The Predictive Role of Maternal Parenting and Stress on Pupils’ Bullying involvement

Abstract

The link between inappropriate parenting style and both bullying and victimization is well documented. However, it is not clear as to which kind of parenting style is associated with victimization. Furthermore, no studies have yet been conducted regarding the role of parental stress in bullying and victimization. This study aimed to examine the role of parenting styles and maternal stress in pupils’ bullying and victimization. A total of 300 primary school pupils, enrolled in fourth and fifth grades, participated in the study. Initially, 100 noninvolved pupils were randomly selected using a multistage cluster sampling method. Then using a screening method, 100 bully pupils and 100 victimized peers were selected. Olweus Bullying Scale and teacher nomination were administered for screening these pupils. Baumrind Parenting Style Questionnaire and revised version of Abidin Parental Stress Index (short form) were also applied to all pupils in the study. Data were analyzed using discriminant function analysis. The findings showed that (a) with regard to parenting styles, significant differences were found among groups. Authoritarian parenting style could significantly predict pupils’ bullying behavior, whereas victimization was predictable in families with permissive parenting style. In addition, noninvolved pupils were predicted to have authoritative parenting style. (b) Considering maternal stress, significant differences were observed across groups. Parents of bullies and victims were predicted to have higher maternal stress than noninvolved pupils. The implications of the study in relation to the role of mothers in bullying and victimization are discussed.

Keywords

bullying violence parental styles parental stress victimization pupils

Introduction

Bullying is broadly defined as a goal-oriented and repetitive aggressive behavior that occurs in an unequal power relationship between perpetrators and their target (Olweus, 1993). It can be classified as direct (overt) and indirect (relational) aggression (X. Li, 2014) and can lead to adverse outcomes for both bullies and victims (Golmaryami et al., 2016; Wojcik & Kozak, 2015). Bullying is the result of individual and contextual factors (Rose, Nickerson, & Stormont, 2015). The contextual factors related to bullying incidents include school climate (Azeredo, Rinaldi, de Moraes, Levy, & Menezes, 2015; Chen, Chang, & Cheng, 2016; Gower, McMorris, & Eisenberg, 2015; Hawley & Williford, 2015; Zych, Ortega-Ruiz, & Del Rey, 2015), peer dynamic (Berger & Caravita, 2016; Zych et al., 2015), social norms (Berger & Caravita, 2016; Hawley & Williford, 2015), and family environment (Zych et al., 2015). Above all, the family environment is the most immediate social context that is related to bullying incident (Gómez-Ortiz, Romera, & Ortega-Ruiz, 2016). Furthermore, the quality of family condition particularly depends on parents’ behavior (Khamis, 2015).

Parents influence a child’s social competence and later peer relationship (Healy & Sanders, 2014). On one hand, a number of parental-related variables such as facilitative parenting (defined as parenting that is utilized to develop a child’s social competency; Healy & Sanders, 2014; Tippett & Wolke, 2015), parental support (Mishna et al., 2016; Rajendran, Kruszewski, & Halperin, 2016; Thompson, 2015), and positive home environment (Khamis, 2015) could provide protective effects against bullying or victimization. On the other hand, some factors including family violence (de Oliveira, da Silva, Yoshinaga, & Silva, 2015; Espelage, 2014), poor family attachment (Chan & Wong, 2015), adverse childhood experiences at home (Connell, Morris, & Piquero, 2016), negative parenting style (Hasan & Jessica, 2016), and harsh discipline (Tippett & Wolke, 2015) can have adverse effects on bullying and victimization. Besides, parenting is known to affect the child’s healthy genetic expression on postnatal growth (Rossouw, 2013). For instance, experiencing distressful life events during pregnancy can lead to children’s later victimization by peers (Lereya & Wolke, 2012). Furthermore, a recent study indicated that bullying and victimization could be better predicted by parenting behaviors than by a child’s characteristics (Kokkinos, 2013). It is recognized that even when children possess certain individual characteristics such as behavioral problems that predispose them to bullying engagement, parental support can alter the cycle of bullying (Rajendran et al., 2016) and victimization, and alleviate the impact of bullying in children (Mishna et al., 2016; Thompson, 2015).

