The Effect of Couple Characteristics and Father’s Child Care Activities on Children"s School readiness: The Mediating Effect of Mother’s Warm Parenting Behavior

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the effect of couple characteristics and the father's childcare activities on school readiness through the mediation of the mother's warm parenting behavior. The data used for this study were drawn from the 7th year of the Panel Study on Korean Children (PKSC) of the Korea Institute of Childcare and Education. The data for 1,153 children aged between 72 and 29 months and going to kindergarten or nursery were analyzed. To examine the relationship and influence of each variable, a structural model was verified, and the model fit was excellent. According to the results of the analysis, it was found that the couple characteristics directly affected the school readiness of the children. