactionterm. The number of participants was 178 forthe externalizing analyses and 179 for inter-nalizing analyses. Again, it is possible thatparent-reported active0support-seeking cop-ing mediated the relations between maternalsupportive0consistent parenting to low levelsof both externalizing and internalizing prob-lems and that this relation was moderated byparental alcohol status. Recall in the initialmoderation analyses that maternal supportive0consistent parenting was positively related toparent-reported support-seeking coping for thenonalcoholic group, but not for the alcoholicgroup. Because grandparent alcohol status didnot moderate the relations of parenting ~G2!to the children’s coping or coping efficacy, itwas not examined as a moderator of the me-diated relations.

Discussion

Research on the role of parent socializationrelated to children’s coping is quite limited.Thus, we examined the relations of children’scoping strategies and coping efficacy with pa-rental socialization, children’s adjustment, andfamily alcohol status. We also examined mod-eration of the association between socializa-tion and coping variables by familial alcoholstatus as well as parent socialization as a me-diator of the relation of familial alcohol statusto children’s coping. Parent socialization wasassociated with some types of children’scoping strategies, especially active coping,support-seeking coping, and coping efficacy;some of these relations were moderated byparent alcohol status. In addition, childrenhigher in certain coping strategies and in cop-ing efficacy were rated by teachers as lower inexternalizing and internalizing adjustmentproblems. Although concurrent data cannotprovide strong evidence for mediational pro-cesses, the pattern of findings was consistentwith the conclusion that children’s coping strat-

egies and coping efficacy may mediate theassociation of parental socialization to chil-dren’s psychological adjustment, and that themediated model sometimes may differ for fam-ilies with and without a history of parentalalcoholism.

Contrary to expectations, parental alcohol-ism was related only to parents’ reports ofchildren’s avoidant coping; children with analcoholic parent were more likely to use avoid-ant coping. Such coping is viewed as rela-tively maladaptive and may be learned eitherthrough modeling or because children withalcoholic parents may learn that it often isuseful to avoid stressful social interactions.Grandparent alcoholism was unrelated tochildren’s coping. The relative dearth of dif-ferences between familial alcoholism andchildren’s coping is surprising given the linkbetween familial alcoholism and children’s reg-ulation. The children in this study were mostlyaged 5 to 10; relations of parenting to children’scoping may consolidate over time. Moreover,as children become more insightful reportersof their own coping with age, such relationsmight be more evident. The lack of findingsmay also be due to the fact that most of thealcoholic parents were fathers, and mothersmay usually be a more important agent forteaching children coping skills.

Regardless of familial alcoholism, our find-ings indicate that parenting was related to cer-tain types of children’s coping, as well as totheir coping efficacy. As we expected, higherlevels of active coping as reported by childrenand parents generally were related to higherlevels of maternal discipline consistency andsupportive parenting, as well as paternalsupportive parenting. The same pattern of re-lations was found for parents’ reports ofchildren’s support-seeking strategies. As sug-gested by Skinner and Edge ~2002!, parentingbehaviors high in warmth, support, and con-sistency may promote children’s coping skills.In addition, parents who are supportive andwho use consistent discipline may be bettermodels of constructive coping. Of course, it isalso possible that children with good copingskills elicit higher levels of positive parentingfrom their mothers and fathers or that inher-ited temperamental factors are partly respon-


sible for the association between parenting andchildren’s coping.

Very few associations, however, were foundbetween avoidance and distraction coping strat-egies and parental socialization. Parentingbehaviors may have less of an impact on avoid-ance and distraction coping strategies than ac-tive or support-seeking coping because theformer types of coping are less likely to in-volve social interaction. Because children’scoping strategies can bring them into and outof certain social contexts ~Skinner & Edge,2002!, coping strategies that enhance socialinteraction ~i.e., some types of active andsupport-seeking coping! might be more likelyto elicit reactions from social partners and,consequently, be more closely associated withparental socialization than are coping strat-egies that are less likely to involve socialinteraction ~i.e., avoidance coping and distrac-tion! ~Skinner & Edge, 2002!. Coping thatbrings children into social contact would bemore likely to allow parents to be activelyinvolved in the children’s coping, a processthat could further enhance children’s copingstrategies. Another reason for the lack of as-sociation between parent socialization andavoidant and distraction coping could be thenature of these types of coping strategies. Sometypes of distraction coping strategies, as wellas avoidant coping that does not involve ac-tive movement away from events or people,involve less overt behavior than support-seeking or active coping ~Kliewer et al., 1996!.Children may have had more difficulty recal-ling or even processing the use of these strat-egies than recalling the use of active andsupport-seeking strategies, and parents may notbe as accurate in rating the occurrence of morecovert types of strategies as they are when rat-ing overtly exhibited coping behaviors.

