Influence of Parenting Styles on Development of

Children Aged Three to Six Years Old

Sutham Nanthamongkolchai PhD*,
Chutima Ngaosusit MSc*, Chokchai Munsawaengsub MD*

* Department of Family Health, Faculty of Public Health, Mahidol University

Objective: To investigate the influences of parenting styles on development of children aged three to six years.
Material and Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted in 360 children and their parents selected by
multi-stage random sampling. The data were collected from July 24th to August 31st, 2004. The Denver II test kit
and the scale by Baumrind D were used to test the child development and parenting styles respectively. A
questionnaire was used to collect the family and child factors. Data were analyzed by frequency distribution
and Multiple logistic regression with the significant level set at p-value of <0.05).
Results: Parenting styles had significant influences on child development (p-value < 0.05). Children raised
with a mixed parenting style had a 1.9 times higher chance of having delayed development compared with
those with democratic parenting style. In addition, significant family and child factors for explaining child
development were family type, mother’s education, father’s occupation, relationship within the family, nutri-
tional status and sex.
Conclusion: Parenting styles had a significant influence on child development. The children raised with
mixed parenting style had a 1.9 times higher chance of having delayed development compared to those whose
parents used democratic parenting style. Therefore, the parents should rear their children by using the
democratic parenting style that leads to the age-appropriate development child.

Keywords: Parenting styles, Children aged three to six years, Development

J Med Assoc Thai 2007; 90 (5): 971-6

Full text. e-Journal: http://www.medassocthai.org/journal

Growth and development of children during the study by Isaranurug S et al that found that factor
three to six years old are very important and are the influencing development of children aged one to under
basis of further child development. To promote proper six years was appropriate child rearing. Those with
growth and development to age, the significant factor proper rearing had a 2.7 times better development
is the child rearing from their families because it is the than those with improper rearing(5). Baumrind D(6,7) has
environment of the children(1,2). Kumar R et al, studied classified parenting style into three types: Democratic,
factors influencing psychosocial development of pre- Authoritative, and Permissive. Each style has a dif-
school children in a rural area of India. They found ferent influence to each child development areas. In
that child rearing is the major factor that influences the addition, the familial socioeconomic status and family
child development(3). The study of Nanthamongkolchai relationship also influence the children’s development,
S et al on family factors influencing development of for those with high economical status and good family
preschool children aged three to six years in four areas relationship had better development than those in low
of Thailand showed that the children receiving good economic status and poor family relationship(3,8,9). The
child care and child rearing had a 2.3 times higher chance literature review showed that the rearing factor had an
to have normal development compared with those re- influence on development of a child aged three to six
ceiving poor child care and child rearing(4). Similar to years, but the study of the effect on child development
Correspondence to : Nanthamongkolchai S, Department of
by different parenting styles particularly in a develop-
Family Health, Faculty of Public Health, Mahidol University, ing country is very few. The present study aimed at
Bangkok 10400, Thailand. analyzing influences of parenting styles on develop-

