Moving Beyond Residential Neighborhoods: An Exploratory Study of How Activity Spaces and Neighborhood Social Processes Relate to Maladaptive Parenting

BACKGROUND. Much of the work examining the context of parenting focuses on attributes of the neighborhoods where people live. However, the environments where parents spend time, such as at work, at their child’s school, or with friends and family, may exert a greater influence on their parenting behaviors than their residential neighborhoods. These environments, termed activity spaces, provide individualized information about the where parents go, offering more detailed understanding of the environmental risks and resources to which parents are exposed affecting parenting behaviors.  This study examines the following: (1) What factors are related to the size of a parent’s activity space? and (2) Is the size of a parents activity space related to use of punitive and non-punitive parenting practices?

METHODS. Data were collected from 42 parents via door-to-door surveys in one neighborhood area. Survey participants provided information about punitive (e.g., corporal punishment, psychological aggression, deprivation of privileges) and non-punitive parenting practices (e.g., use of rewards, monitoring), social supports, neighborhood social processes (informal social control and reciprocated exchange), and the locations of where they conducted daily living activities.  OLS regression procedures were used to examine covariates related to the size of parent activity spaces. Negative binomial models assessed how activity spaces were related to four punitive and five non-punitive parenting practices.

RESULTS. Fathers and those with a local (within neighborhood) primary support member had larger activity spaces. Size of a parent’s activity space was negatively related to use of punitive parenting, but generally not related to non-punitive parenting behaviors. Having more total social support was positively related to use of all types (punitive and non-punitive) parenting practices. Higher levels of reciprocated exchange was related to more frequent use of psychological aggression and corporal punishment. Informal social control was positively related to frequency of deprivation of privileges and corporal punishment.

CONCLUSIONS. Parents with their primary source of support living outside of their neighborhood were more likely to have smaller activity spaces, which were in turn related to punitive parenting.  This could indicate that parents without local support could be socially isolated, which is a risk factor for maladaptive parenting and could lead to frustration and harsh parenting practices. In neighborhoods with high levels of reciprocated exchange and informal social control in neighborhoods (e.g., higher levels of neighbors willing to intervene if they see bad behavior of children), parents might be more willing to deprive a child of privileges or use corporal punishment when they act up, in order to prevent future bad behavior from occurring. Finally, parents who have bigger activity spaces might also come in contact with people who would report or not sanction these types of harsh parenting. Practitioners could asses where parents spend time and that location’s distance from his or her home. A sense of this may allow social workers who work with families to identify specific activities that may get vulnerable parents outside their own home and participating in activities that could result in less use of punitive or harsh parenting.