Furthermore, considering parenting behaviors, numerous scholars have stated that specific parenting practices are less important than the broad pattern of parenting in anticipating child’s well-being. In fact, this broad domain is recognized as parenting style (Darling, 1999). The construct of parenting style has been defined as consistent behaviors of parents utilized to interact with children in a given context. Four types of parenting styles have been identified, namely, authoritative (high on demandingness and responsiveness), authoritarian (high on demandingness but low on responsiveness), permissive (low on demandingness but high on responsiveness), and neglecting (low on both demandingness and responsiveness) (Maccoby & Martin, 1983).

There is growing evidence supporting the link between inappropriate parenting styles and behavioral problems such as bullying and victimization (Garthe, 2011). Numerous studies have indicated that bullies were more likely to come from families with authoritarian parenting styles (Bjorkqvist & Österman, 2014; de Oliveira et al., 2016; Gómez-Ortiz et al., 2016; Ryherd, 2014; Stavrinides, Nikiforou, & Georgiou, 2014; Zottis, Salum, Isolan, Manfro, & Heldt, 2014). In fact, it is well established in the literature that early childhood experiences have effects on schema formation and can determine children’s relationship with others in later life span (McElroy & Hevey, 2014). For instance, recent studies indicate that exposure to physical bullying at home has been correlated to later involvement in bullying as a perpetrator (de Oliveira et al., 2016; Gómez-Ortiz et al., 2016).

However regarding parenting style, some different results have been found on the part of bullies (Atik & Güneri, 2013; Keelan, Schenk, McNally, & Fremouw, 2014; Shin, Hong, Yoon, & Espelage, 2014). For example, findings showed that parents of bullies were low in affection and restriction (Atik & Güneri, 2013), and rejected their children more than uninvolved students (Keelan et al., 2014; Shin et al., 2014).

Also, results of some studies have suggested that the different parenting styles are experienced even among subtypes of bullies (Farrell, 2014; Feldstein, 2013; Moon & Alarid, 2014). For example, Farrell (2014) and Moon and Alarid (2014) found that compared with other subtypes of bullies, parents of physical bullies take less care about their children. Furthermore, Feldstein (2013) illustrated that bullies with negative parenting styles frequently reported higher scores on hostile attributional bias, and lower scores on emotional intelligence and social skills compared with other subtypes of bullies.

However, considering parenting styles of victimized children, research has generally produced mixed evidence. Most studies have emphasized that victimized children generally come from families with harsh parenting styles (Atik & Güneri, 2013; Batanova & Loukas, 2014; Bjorkqvist & Österman, 2014; Gómez-Ortiz et al., 2016; Keelan et al., 2014). For instance, physical punishment (Bjorkqvist & Österman, 2014), maternal psychological control (Batanova & Loukas, 2014), and parents’ low warmth (Atik & Güneri, 2013) have been identified as risk factors for children’s victimization at school setting.

Whereas, other studies have showed that victims’ parents are more close to their children and overprotect them to a much greater extent than other groups (Erginoz et al., 2015; Kokkinos, 2013; Lereya, Samara, & Wolke, 2013). For instance, on the basis of a literature review, Lereya et al. (2013) have claimed that parental overinvolvement and excessive support significantly increased the risk of being a victim of school bullying. Furthermore, it was shown that closeness to mother, inadequate supervision by father (Duncan, 2004, as cited in Abdirahman, Fleming, & Jacobsen, 2013; Erginoz et al., 2015), and being male (Erginoz et al., 2015) were predicted to be risk factors for being victimized.

However, other studies have found no significant differences between victims and uninvolved students in terms of parenting styles. For instance, Fanti and Georgiou (2013) and Keelan et al. (2014) cited that prior studies have reported that victims were not significantly different from noninvolved children in aspects of their parenting styles and had a more positive interaction with their families than bullies. Therefore, findings are inconsistent, and it is unclear as to which kind of parenting style is associated with victimization, and whether replication is needed.