We also expected children’s coping effi-cacy to be associated with parental social-ization, and this hypothesis was partiallysupported by the findings of the present study.The pattern of relations between children’sreports of coping efficacy and parent social-ization were different within child gender ~al-though not necessarily significantly differentacross gender!. Higher maternal discipline con-sistency and higher maternal supportive be-

haviors were related to higher child-reportedcoping efficacy for boys. Higher paternal sup-port was marginally positively related to greaterchild-reported coping efficacy for girls. Onepossible reason for maternal parenting relat-ing to boys’coping efficacy could be that moth-ers feel it is more important for boys to be incontrol of ~i.e., cope with! their emotions.Clearly, boys have more difficulty with exter-nalizing problems than do girls, especiallyphysical aggression and overt antisocial be-haviors ~Dodge, Coie, & Lynam, in press!, sothere is reason for parents to focus on boys’coping efficacy ~see Keenan & Shaw, 1997,for a review of the literature on how differen-tial socialization practices for boys vs. girlsmay be related to the development of genderdifferences in problem behavior!. In addition,higher parent-reported coping efficacy was re-lated to higher levels of maternal and paternalsupportive parenting ~and the pattern of withinchild gender relations was similar for boysand girls!. Not only are children with support-ive parents likely to adopt more adaptive cop-ing strategies than other children, but due topositive parental feedback and their history ofsuccessful coping, they also may be more likelyto believe in their ability to effectively usecoping strategies.

Findings regarding the associations be-tween parent socialization and active copingwere similar for parent-reported and child-reported active coping strategies. In contrast,associations with socialization were foundfor parents’, but not children’s, reports ofchildren’s support-seeking strategies and, ingeneral, more associations were obtained forparent-reported coping strategies and copingefficacy. Except for avoidant coping, parents’reports of coping strategies and efficacy wereassociated with children’s reports of the sameconstruct; however, parents and children pro-vide different perspectives on the children’scoping strategies and efficacy. Children’s self-reports of coping strategies and coping effi-cacy may have been limited by the children’sreluctance to report using unsuccessful cop-ing strategies ~Compas et al., 2001!, or theymay not realize that they use some copingstrategies. The difference in the number offindings for child- versus parent-reported cop-


ing could also be due to the facts that parentsreported on both socialization and coping andthat the sample size was considerably largerfor parental than child reporters.

Parental alcohol status moderated severalof the associations between maternal and pa-ternal socialization and children’s reports oftheir coping and coping efficacy. We expectedthat the relations between parenting andchildren’s coping would be stronger in the al-coholic families because parenting would be aprotective factor in those families; however,mothers’ supportive0consistent parenting aswell as fathers’ consistency of discipline andsupportive parenting were more strongly re-lated to child-reported coping efficacy for chil-dren in families without alcoholism than infamilies with alcoholism. These findings seemto be somewhat consistent with El-Sheikh andBuckhalt’s ~2003! findings regarding the rela-tion of child-reported attachment with the par-ent to parent- and teacher-reported socialproblems, in that a secure attachment to par-ents was a protective factor only in familieswithout an identified drinking problem. Ma-ternal supportive0consistent parenting wasalso associated with parent-reported support-seeking coping in the nonalcoholic but not inthe alcoholic families, and this finding mayfurther support the idea that parenting may bea protective factor more in the nonalcoholicthan in the alcoholic families.