J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007 971

ment of children aged 3-6 years on the hypothesis Statistical analysis
that parenting styles are the major factor affecting the Data were analyzed by frequency distribution
development of children even if child factors and the and percentage to describe the demographic charac-
family factors such as family economy and family rela- teristic of the subjects. Multiple logistic regression
tionship are controlled. The result could be used as a was used to study the influence of parenting styles on
parental guideline to care the children for appropriate the development of 3-6 years old children with the sig-
development. nificant level set at p-value of < 0.05). The analysis was
divided into two models, model one with the parenting
Material and Method styles and family factors as independent variables,
A cross-sectional study was conducted in model two with the parenting styles, family factors and
Roi Et Province. The data were collected by two re- children factors as independent variables. The para-
searchers. The inter-rater reliability test during the meter from the second model reflected the effect of
pilot test showed 95-100 percent agreement in each the parenting styles on development controlling for
item. The interviews of the parents and the assessment family factors and child factors.
of child development took place during July 24th to
August 31st, 2004. The 360 children aged three to six Results
years old were selected by multi-stage sampling. The Characteristic of children three to six years old
research instrument was divided into two parts: Part 1 The finding revealed that 55.6% of the subjects
included the questions developed by the researchers were female, 44.4% were male, 55.6% had two siblings,
to elicit information regarding children data (sex, num- and 33.3% had one sibling. Sixty-eight percent had
ber of siblings), family data (mother’s and father’s edu- normal weight and 27.8% were below normal weight.
cational background, occupation), family type (nuclear, The number of subjects with normal or delayed develop-
extended), and adequacy of income (adequate and in- ment was equal (50%) (Table 1).
adequate). Part 1 also included family relationship scale
by Mccubin H et al(10)(16 items, classify relationship Family characteristics
as balanced or unbalanced), and parenting style scale The majority of fathers (57.5%) and mothers
by Baumrind D(6) with three subscales of styles, demo- (62.2%) received education at elementary school level.
cratic, authoritative, and permissive parenting style. About half of the fathers (50.3%) and mothers (53.1%)
Subjects were judged to have a particular parenting worked in agriculture. 52.8% of subjects lived in an
style if their scores were 75% or more on subscale extended family while 47.2% had a nuclear family. 54.4%
measuring that style. Subjects with mixed parenting had sufficient income for family expenditure, 56.4%
style were those with scores lower than 75% on every
subscale or having scores higher than 75% on more
Table 1. Number and percentages of characteristics of
than one subscale. Part 2 of the instrument assessed children ages 3-6 years (n = 360)
development and nutritional status. The Denver II
was used to assess four areas of child development, Characteristics n %
language, fine motor and adaptation, gross motor or
movement, and social. The subjects were classified as Sex
normal development or delayed development(11). Body Female 200 55.6
weight and height were the measures of nutritional Male 160 44.4
status. The subjects were classified as normal or ab- Number of siblings
1 120 33.3
normal (below normal or higher than normal) accord-
2 198 55.0
ing to the standard curve development (criteria) by 3 or more 42 11.7
Department of Health, Ministry of Public Health(12). X = 1.8 SD = 0.7 Min = 1 Max = 4
Three experts who were two pediatricians Nutritional status
and psychologist assessed content validity of the in- Under normal 100 27.8
strument. Reliability was assessed in 30 parents of pre- Normal 247 68.6
school children who shared similar characteristics with Over normal 13 3.6
the study subjects. Cronbach’s alpha coefficients for Development
family relationship index and parenting styles scale were Normal 180 50.0
Delayed development 180 50.0
0.75 and 0.85, respectively.

972 J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007

had a balanced family relationship while 43.6% had tion, sufficiency of income, and relationships in the
an unbalanced relationship (Table 2). family. The results showed that parenting style factor
and family factors (mother’s education, father’s occu-
Parenting styles of parent pation, and relationship in the family) had a significant
The finding revealed that 55.3% of parents influence on the development of children three to six
had a democratic parenting style, 41.4% with mixed years old (p-value < 0.05).
parenting style, 1.9% with authoritative and 1.4% with For the Model 2, parenting styles, family
permissive parenting style. Due to the small number of factors, and child factors were independent variables.
subjects in last two styles, they were excluded from The present study showed that parenting style had a
multivariate analysis (n = 348) (Table 3). significant influence on the development of children
three to six years old (p-value < 0.05). Children raised
Influence of parenting styles on the development of with mixed parenting style had a 1.9 times higher chance
children three to six years old of delayed development compared with children with
For the Model I, independent variables were democratic parenting style. The family factors and
parenting styles and family factors consisting of child factors that showed significant effect on child
family type, father and mother’s education, occupa- development were mother’s education, father’s occu-
pation, relationship in the family, sex of children, and
nutritional status. Children in an extended family had
Table 2. Number and percentage of demographic charac- a 2.7 times higher chance of delayed development
teristics of children’s families (n = 360) than children in nuclear family. Children whose mother
completed elementary education had a three times
Characteristics n % higher chance of delayed development than those with
mother complete higher education. Children with non-
Mothers’ education
Elementary 224 62.2
agriculturist father had a 3 times higher chance of
Higher than elementary 136 37.8 delayed development than those with an agriculturist
Father’s education father. Children who lived in an unbalanced family had
Elementary 207 57.5 a 6.9 times higher chance of delayed development than
Higher than elementary 153 42.5 those who lived in a balanced family. Males had a 2.3
Mothers’ occupation times higher chance of delayed development than
Agriculture 191 53.1 females and a malnutrition child had a 1.9 times higher
Non-agriculture 169 46.9 chance of delayed development than those with nor-
Fathers’ occupation
mal nutritional status (Table 4).
Agriculture 181 50.3
Non-agriculture 179 49.7
Type of family Discussion
Nuclear family 170 47.2 The present study revealed that the most
Extended family 190 52.8 common parenting style was democratic followed by a
Sufficiency of income mixed parenting style. In model 2 with family factors
Sufficient 196 54.4 and children factors controlled, parenting style still
Insufficient 164 45.6 had a significant influence on children development.
Relationship in the family Mixed parenting style had a 1.9 times higher chance
Balanced 203 56.4
of delayed development than those with democratic
Unbalanced 157 43.6
parenting style. Democratic parents may give love,
warmth, use reasoning, and train their children to be
self-reliant and self-confident. Thus, the children have
Table 3. Number and percentage of parenting style
a chance to use their own ability to the fullest poten-
Parenting style n (360) % tial. Moreover, when parents serve the basic needs of
the children, they will feel ready to learn what effects
Democratic 199 55.3 better development than those parents who help the
Mixed 149 41.4 children to do everything or are all the time strictness.
Authoritative 7 1.9 These results agree with the findings of
Permissive 5 1.4 Baumrind D, Mussen PH et al and Amy EI et al(6,13,14)