Another factor that seems to play an important role in bullying and victimization is parental stress, because it has been shown to associate with some behavioral problems in children (Neece et al., 2012). Parental stress has been defined as an adverse psychological response to the demands of parenthood. It is often generated when an imbalance exists between perceived parenting demands and available resources that permit parents to succeed in the parenting role (Abidin, 1995). Parental stress has an impact on children’s well-being (Widarsson, Engstrom, Berglund, Tyden, & Lundberg, 2014). For example, Park and Walton-Moss (2012) reported that parental stress has a significant association with children’s health-related behaviors. Furthermore, bidirectional relationship has been observed between parental stress and child behavior problems across time (Mackler et al., 2015; Neece et al., 2012). Moreover, an association has been demonstrated between parental stress, and the child’s internalizing and externalizing behavior problems (Ostberg & Hagekull, 2013; Tharner et al., 2012).

The direct effect of parental stress on children’s internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors, and its indirect effect through maternal psychological aggression (L. Li & Meifang, 2015) and children’s attachment security (Hopkins, Gouze, & Lavigne, 2013; Tharner et al., 2012) have been observed in recent studies. Furthermore, insecure attachment is associated with bullying (Keelan et al., 2014; Kokkinos, 2013) and victimization of children in the future (Keelan et al., 2014).

Thus, the uni- and bidirectional relationship between parental stress and children’s problem behaviors has been indicated in previous studies, but there is a clear lack in studies on the relationship between parental stress and bullying as well as victimization behaviors, and its uni- or bidirectional relation to bullying and victimization remains uncertain and still not investigated. Yet, the authors have uncovered only one published study reported to observe the longer term impact of parental stress on victimization of their children at school. According to this study, Lereya and Wolke (2012) designed a large-scale longitudinal study that investigated the effect of maternal stress during pregnancy on children’s victimization. The result has shown that experiencing stress in pregnancy and severe adverse events can contribute directly to children’s victimization by peers.

Furthermore, it has been reported that the culture of Iran is unique regarding the influence of parents on children’s behaviors. In this collectivist culture, children normally spend more time with their families than with their peers. Thus, the role of Iranian parents might be more than peers on pupils’ bullying involvement. However, to date no studies in Iran have examined the role of parents in children’s bullying and victimization.

On the whole, it seems that inappropriate parenting styles and maternal stress may predispose children toward problem behaviors such as bullying or victimization. But as mentioned above, findings are inconsistent regarding the parenting styles of victimized pupils. Furthermore, previous studies have not investigated the role of parental stress in bullying behaviors. Although as Williford, Boulton, and Jenson (2014) stated, despite the importance of transition stage from childhood to early adolescence, as the prevalence rate of bullying tends to rise throughout these years, few studies have examined the patterns of bullying involvement in this period. Finally, it should be remarked that no studies have yet been conducted in Iran regarding the role of parents in children’s bullying involvement. Thus, this research aimed to fill in the existing gap in the literature and examine the role of maternal parenting styles and maternal stress in predicting preadolescents’ bullying and victimization. To this end, two Research Questions 1 and 2 were proposed:

Could bullying, victimization, and being noninvolved be differentiated based on parenting style?

Could bullying, victimization, and being noninvolved be differentiated based on maternal stress?

Method

Participants, Procedure, and Design

Statistical population includes all pupils enrolled in the fourth and fifth grades of primary schools located in Tabriz city. Three districts (one, two, and four) were selected as representative of Tabriz schools. Subjects were selected from public schools. Therefore, initially 100 noninvolved pupils were randomly selected using a multistage cluster sampling method. Then, through screening technique, 100 bullies and 100 victims were selected. To carry out the research, the ethical approval from the respective education ministries was acquired. Then, school principals were informed about the aims of the research and requested for their cooperation. Principals in all selected elementary schools (15 schools) gave their consent for data collection. Pupils completed the Olweus bullying self-report questionnaire, and teachers and principals confirmed the result of bullying questionnaire utilizing teacher nomination. Then, Baumrind Parenting Style Questionnaire and Abidin Parental Stress Index (PSI) were administered during parent–teacher association (PTA) meetings to 300 mothers of pupils enrolled in 15 elementary schools. It should be noted that PTA meetings periodically held in Iranian schools on average once a month and parents’ attendance in this meeting is almost compulsory.

Originally, pupils’ anonymity and confidentiality were assured, and parents were provided with an explanation of how to complete the questionnaires. Time taken for completing the questionnaire was approximately 40 to 50 min.

Discriminant analysis was conducted to test the predictive role of maternal parenting styles and stress in preadolescents’ bullying involvement, while controlling for pupil- and school-level variables, including gender, age, grade, and socioeconomic status (SES).

