Fathers' authoritative and authoritarian attitudes and paternal involvement in a climate of political violence (original) (raw)

Objectives: This study explored the behavioral and emotional adjustment of Israeli school-age children who are exposed to political violence. Based on Bronfenbrenner's (1986) ecological model and ecological model of psychosocial trauma (Harvey, 2007), we examined the direct contribution of exposure, gender, maternal characteristics (mother's posttraumatic stress symptoms [PTSS], maternal care and maternal control), and community type (development town vs. kibbutz), to school-age children's adjustment. In addition, we examined whether maternal characteristics and community type moderated the association between exposure and adjustment. Method: There were 121 mother-child dyads from the development town of Sderot (n = 62) and from the surrounding kibbutzim (n = 58) participated. Results: Revealed that being a boy, living in Sderot, and mothers' higher PTSS, contributed directly to children's total difficulties (i.e., externalizing and internalizing problems), and t...