Download - Maternal attributions and young children's conduct problems: a longitudinal study

Infant and Child DevelopmentInf. Child Dev. 15: 109–121 (2006)

Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/icd.440

Maternal Attributions and YoungChildren’s Conduct Problems:A Longitudinal Study

Charlotte Wilsona,*, Frances Gardnerb, Jennifer Burtonb

and Sarah Leungc

a Brookside Family Consultation Clinic, Douglas House, Cambridge, UKb Department of Social Policy and Social Work, University of Oxford, UKc Child and Family Consultation Service, Swindon, UK

The association between negative maternal attributions andchild conduct problems is well established in correlationalstudies. However, little is known about how these variablesinfluence each other over time. The present study examinedpatterns of prediction over time between maternal attributionsand pre-school conduct problems. Sixty mothers and their 3-year-old children with a range of levels of conduct problems wereinterviewed when the child was just 3, and then again when thechild was just 4. Childhood conduct problems were assessedusing the parental account of childhood symptoms and parentalattributions were assessed using a modification of Walker’sParental Attribution Questionnaire. Results indicate that even asyoung as age 3, child conduct problems are associated withnegative maternal attributions. In longitudinal analyses, chil-dren’s conduct problems at age 3 predicted mothers’ attributionsat age 4, but mothers’ attributions did not predict children’sconduct problems over the same time period. The data areconsistent with the notion that negative attributions may be aresult, rather than a cause, of having a difficult-to-manage child.This has implications for current proposed mechanisms that linkmaternal attributions and child conduct problems, and thus forinterventions for these problems. Copyright # 2006 John Wiley& Sons, Ltd.

Key words: maternal attributions; pre-school conduct problems;longitudinal

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INTRODUCTION

Pre-school conduct problems are common, persistent, costly to society and have apoor prognosis (Richman et al., 1982). Young children with early-starting

Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

*Correspondence to: Charlotte Wilson, Brookside Family Consultation Clinic, 18dTrumpington Road, Cambridge, CB2 2AH, UK. E-mail: [email protected]

antisocial behaviour are more likely to have poor social, academic and healthoutcomes later in life, with some children going on to show delinquent andcriminal behaviour (Loeber and Stouthamer-Loeber, 1998; Brame et al., 2001). Aswith most disorders, chronicity and severity of the problem is linked to poorintervention outcomes. There is an increasing body of literature exploring factorsthat influence the development of early conduct problems and one factor thatappears to be very important is parenting behaviour. For example, inconsistentdiscipline and coercive cycles of reinforcement (Patterson et al., 1992) have beenshown to be strongly associated with children’s conduct problems. Parentingbehaviour is also the primary focus in many programmes designed to helpchildren with conduct problems. Many randomized controlled trials show theseintervention programmes to be effective (Brestan and Eyberg, 1998; Sanders et al.,2000; Scott et al., 2001). However, some families are not helped by intervention;they may drop out, or show improvements that are not generalizable orsustainable (Kazdin, 1990; Taylor and Biglan, 1998). Further work is required toimprove the outcomes for young children with conduct problems (Webster-Stratton et al., 2001).

Parental cognitions represent one mechanism that may influence thedevelopment of, and intervention for, children’s conduct problems. In theliterature on adult disorders the study of cognitions has been extremelyimportant in understanding and treating problems such as anxiety disorders(Clark, 1986; Wells, 1997). It has been suggested that understanding the roleof cognitions in parenting may help to improve outcomes of interventionprogrammes for young children’s conduct problems (Johnston, 1996; Peters et al.,2005). Cognitions are theoretically important in parenting (Olson et al., 2000) anda cognitive-behavioural model would suggest that parenting behaviours areaffected by the kind of cognitions parents have about their child. For example,when a parent believes their child’s behaviour is deliberate, this may result indifferent responses compared to believing the same behaviour is accidental.These causal explanations for behaviours and outcomes are known asattributions, and parental attributions for children’s misbehaviour have beenstrongly associated with children’s conduct problems (Baden and Howe, 1992;Johnston and Freeman, 1997).

Early studies investigating parental attributions were cross-sectional. Badenand Howe (1992) found that mothers of school-aged children with conductproblems believed that their child’s misbehaviour was more intentional,global, stable and difficult to control. In addition, Johnston and colleaguesfound that parental attributions for oppositional child behaviours were morenegative than parental attributions for hyperactive behaviours, which inturn were more negative than parental attributions for non-problem beha-viours (Johnston and Freeman, 1997; Johnston and Patenaude, 1994; Johnstonet al., 1992).

