The Effects of Parental Marital Conflict and Parenting Styles on Anxiety in Anxious-Vulnerable and Anxious-Secure Children

This study examined the differences between mothers’ and fathers’ maritalconflict, warm parenting, and limit setting parenting styles, and analyzed theinfluence of these variables on children’s anxiety. The children were divided intoanxiety-prone and anxiety-secure children, and the influence of these variables wasexamined separately. The study subjects were 1,212 children and 1,212 parentswho responded to the 7th Panel Study on Korean Children. To determine thereliability of the test tool, Cronbach’s was calculated. To examine the differencesbetween each variable, paired sample t-test, cluster analysis, and stepwiseregression analysis were performed to verify the influence of these variables onchildren’s anxiety. The results revealed differences between mothers’ and fathers’ warm parentingstyles and limit setting parenting styles. The influence of these variables on theanxiety of anxious-vulnerable children was examined. As a result, mothers’ maritalconflict, mothers’ warm parenting styles, and fathers’ warm parenting styles hadeffects on the anxiety of anxious-vulnerable children. In addition, fathers’ warmparenting styles and mothers’ marital conflict had effects on the anxiety ofanxious-secure children. Among these, mothers’ marital conflict was identified as amajor predictor of children’s anxiety. Mothers’ marital conflict was a variable thatintensified children’s anxiety. Therefore, it was found that measures to reducematernal marital conflict are necessary for the positive development of children.