J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007 973

Table 4. Multiple logistic regression analysis between parenting style factors, family factors, child factors and levels of
development of children aged three to six years

Factors Model 1 Model 2

β Ad OR (95% CI) β Ad OR (95% CI)

Parenting style factors

Mixed parenting style (1) 0.5045* 1.66 (1.0162-2.6991) 0.6463* 1.91 (1.1450-3.1811)
Family factors
Extended family (2) 1.0354* 2.82 (1.7450-4.5457) 1.0026* 2.73 (1.6636-4.4646)
Father’s education: Elementary(3) -0.3666 0.69 (0.4033-1.1912) -0.3445 0.71 (0.4063-1.2358)
Father’s occupation: Non-agriculture(4) 1.1200* 3.06 (1.4152-6.6369) 1.0949* 2.99 (1.3468-6.6327)
Mother’s education: Elementary(5) 1.0537* 2.87 (1.6710-4.9228) 1.1009* 3.00 (1.7314-5.2219)
Mother’s occupation: Non-agriculture(6) -0.1758 .84 (0.3824-1.8396) -0.0477 0.95 (0.4235-2.1465)
Insufficient family income(7) 0.0987 1.10 (0.6663-1.8282) -0.0259 0.97 (0.5716-1.6611)
Relationship in thefamily: Unbalanced(8) 1.9847* 7.28 (1.5358-34.4801) 1.9339* 6.92 (1.4138-33.8382)
Child Factors
Male(9) 0.8164* 2.26 (1.3633-3.7542)
Number of siblings: More than one(10) -0.3710 0.69 (0.4033-1.1806)
Nutritional status: Not normal(11) 0.6542* 1.92 (1.1135-3.3232)
-2 log Likelihood 471.34008 471.34008
p-value <0.001 <0.001
n 348 348

Note: Development of children : Normal development = 0, Delayed development = 1

* statistical significance at p-value < 0.05
Ad = Adjusted, OR = OddsRatio, β = Coefficient
Number in bracket after the Adjusted OR is 95% Confidence Interval (95% CI)
Number in bracket after each factor is the referencing member 1. Democratic parenting style, 2. Nuclear family,
3. Education higher than elementary, 4. Agriculture occupation, 5. Education higher than elementary,
6. Agriculture occupation, 7. Sufficient income, 8. Balanced family, 9. Female, 10. One child,
11. Normal nutritional status

that showed parents with a democratic parenting development. The findings were consistent with those
style had love, and attention with reason, and the from the previous studies that found that the mothers’
children had a chance to help themselves that made education and the fathers’ occupation had an influence
them develop properly. on the child development(3,4-8).
The family factors and children factors hav- For the types of family, the children in an ex-
ing an influence on child development were mother’s tended family had a higher chance of delayed develop-
education, father’s occupation, family type, relation- ment than those who lived in a nuclear family. The
ship in the family, sex, and nutritional status. These children growing up in an extended family are sur-
findings suggested that the most important factor was rounded by many relatives who take care of them and
the mothers’ education. Mothers are the ones who help them all the time. As a result, the children do not
mainly take care of the children, so those with a higher have a chance to learn and do activities by themselves,
education would be more knowledgeable to raise and so they are likely to have delayed development. Re-
experience the appropriate learning to the children. This garding relationship in the family, children raised in
is also the case for the father’s occupation. Children an unbalanced family had a higher chance of delayed
who lived with a non-agriculturist father had a higher development than those who lived in a balanced
chance of delayed development than children who family. Relationship within the family is one of the
lived with the agriculturist father. This might be due to factors that determine the stability in the family. Living
the fact that the non-agriculturist father may have less within a family with a good relationship, the children
time to pay close attention and promote learning and would be showered with love and attention that bring