Unexpectedly, we also found that, in thealcoholic group, more paternal discipline con-sistency was associated with lower levels ofchild-reported support-seeking and distrac-tion coping. Fathers of COAs who reportedusing consistent discipline may have been moreinvolved with their children than those whodid not report using consistent discipline. Per-haps children with alcoholic parents ~the ma-jority of whom were fathers! who are activelyinvolved in parenting are reluctant to seek pa-rental assistance with coping because they lackconfidence that their parents will provide use-ful assistance in coping ~due to negative ex-amples at home!, and the finding that parents’reports of children’s avoidant coping werehigher in alcoholic families is consistent withthis explanation. These findings suggest thatalcohol abuse within a family has the poten-

tial to interfere with the constructive role thatpositive parenting behavior can play in thedevelopment of children’s coping strategies.

Paternal socialization, in comparison to ma-ternal socialization, may have moderated moreof the relations of parenting to the children’sreports of their coping primarily because mostof the alcoholic parents were fathers. Fathers’consistent parenting may have had a differentmeaning for children with alcoholic fathersthan with nonalcoholic fathers. Moreover, otherfactors, such as parental personality, are likelyrelated to parental alcoholism and may inter-act in predicting not only parents’ childrearing~as was found by Brook, Whiteman, Balka, &Cohen, 1995!, but also children’s coping andadjustment ~see Brook, Whiteman, Shapiro,& Cohen, 1996!. In any case, our findingsabout the moderational role of parent alcoholstatus seem to be consistent with those of El-Sheikh and Buckhalt ~2003! in demonstratingthat parental alcoholism and the quality of theparent–child relationship ~and family function-ing! interact when predicting children’s socialand behavioral adjustment.

Based on past findings ~Compas et al., 2001;Kliewer et al., 1994!, we expected coping strat-egies and coping efficacy to be associated withchildren’s psychological adjustment. Bothchildren’s and parents’ reports of coping effi-cacy were negatively related with teacher-reported internalizing ~but not externalizing!problems. Children’s perceptions of their cop-ing efficacy would be expected to relate totheir feelings of control versus helplessnessand depression. Consistent with Compas’ re-view, parents’ reports of children’s active0support-seeking coping were negatively asso-ciated with teachers’ reports of both internal-izing and externalizing problems; these modesof coping can be used to modulate internalemotion and also can change a stressful situ-ation or elicit help in changing it. Moreover,the pattern of findings is consistent with thepossibility that children’s coping strategies andcoping efficacy sometimes mediated associa-tions between parent socialization and adjust-ment. Parent-reported active0support-seekingcoping mediated the negative associations ofmaternal supportive0consistent parenting andpaternal supportive parenting with both exter-


nalizing and internalizing adjustment prob-lems. Furthermore, both child- and parent-reported coping efficacy mediated the negativeassociations of maternal supportive0consistentparenting and paternal supportive parentingwith children’s internalizing adjustment prob-lems. In addition, consistent with the moder-ated relations already discussed, parentalalcoholism moderated some of the relations ofsocialization with adjustment, as mediated bychildren’s coping.

Thus, children with more maternal supportand consistent discipline and more paternalsupport displayed more active0support-seekingcoping and coping efficacy ~as reported byboth parents and children!, and those copingstrategies were associated with better psycho-logical adjustment. These findings are consis-tent with the conclusion that parenting behaviorcan influence children’s coping and copingefficacy, which in turn, influence children’sadjustment. However, we cannot prove causalrelations, especially with concurrent data. Thefact that parenting seldom predicted adjust-ment when controlling for coping indicatesthat parenting did not mediate the relationsbetween coping and adjustment. Moreover, itis possible that a third variable, such as hered-ity, marital conflict, neighborhood violence,or the children’s temperament, may affect par-enting, children’s coping, and their adjust-ment, and that parenting and coping do nothave causal effects on adjustment. The factthat parenting was only weakly related to ad-justment ~see footnote 2! suggests that medi-ation was indirect. MacKinnon et al. ~2002!,like Kenny, Kashy, and Bolger ~1998!, haveargued that mediation can occur even whenan independent variable does not predict thecriterion ~outcome! variable ~or only weaklypredicts it!. Thus, our findings suggest thatparenting may have indirect effects on teacher-reported adjustment through its effects oncoping. It is quite possible that relations ofparenting to adjustment would be stronger ifadjustment had been reported by the childrenor by a parent because problem behaviors candiffer across the home and school contexts.Nonetheless, having a different reporter of ad-justment than of coping and socialization isthe more stringent test of mediation.