These cross-sectional studies do not allow the direction of influence betweenparental attributions and child conduct problems to be examined. More recentlongitudinal studies have been able to investigate this. For example, Nix et al.(1999) explored whether maternal attributions predicted later child conductproblems. They found that earlier maternal hostile attributions about pre-kindergarteners predicted later externalizing problems of the child, but onlyin school. Hastings and Rubin (1999) examined the opposite direction ofinfluence; whether child conduct problems predicted later maternal attributions.They found that for some families, child aggression predicted more maternalhostile attributions 2 years later. Both studies only examined one direction

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Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Inf. Child Dev. 15: 109–121 (2006)

of influence. Furthermore, they were not able to control for the predicted variableat the first time point. One study that measured both attributions andchild behaviour problems at two time points found that maternal aggressionwhen the child was between 7- and 9-years old predicted child attributions12–15 months later (MacKinnon-Lewis et al., 2001). However, child aggressiontowards mother at time 1 did not predict the mother’s attributions of intentat time 2, nor did maternal attributions of intent at time 1 predict child aggressionat time 2.

It is therefore unclear from these studies how child conduct problems andparental attributions influence each other over time. Two of the studies reportedabove only looked at one direction of influence, and the study that looked atboth, did so in older children, and only examined the attributional dimensionof intent. There are compelling arguments for looking at how parentalattributions and child behaviour influence each other in young children. Parentalattributions are themselves affected by the age of the child (Cote and Azar,1997; Dix et al., 1986). Furthermore, many children who have difficulties withaggressiveness at 7 years also had problems when they were younger. Byexamining how parental attributions and child conduct problems influence eachother over time in pre-school children it is possible to explore these importantrelationships at a developmental stage when child conduct problems are not yetwell established.

There are also compelling arguments for looking at a range of attributionaldimensions. Joiner and Wagner (1996) found that there were robust associationsbetween child outcomes and attributions, for the attributional dimensionsstability and globality. They suggest that there may be support for dimension locusof control, but that this dimension has proven most difficult to measure.

In order to examine how attributions affect the early development of children’sconduct problems, we carried out a longitudinal study of 60 mothers and their3-year-old children. By assessing child conduct problems and a range ofattributional dimensions at two time points, 1 year apart, possible bi-directionalrelationships between them could be clearly tested. Some researchers haveproposed that child conduct problems at time 1 will influence parentalattributions at time 2 (Geller and Johnston, 1995; Hastings and Rubin, 1999) asparents who have children with difficult-to-manage behaviours will becomeincreasingly more negative about their children as the behaviour persists oreven worsens. Other researchers have proposed that parental attributions attime 1 affect child conduct problems at time 2 (Nix et al., 1999; Slep and O’Leary,1998), via their effects on parental behaviour. This direction of influence hassignificant implications for intervention. If maternal cognitions are influencingchild behaviour via their effect on maternal behaviour, then they would bean appropriate target for intervention themselves, in addition to targeting thematernal behaviour directly. This study tested both of these directions ofinfluence.

To summarize, the study had the following objectives:

1. to test whether mothers of children with higher conduct problem scores at age3 make more negative attributions at age 3 about the causes of their child’smisbehaviour (i.e. that it is due to more internal, global, stable factors);

2. to test whether child conduct scores at age 3 predict maternal attributions atage 4, controlling for age 3 maternal attributions; and

3. to test whether maternal attributions at age 3 predict child conduct scores atage 4, controlling for age 3 conduct scores.

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METHOD

Participants

Recruitment StrategyFamilies were recruited through health visitors (community-based primary care

nurses) when the child was approaching it’s third birthday. Health visitors fromsocially disadvantaged neighbourhoods in mainly urban and some rural districtswere asked to nominate children who, in their clinical judgement, showed markedor moderate conduct and oppositional-type behaviour problems which werecausing concern to parents or professionals. In order to increase the range of levels ofconduct problems in the sample, we also asked for nominations of children from thesame neighbourhoods who showed average or low levels of problems. Exclusioncriteria included: major child disability; mother working full time (this madescheduling of visits difficult); English not the main language spoken to the child.Referred families were contacted initially by telephone, then visited in the home fordiscussion of the project and consent. Families were not paid for participation.