Measures

Bullying and victimization

Information about bullying was gathered with the bully/victim questionnaire developed by Olweus (1996). This questionnaire contains 39 questions. Both victim and perpetrator versions were included. The explanation of bullying captures all three main elements of the definition of bullying: the intention to harm the victim, the repetitive nature of bullying, and the imbalance of power between the victims and perpetrator(s). Questions include overt as well as invisible forms of bullying. The behavior is considered as bullying when it occurred at least 2 times in the past couple of months. Internal consistency of the total items considered acceptable for this sample (Cronbach’s α = .83). Also the result of self-report questionnaire was confirmed by teacher nomination.

Parenting style

Parenting style was measured with a 30-item questionnaire, originally developed by Baumrind (1971). This questionnaire assesses three types of parenting styles (authoritarian style, authoritative style, and permissive style). The response format was based on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from (1) strongly disagree to (5) strongly agree. Validity and reliability of Iranian version of the questionnaire reported as optimal in previous studies (Esfandiari, 1995).

Maternal stress

Maternal stress was measured using the abbreviated Persian version of the short form of PSI (Abidin, 1995). From this measure, the 18-item Parenting Distress subscale was used to measure maternal stress. These items have an internal consistency of .88 representing the reliability of a short index for maternal stress. The scale is reversely scored. A higher score in the scale reflects lower parental stress and vice versa.

Statistical Analysis

Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and discriminant function analysis. The statistical analysis of the data was performed using SPSS 19.

Results

Means and standard deviations for the whole sample for each scale are presented in Table 1.

Table 1.

Mean and Standard Deviation of Predictive Variables in Each Group.

Variables	Bully		Victim		Noninvolved
Variables	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD
Authoritarian Ps^a	32.02	9.41	25.48	9.59	22.59	6.3
Permissive Ps^a	24.78	9.34	34.67	9.76	24.66	7.5
Authoritative Ps^a	24.69	5.51	31.48	5.37	37.24	8.27
Parental stress^a	45.37	8.39	42.71	6.14	51.01	10.74

Note. Ps = Parenting style.

Predictors.

Table 1 indicates that most bullies come from families with authoritarian parenting style. However, means of victims are high in families with permissive parenting style, and noninvolved pupils obtained high mean in families with authoritative parenting style. Furthermore, compared with noninvolved pupils, bullies and victims have families with higher levels of maternal stress, and compared with bullies, victims have families with relatively high levels of maternal stress.

Table 2 shows that all four predictive variables had a significant role in predicting behaviors of bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils. It means that based on parenting styles and maternal stress, behaviors of bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils could be predicted. However, bullying, victimization, and being noninvolved could be differentiated based on parenting styles and maternal stress.

Table 2.

Predictive Variables in Step-by-Step Discriminant Function Analysis.

Step	Variables	Variables in Discriminant Function	Wilks’s Lambda	Equivalent F (2.297)
1	Authoritarian Ps^a	1	.82	31.81
2	Permissive Ps^a	2	.78	41.49
3	Authoritative Ps^a	3	.61	92.81
4	Parental stress^a	4	.86	24.11

Note. Ps = Parenting style.

Predictors.

Table 3 shows that in Discriminant Function 1, authoritarian and permissive parenting styles had a significant role in predicting behaviors of bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils. Thus, it could be concluded that based on authoritarian and permissive parenting styles, bullying, victimization, and being noninvolved could be differentiated. Also, in Discriminant Function 2, authoritative parenting style and maternal stress had a significant role in predicting behaviors of bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils. Hence, authoritative parenting style and maternal stress could also differentiate bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils.

Table 3.

Correlation of Predictive Variables With Discriminant Functions (Structure Matrix Coefficients) and Standardized Coefficient of Discriminant Function.

Variables	Correlation With Discriminant Function		Standardized Coefficient of Discriminant Function
Variables	Function 1	Function 2	Function 1	Function 2
Authoritarian Ps^a	.46*	.35	1.82	0.57
Permissive Ps^a	.40*	.10	1.81	0.69
Authoritative Ps^a	.37	.93*	0.49	1.20
Parental stress^a	.14	−.58*	−0.23	−0.12

Note. Ps = Parenting style.

p<0.000.

Predictors.

