Maternal prenatal, infancy and concurrent predictors of maternal reports of child psychopathology

RESEARCH on parent perceptions of infant temperament and child maladjustment has evolved from an initial interpretation of parent reports as objective, veridical descriptions of the child to an interpretation of parent reports as social perceptions that reflect both objective qualities of children and personality characteristics of parents (Bates 1983). Evidence that parents' descriptions reflect generalized behavior of their children is provided by modest correlations between parent and teacher reports of child behavior (Becker and Krug 1964; Glidewell et al. 1959; Rutter et al. 1970). Although limited agreement of parents and teachers in descriptions of child behavior might be interpreted as evidence of situational specificity of behavior (Mischel 1968), an alternative interpretation is that characteristics of parents influence their perceptions of child behavior. This longitudinal study tests hypotheses that maternal characteristics during pregnancy and infancy, prior to the development of stable child characteristics, predict mothers' reports of child psychopathology during the kindergarten year.