SampleA total of 60 children were studied, of whom 32 were boys. Mean age was 37

months, range 36–39 months. The families were largely working class, with 60%of parents in manual jobs (OPCS, 1991). A high percentage of families werereceiving welfare benefits; 42%, compared to a national average of 14%. In all,33% mothers were in the clinical range on a depression-screening instrument(GHQ; Goldberg, 1978) and 13% were single parents. The families werepredominately White, with 5% classified as non-White Asian or African-Caribbean. 68% of the children were referred by health visitors as causingconcern because of oppositional or conduct problems. The mean total ChildBehaviour Checklist (CBCL 2-3) T-score was 60 (S.D. 8.8) for these children,which is at approximately the 85th percentile on US norms, compared to 50 (S.D.6.1) for the remaining children, whose behaviour was not causing concern. Thesefigures are comparable with normative data for referred and non-referredsamples, respectively (Achenbach, 1992). Health visitor judgments were not usedfurther in the analysis; the whole sample is used to predict conduct problemoutcomes, based on continuous scores on standardized clinical instruments.

Sample at Follow-up100% of families who completed the age 3 assessments also completed the age

4 follow up assessment. However, at age 3 one family suddenly left the area inbetween our second and third visits. They were traced at follow up through theNational Health Service but did not respond. The sample size for the presentanalyses is 59 at age 3 and 4.

Measures

All data, including GHQ and CBCL 2-3, were collected during home visits at bothtime points.

Conduct ProblemsTo assess conduct problems we used the parental account of childhood

symptoms (PACS; Taylor et al., 1986), a semi-structured interview designed to be

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a more objective assessment of the level of oppositional and overactive behaviourproblems in a child than commonly used questionnaires. Mothers are asked todescribe typical examples of a number of child behaviours. Oppositionalbehaviours include, for example, temper tantrums and refusing to do things,and overactive behaviours include not being able to sit and watch television orplay alone for more than a few minutes. Each description is rated on severity andfrequency by a trained interviewer. Two scores are given; one for the past week,and one for the past 6 months. Recent longitudinal and intervention studies ofyoung children suggest that the PACS is particularly suited to assessing changein symptom levels over time (Gardner et al., 1999; Scott et al., 2001; Sonuga-Barkeet al., 2001). It has good inter-rater reliability, the concurrent validity against othercriteria is reasonable, and the predictive validity over 10 years is fairly high(Taylor et al., 1996). It was modified for younger children by Sonuga-Barke et al.(1994), by dropping some age-inappropriate items such as lying, and changingthe coding of parental responses to match developmental expectations. This pre-school version has good inter-rater reliability, and discriminant validity (Sonuga-Barke et al., 1994).

Maternal AttributionsTo assess maternal attributions we used an adaptation of Walker’s Parental

Attributions Questionnaire (PAQ; Walker, 1985). The PAQ involves parentsproducing examples of child misbehaviours, and then rating each example onseveral dimensions using a Likert-type scale. This method of assessingattributions, by getting or giving an example of behaviour, and then askingparents to rate the child behaviour on several dimensions, has been used in manystudies (see Bugental et al., 1998). The present study adapted the PAQ by givingmothers the examples of misbehaviours rather than asking them to produceexamples themselves because it was judged that the children in the studyhad a wide range of conduct problems, and so the examples the mothers wouldgive would be very different in severity. This would make the results difficultto interpret.

Story vignettes were piloted on 20 mothers of young children (2.5–4 years) whowere not involved in the main study. The 4 vignettes given the highest ratings bymothers for being true to life and easy to understand were used in the mainstudy. These are detailed in Table 1. In the main study mothers were asked to ratehow typical the misbehaviour in the story was for their child. If the story was notat all typical the mother was not asked about the story, as it was felt they wouldbe using a different type of information to judge the cause of the misbehaviour(see Bugental et al., 1998 for a discussion of this). Every mother responded to atleast one story. The mean number of stories responded to was 3.1.

Mothers were read each story and then asked to remember a situationwhere her child behaved like that, and to give a cause/reason for the child’smisbehaviour. The mother was than asked to rate the cause of the child’smisbehaviour on scales of internal locus, stability, and globality. All scales ranfrom 0 to 100, and had both ends labelled (see Table 1 for questions asked in orderto assess each dimension). For example, the scale assessing stability has 0 labelledas ‘not at all stable’, and 100 is labelled as ‘completely stable’. This was repeatedfor each of the 4 stories. The complete questionnaire was piloted on 10 motherswho found the language appropriate, and the questions easy to understand.

