Mothers' perceptions of neighborhood violence and mother-reported monitoring of African American children: An examination of the moderating role of perceived support

doi:10.1016/S0005-7894(05)80051-6

Behavior Therapy

Volume 36, Issue 1, Winter 2005, Pages 25-34

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0005-7894(05)80051-6 Get rights and content

This prospective study examined the association between perceived neighborhood violence and maternal monitoring and the moderating role of 2 sources of social support (coparents and friends/neighbors) among low-income African American single mothers. Mothers' ratings of neighborhood violence were associated with monitoring both concurrently and longitudinally; however, this association was qualified by each source of social support. When neighborhood violence is perceived as being high by mothers, high levels of social support from coparents and from friends and neighbors are associated with more maternal monitoring. The findings point to the importance of understanding the social context in which African American single mothers live when developing and implementing parenting prevention and intervention programs targeting high-risk families.

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A limited number of empirical studies have examined parental monitoring as a function of neighborhood characteristics in concert. Jones et al. (2005) found that African American parents' perceptions of neighborhood social support were not directly associated with parental monitoring, but the effect of neighborhood social support was dependent on neighborhood problems. Specifically, neighborhood social support was positively associated with parental monitoring only under conditions of high neighborhood problems.
The intersection of SES and race-ethnicity impact youth development at the family and neighborhood levels. The confluence of neighborhood structural and social characteristics intersects to impact parenting multiple ways. Within lower-income neighborhoods, there is variability in economic and racial-ethnic demographics and social characteristics and a multitude of different lived experiences. We use a person-centered approach to understand how a plurality of neighborhood social characteristics shape parents’ ethnic-racial socialization and monitoring strategies, normative parenting practices for diverse families. With 144 African American and Latino families in a new destination context—areas lacking an enduring historical and economic presence of same-ethnic populations—we examined whether we could replicate neighborhood profiles found in other neighborhood contexts using four neighborhood social process indicators (i.e., connectedness, cohesion and trust, informal social control, and problems), identified family- and neighborhood-level predictors of profiles, and explored differences in ethnic-racial socialization and parental monitoring knowledge by profile. We replicated three neighborhood profiles—integral (high on all positive social dynamics and low problems), anomic (low on all positive social dynamics and high problems), and high problems/positive relationships. Caregivers in these profiles differed in family SES and neighborhood disadvantage such that those in anomic neighborhoods had the lowest income-to-needs ratio whereas those in integral neighborhoods experienced the highest neighborhood disadvantage and lowest proportion of Hispanic residents. Egalitarianism, an ethnic-racial socialization message, and parental monitoring levels differed by neighborhood. Findings suggest African American and Latino families’ unique experiences in a new destination context, signaling a complex interplay between race-ethnicity, SES, and place.
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Aim 1 findings were largely consistent with hypotheses and most of the previous literature (e.g., Odgers et al., 2012). Previous research inconsistent with this study's results (e.g., Armistead et al., 2002; Jones et al., 2005) has considered only one aspect of parenting, finding that monitoring is enhanced in the context of poor neighborhood quality. Examined as a latent construct that includes relationship quality, monitoring, and parental involvement, parenting appears to be compromised by neighborhood quality, pointing to the importance of understanding parenting and its contextual influences from a multidimensional approach.
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^*: This research was supported in part by the William T. Grant Foundation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the University of Georgia's Institute for Behavioral Research. Appreciation is expressed to Edward Morse and Patricia Simon Morse for their role in data collection.

¹: Deborah J. Jones is now at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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Original ResearchMothers' perceptions of neighborhood violence and mother-reported monitoring of African American children: An examination of the moderating role of perceived support*

Behavior Therapy

Behavior Therapy

Applied Developmental Psychology

Aggression and Violent Behavior

The continuing coparental relationship between divorced spouses

American Journal of Orthopsychiatry

Parenting practices, child adjustment, and family diversity

Journal of Marriage and the Family

Parenting styles and adolescent development

Social ties and social support

The determinants of parenting: A process model

Child Development

Corelates of parenting styles in predominantly working- and middle-class African American mothers

Journal of Marriage and the Family

Effects of crime and violence in neighborhoods and schools on the school behavior and performance of adolescents

Journal of Adolescent Research

The influence of neighborhood disadvantage, collective socialization, and parenting on African American children's affiliation with deviant peers

Child Development

The ecology of human development: Experiments by nature and design

The relations of maternal social support and family structure with maternal responsiveness and child outcomes among African American families

Developmental Psychology

Social support and parenting in poor, dangerous neighborhoods

Child Development

Psychosocial models of the role of social support in the etiology of physical disease

Health Psychology

Social support, stress, and the buffering hypothesis: A theoretical analysis

Measuring neighborhood context for young children in an urban area

American Journal of Neighborhood Psychology

Race and ethnicity: Effects on social networks

Parental monitoring and the prevention of child and adolescent problem behavior: A conceptual and empirical formulation

Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review

Belief, attitude, intention, and behavior: An introduction to theory and research

Role of parenting in adolescent deviant behavior: Replication across and within two ethnic groups

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

How families manage risk and opportunity in dangerous neighborhoods

The effects of neighborhood violence on children

Poverty trends

Neighborhood safety and social involvement: Associations with parenting behaviors and depressive symptoms among African American and Euro-American mothers

Journal of Family Psychology

Successful parenting in high-risk neighborhoods

The Future of Children

Original Research
Mothers' perceptions of neighborhood violence and mother-reported monitoring of African American children: An examination of the moderating role of perceived support*