Fathers’ reports of consistent discipline gen-erally were unrelated to coping, except whenmoderated by familial alcoholism status. Ma-ternal parenting may play a particularly im-portant role in children’s coping ~Ruchkinet al., 1999!. Also, our findings on paternaldiscipline consistency are similar to Brooket al.’s ~2002! finding in a study includingparents with substance abuse problems; pater-nal support, but not holding definite rules,was related to adolescents’ perceptions of be-ing an adaptive coper. However, paternal con-sistency was positively related to children’sefficacy in nonalcoholic families. Differencesin variability of maternal and paternal prac-tices ~i.e., SDs! do not seem to account for thedifferences in the findings for mothers andfathers. The sample size for fathers was smallerthan for mothers, but fathers’ supportive par-enting was associated with children’s coping.Fathers’ discipline consistency may have lessof an impact because fathers interact less withtheir children or because the effects of pater-nal consistency varied as a function of paren-tal alcoholism.

Unexpectedly, familial alcohol status gen-erally was not related to consistency of disci-pline and supportive parenting practices foreither mothers or fathers using the measuresin this paper; therefore, we could not examinethe hypothesis that parenting practices wouldmediate the association between familial alco-hol status and child coping. Perhaps there arelarger differences related to familial alcohol-ism in parents’ aversive, negative parentingthan in the supportive and consistent parent-ing measured here. Only two of the nine itemsused in the parental support measure assessedharsh parenting, and these questions did notreflect extreme levels of negative parentingbehaviors. In addition, we may have foundmore of a difference if the children had re-ported on the parents’ behavior ~which wasnot done because many of the children wereyoung and we were concerned that some par-ents would object!. Another consideration isthat relatively few of the mothers were alco-holic, which would have reduced the odds offinding differences based on alcoholism in ma-ternal parenting. More findings may have beenobtained if all fathers had completed the CCNES


~recall it was administered only in the labora-tory!. In addition, many of the studies in whichparenting was related to familial alcohol statusinvolved young children ~Eiden & Leonard,1996, 2000!; familial alcoholism may under-mine the quality of parenting less for olderchildren who need less support and constantattention, or it may undermine different dimen-sions of parenting in children than in infants~e.g., parental monitoring may be very impor-tant as offspring become adolescents!. The ef-fects of familial alcoholism may also dependupon the children’s developmental stage whenexposed to active periods of parental drinkingversus periods of recovery ~Harter, 2000; Sher,1991!. Grandparent alcoholic status had littlerelation to coping or G2 parenting and did notmoderate the relations between G2 parent so-cialization and children’s coping.This may havebeen partly because we had information on onlyone set of grandparents.

Strengths of the current study include thefact that the measures of coping were com-pleted by multiple reporters ~parents and chil-

dren!, and that an independent assessment ofadjustment problems was provided by teach-ers. In addition, this study is one of very fewexamining the relations of socialization tochildren’s coping efficacy. Another strength isthe focus on parental alcoholism as modera-tors of the targeted relations. Limitations ofthe current study include the relatively smallsample size for child-reported coping and thelack of a measure of children’s perceptions ofparenting ~or of observed parenting!. Havinga measure of children’s perceptions of parent-ing or of observed parenting would help toeliminate any reporter bias in the cases whereparents completed both the coping and parent-ing measures. Finally, as already noted, theresults cannot establish a causal role ofparent socialization to children’s coping or ofchildren’s coping to children’s adjustment; al-ternative explanations for the results are plau-sible. Nonetheless, the findings are consistentwith the possibility of mediation by copingand coping efficacy of the relation of parentalsocialization with children’s adjustment.

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