Ratings on each dimension scale were found to have moderate to good internalconsistency with alpha values varying from 0.64 (locus of control) to 0.78



(stability). These figures are comparable to others found for the PAQ (Baden andHowe, 1992; Bugental et al., 1998).

Analysis

The attribution dimension scales and the PACS were normally distributed andwithin acceptable limits for skewness and kurtosis. Therefore we first correlatedattributional dimensions with the score on the PACS at age 3 (time 1). We thencorrelated attributional dimensions age 3 with the score on the PACS age 4 andvice versa. Where appropriate, we then performed hierarchical multipleregression analyses to assess whether the PACS score or the attributionaldimension predicted unique variance over time.

RESULTS

Concurrent Associations at Age 3 (time 1)

Table 2 shows correlations between PACS conduct score and attributiondimensions. Dimensions internal locus and globality were correlated with PACSconduct score (for internal locus, r ð60Þ ¼ 0:28, p50:05; for globality, r ð60Þ ¼ 0:30;

Table 1. Stories used and questions asked in order to assess each attributional dimensionin attributional measure

Stories (version for girls)

One The phone rings, and you answer it. It is a friend who needs to talk. (Nameof child) starts calling to you, and tugging at your leg. You ask her to go andplay quietly for a few minutes. She continues to tug at your leg, and whenyou ask her again she starts whining.

Two You are in a hurry to go out. You approach (name of child) to put her coatand shoes on. She struggles, runs away, and starts shouting and crying.

Three You are making dinner for later, and it has to go in the oven to cook, or itwon’t be ready in time. (Name of child) is hanging round your feet, and youask her to go and play quietly by herself for a few minutes. She goes away,but comes back a minute later, and starts whining.

Four You are shopping with (name of child). She is very curious about all thethings on the shelves and keeps trying to touch them, and put them in thebasket. You say that you don’t need them and put them back on the shelf.(Name of child) starts fussing, and whining.

Dimension Question askeda

Internal locus Is this (name cause) something about your child as an individual, orsomething about something more general such as her age or thecircumstances?b

Stability Does (name cause), in general, happen the same amount from one week tothe next, or does the amount change a great deal?

Globality Is this (name cause) something that would only happen in this particularsituation, or would it happen in other situations and in other areas of yourchild’s life?

a The questions follow Walker, and are adapted for younger children where necessary.b This follows the social psychology tradition where internal causes were considered those that werepersonal to the individual and external causes were considered impersonal. Age would be consideredimpersonal and therefore external. See Munton et al. (1999), pp. 10–16.

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p50:05). Therefore with PACS conduct score as the dependent variable, internallocus entered in a multiple regression at step 1 predicted 11% of the variance(R2 ¼ 0:11, p50:01). Globality added as step 2 predicted an additional 16% ofthe variance (R2 ¼ 0:16, p50:01; Fð1; 60Þ ¼ 11:5, p50:01). This indicates thatboth internal locus and globality predict unique variance in PACS conductscore at age 3.

Stability of Measures From age 3 to 4

Table 2 shows correlations between PACS conduct scores and attributiondimensions at age 3 and 4. Conduct problems were found to be reasonablystable (r ð59Þ ¼ 0:44, p50:01), as was attribution dimension internal locus(r ð59Þ ¼ 0:37, p50:01). The dimensions of stability and globality were not stableover 1 year.

Longitudinal Associations Between PACS Conduct Score and MaternalAttributions

As shown in Table 2, PACS conduct score at age 3 was associated with internallocus at age 4 (r ð59Þ ¼ 0:42, p50:01) and globality at age 4 (r ð59Þ ¼ 0:53, p50:01).However, there were no associations in the opposite direction betweenattributional dimensions at age 3 and PACS conduct score at age 4 (r (59) rangedbetween �0.13 and 0.18, all ns). There is therefore no support for the hypothesisthat maternal attributions influence child conduct problems over time.

Longitudinal Hierarchical Regression Analyses

In the first regression (Table 3), internal locus at age 4 was predicted from internallocus at age 3 and PACS conduct score at age 3. Internal locus at age 3 wasentered at the first step and predicted 12% of unique variance in internal locus atage 4 (R2 ¼ 0:12, p50:01). An additional 11% of unique variance was explainedwhen PACS conduct score was added at step 2 (R2 ¼ 0:11, p50:01; F ð1; 59Þ ¼ 7:0,p50:01). In the second analysis (Table 4) globality at age 4 was predicted fromglobality at age 3 and PACS conduct score at age 3. Globality at age 3 was entered