Table 4 indicates that in Discriminant Function 1, authoritarian and permissive parenting styles had a significant role. Besides, in Discriminant Function 2, authoritative parenting style had a strong role than the other variables.

Table 4.

Unstandardized Coefficients of Discriminant Variables in Discriminant Functions.

Variable	Function 1	Function 2
Authoritarian Ps	0.21	0.07
Permissive Ps	0.20	0.08
Authoritative Ps	0.08	0.18
Parental stress	−0.03	−0.01
Fixed alpha coefficient	−12.47	−9.06

Note. Ps = Parenting style.

Data in Tables 5 and 6 indicate that 82% of pupils could be correctly classified in bully group. However, 79% of them could be correctly classified in victim group. Furthermore, 73% of pupils could be correctly classified in noninvolved group; each of the group’s classification is based on parenting style and maternal stress. In sum, 78% of pupils could be correctly classified in three groups (bully, victim, and noninvolved groups), based on parenting style and maternal stress.

Table 5.

Classification Analysis for Behavioral Condition.

Original Group Membership	N	Predicted Group Membership
		Bully	Victim	Noninvolved
		n	n	n
Bully	100	83	14	3
Victim	100	21	79	0
Noninvolved	100	12	15	73

Table 6.

Classification Analysis for Behavioral Condition.

Original Group Membership	N	Predicted Group Membership
		Bully	Victim	Noninvolved
		n	n	n
Bully	100
Frequency		83	14	3
%		83	14	3
Victim	100
Frequency		21	79	0
%		21	79	0
Noninvolved	100
Frequency		12	15	73
%		12	15	73

Overall, with regard to structural coefficient, it can be inferred that both authoritarian and permissive parenting styles had a significant role in differentiating bullies and victims from each other (according to Function 1). However, authoritative parenting style and maternal stress had a significant role in differentiating noninvolved pupils from bullies and victims (according to Function 2).

Discussion

The current study aimed to test the role of parenting style and maternal stress in predicting pupils’ bullying and victimization. Results indicated that maternal parenting styles and maternal stress play a significant role in differentiating bullies, victims, and noninvolved pupils from one another.

Regarding parenting styles, findings showed that authoritarian parenting styles were more likely to predict bullying behavior. Also, victimization could be predicted in families with permissive parenting style. Furthermore, the results obviously showed that noninvolved children were more probably predicted by authoritative parenting style of their mothers.

Considering maternal stress, results indicated that higher level of maternal stress was predicted in both bullies and victims. However, noninvolved pupils were predicted to have lower levels of maternal stress. These findings extend the literature by showing that high maternal stress correlates with both bullying and victimization behaviors in preadolescents.

In regard to parenting style and its relationship with bullying behavior, findings may in some ways fit to Perry, Hodges, and Egan (2001) family relational schema model. This model indicated that children exposed to cycle of revictimization by their parents are at risk of developing a victim schema that negatively affects their appraisal of ambiguous situation in peer interactions. Thus, in later life phases, encountering with new situations activates victim schema—due to the past experiences—and as a consequence they see themselves as susceptible to threatened by peers. Hence, considering authoritarian parenting styles of their mothers, it appears that bullies have biased interpretation of others. Their schema is grounded in the assumption that every new situation is threatened. Thus, they tend to avoid being revictimized by overreacting to perceived threat.

Also according to Perry et al.’s (2001) family relational schema model, cyclic victimization has disturbed effects on social information processing, and consequently this may lead an individual to interpret inappropriately regarding the intentions of others (Feldstein, 2013; Reemst, Fischer, & Zwirs, 2016). This is exactly what is expected in physical (reactive) bullying (Wilkowski & Robinson, 2008), which is the most frequently reported form of bullying in this research. Accordingly, from the perspective of social information processing model, bullies were deficient in social information processing (Crick & Dodge, 1994).

The positive association between authoritarian parenting style and early adolescents bullying behavior was expected and is in line with those of previous research (Bjorkqvist & Österman, 2014; de Oliveira et al., 2016; Gómez-Ortiz et al., 2016; Ryherd, 2014; Stavrinides et al., 2014; Zottis et al., 2014).

