Marital satisfaction, parenting styles, and child outcomes in families of autistic children

Abstract

Theory and research on the general population suggest that parents' marital relationship quality is associated with children's emotional and behavioral functioning directly, as well as indirectly, by affecting parenting attitudes and behaviors. However, little has been done to investigate the potential connection among parent marital satisfaction, parenting styles, and outcomes for autistic children. Using longitudinal data collected from 188 couples parenting an autistic child, this study tested the time-ordered indirect effect of parent marital satisfaction (assessed at Time 1) on the internalizing and externalizing symptoms (assessed at Time 3) of autistic children (originally aged 5-12 years) via parenting styles (assessed at Time 2) using actor-partner interdependence modeling extended to mediation. Results indicated that a lower level of marital satisfaction at Time 1 predicted impaired child outcomes at Time 3 via its impact on parenting style at Time 2. For both parents, lower marital satisfaction predicted more child externalizing symptoms via reports of more authoritarian parenting style. Lower marital satisfaction in mothers at Time 1 was also associated with higher levels of child internalizing symptoms at Time 3 via increased authoritarian parenting in mothers. No partner effects were found. A family-wide approach that includes support for the parent marital relationship, which may have downstream effects on parenting, is important for promoting optimal emotional and behavioral health in autistic children.

Keywords: Autism; Behavior; Couple Relationship; Parenting.

Figure 1.

Conceptual diagram of the hypothesized APIMeM. The tested models were run in mixed-mixed-between (M-M-B) format such that both X and M were considered mixed dyad variables and Y was a between dyad variable. The model equation, adapted from Coutts et al. (2019), are as follows: $${\text{M}}_1=i_{\text{M}1}+a_{\mathit{1}}\text{X}1+a_{\mathit{7}}\text{X}2+e_{\text{M}1}\cdots$$ $${\text{M}}_4=i_{\text{M}4}+a_{\mathit{10}}\text{X}1+a_{\mathit{4}}\text{X}2+e_{\text{M}2}\cdots$$ $$\text{Y}=i_{\text{Y}}+{c^{\prime }}_{\mathit{1}}\text{X}1+{c^{\prime }}_{\mathit{2}}\text{X}2+b_{\mathit{1}}\text{M}1+b_{\mathit{2}}\text{M}2+b_{\mathit{3}}\text{M}3+b_{\mathit{4}}\text{M}4+b_{\mathit{5}}\text{M}5+b_{\mathit{6}}\text{M}6+e_{\gamma }$$ $$\text{Direct Effects}-\text{X}1\text{ on Y}:{c^{\prime }}_{\mathit{1}};\text{X}2\text{ on Y}:{c^{\prime }}_{\mathit{2}}$$ $$\text{Indirect Effects}-\text{X}1\text{ on Y}:a_{\mathit{1}}{b}_{\mathit{1}},a_{\mathit{2}}{b}_{\mathit{2}},a_{\mathit{3}}{b}_{\mathit{3}},a_{\mathit{10}}{b}_{\mathit{4}},a_{\mathit{11}}{b}_{\mathit{5}},a_{\mathit{12}}{b}_{\mathit{6}};\text{X}2\text{ on Y}:a_{\mathit{4}}{b}_{\mathit{4}},a_{\mathit{5}}{b}_{\mathit{5}},a_{\mathit{6}}{b}_{\mathit{6}},a_{\mathit{7}}{b}_{\mathit{1}},a_{\mathit{8}}{b}_{\mathit{2}},a_{\mathit{9}}{b}_{\mathit{3}}$$