Table 2. Correlations between PACS conduct score and attributional dimensions at age 3and 4

Age 3

PACS conduct score Internal locus Stability Globality

Age 3PACS conduct score 0.28* 0.12 0.30*

Age 4PACS conduct score 0.44** 0.18 �0.13 0.05Internal locus 0.42** 0.37**

Stability 0.07 0.17Globality 0.53** 0.12

*p50:05, **p50:01.



at the first step and did not predict any unique variance in globality at age 4(R2 ¼ �0:06, ns). However, when PACS conduct score at age 3 was added at step2, 27% of unique variance was explained (R2 ¼ 0:27, p50:01; F ð1; 59Þ ¼ 17:7,p50:01). These analyses provide support for the hypothesis that child behaviourinfluences maternal attributions over time.

DISCUSSION

Concurrent Associations at Age 3

As has been found in other studies, we found that conduct problems in youngchildren were associated with maternal attributions at the same age. In thepresent study, mothers of children with higher levels of conduct problemsbelieved their children’s misbehaviour to be due to factors within the child(internal locus), and due to factors that would affect many aspects of the child’sbehaviour (globality). However, the dimension of stability was not associatedwith level of conduct problems. It may be that the dimension of stability becomesmore important in older children (Dix et al., 1986). Alternatively, the dimension ofstability may not be a reliable one in this study, as we did not find it to be stableover time, and did not show meaningful relationships with other variables, eitherat age 3, or longitudinally.

Longitudinal Predictions

The main focus of the present study was to explore how maternal attributionsand child conduct problem influence each other over time. Our findings suggest

Table 3. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis predicting attributional dimensioninternal locus at age 4 from internal locus and PACS conduct score at age 3

Variable Adjusted R2 R2 change F change (p-value) Beta t, p-value

Step 1 0.12 0.14 7.9 (p ¼ 0:007)Internal locus (age 3) 0.37 2.80, 0.007

Step 2 0.22 0.11 7.00 (p ¼ 0:001)Internal locus (age 3) 0.28 2.11, 0.04PACS conduct score (age 3) 0.35 2.65, 0.01

DV=Internal locus of control at age 4.

Table 4. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis predicting attributional dimensionglobality at age 4 from globality and PACS conduct score at age 3

Variable Adjusted R2 R2 change F change (p-value) Beta t, p-value

Step 1 �0.06 0.01 0.71 (p ¼ 0:41)Globality (age 3) 0.12 0.84, 0.41

Step 2 0.25 0.27 17.7 (p50:001)Globality (age 3) �0.15 �0.12, 0.91PACS conduct score (age 3) 0.53 4.21, 50.001

DV=globality at age 4.

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that early child conduct problems predict later maternal attributions. We foundthat mothers with more difficult children at age 3 were more likely to make moreglobal, and internal attributions about their child’s misbehaviour at age 4. Incontrast, we found no evidence to suggest that early maternal attributions predictlater conduct problems. To our knowledge, this is one of the first studies tomeasure both attributions and behaviour at two time points. Our finding issimilar to the unidirectional findings of Hastings and Rubin (1999) andMacKinnon-Lewis et al. (2001). However, different findings have been found byother researchers. For example, Nix et al. (1999) found that earlier maternalhostile attributions did predict later child externalizing conduct problems inschool. However, they could only control for child externalizing behaviour athome at the first time point. In an experimental, rather than longitudinal study,Slep and O’Leary (1998) found that manipulating parental attributions ofresponsibility altered child behaviour. Again, Slep and O’Leary were unable tomanipulate other aspects of maternal attributions that have been found to beimportant in the current study.

It is possible that there are certain groups of parents with more extremeattitudes in which early maternal attributions may predict later levels of childconduct problems. For example, this might be seen in parents who are at risk ofabusing their children. Parental physical abuse of children is associated withnegative attributions (Bugental and Happaney, 2004; Dopke and Milner, 2000;Larrance and Twentyman, 1983) and it is suggested that these negativeattributions persist in the absence of child conduct problems. However, theseattributions, and the resulting parental behaviour, would then lead to the childdeveloping conduct problems. This could be tested in future research.