According to the self-report scales, a majority of bullies reported to be perpetrators of physical but not relational bullying. Many of them were also confirmed by the teachers as perpetrators of physical bullying. It appears that these pupils tend to see themselves as powerful and feel proud of being bully. This claim is consistent with pioneer research on bullying which exemplified bullies as persons with physical but not intellectual abilities (Roland, 1989). As a corollary to this view, they seem to misuse their physical privilege to intimidate and threaten their victims to physically assault.

Bullies are more likely to have lower self-control (Chui & Chan, 2015). Poor cognitive skills in bullies may lead them to lower self-control and impulsive behavior. Furthermore, as a corollary to the strength model of self-control (Baumeister, Vohs, & Tice, 2007), restrictive/overcontrolling parenting style seems to deplete children’s self-control capacity, resulting in subsequent failures in self-control behavior. Consequently, bullies are not able to inhibit their overt aggression to be unraveled and less likely to employ indirect bullying. As many teachers pointed to the recognition these bullies in light of their overreactions. Moreover, consistent with these findings and with respect to parenting styles and its relationship with physical bullying, Farrell (2014) and Moon and Alarid (2014) found that physical bullying was associated with negative parenting styles. Also, Feldstein (2013) indicated that bullies with negative parenting styles were high in hostile attributional bias and low in emotional intelligence as well as in social skills compared with other subtypes of bullies who do not experience negative parenting styles.

Regarding parenting style and its relationship with victimization, results can relatively be explained by Perry et al.’s (2001) family relational schema model.

It can be suggested that when parents respond immediately to children’s demands, unconsciously induct them, they do not able to independently safeguard themselves against would-be assailants. Thus, under such circumstances, victim schema could be developed in these children as a start-up for labeling events. Consequently, when parents are not present (e.g., at school setting), these children become defenseless—according to their victim schema—and do not able to protect themselves from undesirable behaviors of others and subsequently react in a submissive manner, which is easily detected by bullies.

With respect to parenting style and its relationship with victimized behavior, previous results are more differentiated. Inconsistent with these findings, large amount of research indicated that victims more probably have parents with harsh disciplinary styles (Batanova & Loukas, 2014; Bjorkqvist & Österman, 2014; Gómez-Ortiz et al., 2016; Keelan et al., 2014) and low warmth (Atik & Güneri, 2013).

However, the results of this study are in agreement with those of few studies, reporting that victimized children more likely belong to mothers with permissive and overprotective parenting styles compared with bullies and noninvolved children (Erginoz et al., 2015; Kokkinos, 2013; Lereya et al., 2013).

Although this finding is inconsistent with some research showing that victims were more similar to noninvolved pupils than bullies with respect to their parenting styles. For example, Fanti and Georgiou (2013) and Keelan et al. (2014) cited that prior studies suggested that victims were not significantly different from noninvolved children in aspects of their parents’ parenting styles.

Some possibilities could account for the results of this study regarding to victims parenting styles First, utilizing permissive parenting style may be due to the mothers’ perception regarding their children’s inability to assert themselves against higher status groups. Thus, they adopt this style to obtain their children’s rights from dominant peers. However, in this case, permissive parenting style would be exacerbating the cycle of already existing victimization. In other words, when peers notice this episode, they will tend to consider more this person as a potential target for their ill-intentional behaviors.

Another interpretation of these results that should be taken into consideration is that parenting style differences were observed between mothers and fathers across some studies. For instance, research by Duncan (2004, as cited in Abdirahman et al., 2013) and Erginoz et al. (2015) demonstrated that victimized male pupils were less likely to receive adequate supervision from their fathers, yet have close relationship with their mothers.

Likewise in the research by Olweus (1993, as cited in Rigby, 2013), most victimized children were highly protected by their mothers. It appears that mothers adopt permissive style to compensate for the lack of fathers’ affection toward child, as well as to protect child from the adverse effects of fathers’ behavior.

In this research, questionnaires were completed by mothers alone; hence, this probably leads results to permissive parenting style. As the mothers spend relatively more time than fathers caring for their children, the role of mothers in child rearing is of paramount importance. For this reason, the results of the present study could be considered realistic.

Besides, regarding maternal stress, results showed that compared with noninvolved pupils, bullies or victims could be predicted to have a higher level of maternal stress. This finding is consistent with prior findings (Hopkins et al., 2013; Keelan et al., 2014; Kokkinos, 2013; Lereya & Wolke, 2012; L. Li & Meifang, 2015; Mackler et al., 2015; Neece et al., 2012; Ostberg & Hagekull, 2013; Park & Walton-Moss, 2012; Tharner et al., 2012).

