Parenting Challenges Among Families Experiencing Homelessness with Children with and without Externalizing Behavior Problems.

OBJECTIVE

To examine differences in parenting factors among caregivers with children with and without externalizing behavior problems (EBP) in a community homeless shelter sample versus a stable housing sample.

METHOD: Nine hundred and fourteen children (ages = 2.01-7.49 years, SD = 1.45 years, 40.8% female, 54.3% Black, 46.7% Hispanic) were recruited from a service-driven research project in a shelter setting (n = 638) and a longitudinal/clinical study (n = 276). Primary caregivers (97% mothers) completed a parenting stress questionnaire and an observational measure of parent-child interactions.

RESULTS

Logistic regression indicated that children who were Black and/or of Hispanic background were less likely to be identified as having elevated EBP but only in the homeless shelter sample. Multivariate analyses indicated that the homeless shelter-EBP group reported the highest levels of overall stress compared to the homeless shelter-typically developing (TD), stable housing-EBP and stable housing-TD groups. Mothers from the homeless shelter-EBP group exhibited a higher proportion of negative verbalizations relative to caregivers from all other groups while mothers from the homeless shelter-TD group exhibited a higher proportion of positive verbalizations relative to the caregivers from the homeless shelter-EBP group and the stable housing TD group. Both homeless shelter groups engaged in less total verbalizations relative to both stable housing samples, with the stable housing-EBP group exhibiting the most verbalizations.

CONCLUSIONS

High levels of parenting stress and negative parent-child interactions within a homeless shelter sample are exacerbated by having a child with EBP. Embedding universal parenting programs in a homeless shelter setting to reduce parenting stress would be valuable to address health disparities in this vulnerable population.