Clinical Implications

Some cautious clinical implications can be drawn. One interpretation of theresults of the present study is that negative maternal attributions are simply aresult of having a child who has difficult behaviour (Geller and Johnston, 1995).This may be mediated by generation of parental affect, or may indicate avulnerability for certain parents to develop certain types of cognitions if theirchild has hard-to-manage behaviour. It has been suggested that parental negativeattributions about children with conduct problems may not be distorted, asconduct problems are quite stable over time, and children with conduct problemsoften show difficult and aggressive behaviour in a number of settings. If this isthe case, it is unlikely that adding attributions to parenting programmes willhave any effect (Goddard and Miller, 1993; Forgatch and Patterson, 1998), or willcontribute added benefits for the child over time (Sanders et al., 2004). Indeed,recent studies suggest that even if an intervention programme is successful, andconduct problems get better, maternal attributions do not necessarily change(Peters et al., 2000) or change in complex ways (Wilson and White, submitted).

It appears that attributions may play a more complex part in the developmentof, and intervention for, children’s conduct problems. It has been suggested thatnegative parental attributions at the end of an intervention may predict relapse(Patterson et al., 1992). It is also possible that negative attributions may predictresponse to an intervention, or even predict attendance (Calam et al., 2002). It issuggested that parents with very negative attributions about their children aremore difficult to engage in parent training interventions (Morrisey-Kane andPrinz, 1999). Alternatively, it may be that focusing on parental attributions for



children’s misbehaviour is too simplistic. Parental attributions about positivepro-social behaviours and about their own efficacy as a parent may interact withattributions about their child’s negative behaviours. Also, it could be that ‘hotter’cognitions, such as those that occur in the actual situation in which the childmisbehaves, are more important in determining parental behaviour thanattributions that are considered to be ‘colder’ cognitions (Dadds et al., 2003).Finally, it could be that parental attributions do not affect child behaviour, butaffect children’s attributions about themselves.

Strengths and Limitations of the Study

One strength of the present study lies in its longitudinal design. Although thefollow up was only 1 year it is thought that this stage, between age 3 and 4, islikely to be developmentally important given the major developments inchildren’s cognition, emotional understanding and pro-social behaviour thatoccur during this year. The follow-up rate of 100% of participants who completedtime 1 procedures is very good. Another strength is the recruitment of acommunity-based sample of children at their third birthday, largely fromdisadvantaged neighbourhoods, showing a wide range of levels of behaviourproblems, but skewed towards those already causing concern to parents andhealth professionals. We do not know whether any particular biases affected thehealth visitors’ choice of families, however, since health visitors have all childrenunder their care, the sample was unlikely to be biased toward those already inpre-school, those referred for professional help, or those responding to adverts.

One limitation of the study may be the measure of maternal attributions, inthat it was specially adapted for this study. Several researchers have commentedthat studies of parental attributions tend to redesign a questionnaire or interviewinstead of using an existing validated one. However, the reasons for redesigningquestionnaires may well be valid, because each researcher asks a differentquestion, and only a few of the measures available have been validated.Certainly, it is felt that direct comparisons between maternal attributions andbehaviour, reported elsewhere, could not have been achieved without adaptingthe measure for the study (Wilson et al., submitted). However, it does limit theinterpretation and comparison with other studies. A second limitation of themeasure is that mothers were only asked about the vignettes that were typical fortheir child. Therefore, different mothers answered different numbers of stories,and the scores were pro-rated. This may affect reliability and validity. Asdescribed above, it was felt this was necessary because asking about non-typicalstories was likely to lead to mothers’ processing the situational information,rather than using their existing beliefs about their child (Bugental et al., 1998).Post hoc analyses also suggested that there were no significant differencesbetween mothers who answered different numbers of stories (data not shown).The present study also concentrates solely on maternal attributions. There isevidence to suggest that paternal attributions may be different, even though thedifferences found to date have not been systematic (Johnston, 1991). Very little isknown about how paternal attributions may affect child conduct problems. It islikely however, that paternal attributions will be important both in therelationship between father and child, but also in the relationship betweenfather and mother.

The relationship between child conduct problems and parental attributionsappears to be a robust one, and it is becoming clearer that early hard-to-manage

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behaviour in children has an impact on maternal thoughts and beliefs. Incontrast, this study throws further doubt on the hypothesis that parentalattributions have a direct effect on children’s conduct problems. It highlights theneed for greater understanding of the mechanisms involved in this relationship.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors would like to thank the Wellcome Trust for generous funding; theUK Medical Research Council for the doctoral studentships for Charlotte Wilsonand Sarah Ward; Professors Edmund Sonuga-Barke, David Clark, PaulSalkovskis and colleagues in Oxford University Department of Psychiatry forhelpful discussions; to health visitors and general practitioners for recruitment;and most of all to parents and children who participated.

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