According to the literature, parental stress is associated with insecure attachment (Hopkins et al., 2013; Tharner et al., 2012) and problem behaviors (Mackler et al., 2015; Neece et al., 2012; Tharner et al., 2012) in children. Parents with stressful parenting issues and concerns fail to be sensitive and responsive to their child’s symptoms. Ultimately, this type of interaction culminates in the form of insecure attachment styles in children (Deater-Deckard, 1998). It appears that parental stress leads to the formation of insecure attachment in children (Hopkins et al., 2013), and insecure attachment is associated with bullying (Keelan et al., 2014; Kokkinos, 2013) and victimization of children in the future (Keelan et al., 2014).

According to attachment theory and with reference to opinions of neuroscientists, parental stress can be explained in these three groups (Rossouw, 2013).

Noninvolved pupils experienced less parental stress than other two groups. When parental stress is less experienced, the possibility of forming a secure attachment in children is increased (Deater-Deckard, 1998).

The explanation of this result is that overactivation of limbic system, which in turn results in the excessive secretion of stress hormones, was inhibited in the presence of safe cues (Hart, 2011, as cited in Rossouw, 2012). Thus, noninvolved pupils can better deal with stressful situations by applying their cognitive abilities.

However, bullies and victims displayed significantly higher levels of maternal stress. When maternal stress is high, the probabilities of insecure attachment formation (Deater-Deckard, 1998), as well as secretion of stress hormones, could be increased in children. As a result, cognitive skills could be impaired, emotional control could be disturbed, and probability of impulsive behavior such as bullying could be increased. Although in some other cases, cyclic up-regulation of limbic system activity in response to stress eventually can lead to reduced warning system’s sensitivity in reaction to environmental risk factors (Rossouw, 2013), thus in conflict situation these individuals could be left defenseless and experience a sense of learned helplessness. Apparently, these symptoms are prevalent among victims and depressive children.

Limitations

The present study has some limitations. First, data were collected from fourth- and fifth-grade male pupils, and the findings cannot be generalized beyond these groups. Second, in the present study, only the mothers participated to investigate parenting styles and maternal stress. Most of the fathers were not available at the time of collecting data. Because in Iran, traditionally fathers are the main providers of financial support for their family and spend more time at work outside. However, historically Iranian mothers are the primary caregivers of their children. Furthermore, mothers have more time to interact with their children as well as to affect their behaviors. Therefore, it seems that the results could not be inflated as fathers did not participate in the study. Third, data were obtained through self-report questionnaires and teacher nomination only. Further assessment methods such as behavioral observation and multiple measurements (e.g., peer, teacher, and parent) could also be incorporated into the future research. The fourth limitation is related to the cultural differences. As this study was conducted in an Eastern country, the results should be cautiously compared with those from Western countries. Finally, the cross-sectional design was another limitation of the study.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Fatemeh Alizadeh Maralani received a MA degree in Educational Psychology from the University of Tabriz. Her main research interests are focused on social, cognitive, and behavioral development of children and adolescents, abnormal behaviors and bullying issues. She is also working in a psychiatric clinic with students who have emotional and behavioral problems. She is writing a book on the socialization of problem behavior in youth that is currently in preparation.

Mirmahmoud Mirnasab received his PhD in Psychology and Education of Exceptional Children from University of Tehran and is currently an associate professor at the Department of Education in the University of Tabriz. At present, he is teaching behavior modification, child psychopathology and special education courses for graduate and undergraduate students. He has been working as a psychologist at Razi Psychiatric Hospital of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences where he is planning and administrating behavior modification treatments for children and adolescents with disruptive behaviors. His main scientific interests include bullying and victimization, students’ challenging behaviors, parent-child interaction, ADHD and behavior modification.

Touraj Hashemi has PhD in Educational Psychology from the University of Kharazmi and works as a professor at the Department of Psychology in the University of Tabriz. He has been teaching some undergraduate and graduate courses in applied research methodology and statistics for behavioral science, learning psychology and psychopathology. His main interests include childhood disorders, learning and educational problems, psychological evaluation and psychometrics.

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