974 J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007

good development(7,13). This finding was congruent 7. Baumrind D. Some thoughts about child rearing.
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found that the relationship in the family was associ- 8. McCulloch A, Joshi HE. Neighbourhood and
ated with child development(9,15). family influences on the cognitive ability of chil-
For the sex and nutritional status of the chil- dren in the British National Child Development
dren, males had a higher chance of delayed develop- Study. Soc Sci Med 2001; 53: 579-91.
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ports the previous findings of Supanvanich S and study of officially recorded and self-reported child
Bureau of Health Promotion(16,17) that showed that the abuse and neglect. Child Abuse Negl 1998; 22:
malnutrition had an effect on children’s development 1065-78.
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J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007 975

อิทธิพลของรูปแบบการอบรมเลีย้ งดูตอ่ พัฒนาการเด็กอายุ 3–6 ปี

สุธรรม นันทมงคลชัย, ชุตมิ า เหง้าสุสทิ ธิ,์ โชคชัย หมัน่ แสวงทรัพย์

วัตถุประสงค์: เพื่อศึกษาอิทธิพลของรูปแบบการอบรมเลี้ยงดูต่อพัฒนาการเด็กอายุ 3–6 ปี

วัสดุและวิธกี าร: เป็นการสำรวจภาคตัดขวาง เก็บรวบรวมข้อมูลจากเด็กและบิดามารดาในจังหวัดร้อยเอ็ดจำนวน 360
คน เลือกกลุ่มตัวอย่างจากการสุ่มตัวอย่างแบบหลายขั้นตอน เก็บข้อมูลระหว่างวันที่ 24 กรกฎาคม – 31 สิงหาคม
พ.ศ. 2547 โดยใช้วิธีการสัมภาษณ์ ประเมินรูปแบบการอบรมเลี้ยงดูและพัฒนาการเด็กด้วยแบบวัดที่พัฒนามาจาก
แนวคิดของ Baumrind D และ Denver II วิเคราะห์ขอ้ มูลโดยใช้ความถี่ ร้อยละ และ multiple logistic regression
ผลการศึกษา: รูปแบบการอบรมเลีย้ งดูมอี ทิ ธิพลต่อพัฒนาการเด็กอย่างมีนยั สำคัญทางสถิติ (p-value < 0.05) โดย
เด็กที่ถูกเลี้ยงดูแบบผสมมีโอกาสที่เด็กจะมีพัฒนาการช้ากว่าวัยเป็น 1.9 เท่าของเด็กที่ถูกเลี้ยงดูแบบประชาธิปไตย
นอกจากนัน้ ปัจจัยด้านครอบครัวและปัจจัยด้านตัวเด็กทีม่ อี ทิ ธิพลต่อพัฒนาการเด็กอย่างมีนยั สำคัญทางสถิติ (p-value
< 0.05) ได้แก่ประเภทครอบครัว ระดับการศึกษามารดา อาชีพบิดา สัมพันธภาพในครอบครัว ภาวะโภชนาการและ
เพศเด็ก
สรุป: รูปแบบการอบรมเลี้ยงดูมีอิทธิพลต่อพัฒนาการเด็กโดยเด็กที่ถูกเลี้ยงดูแบบผสมมีโอกาสที่จะมีพัฒนาการล่าช้า
กว่าวัยเป็น 1.9 เท่าของเด็กที่ถูกเลี้ยงดูแบบประชาธิปไตย ดังนั้นบิดามารดาควรเลี้ยงดูเด็กแบบประชาธิปไตยเพื่อ
นำไปสู่การมีพัฒนาการที่สมวัยต่อไป

976 J Med Assoc Thai Vol. 90 No. 5 2007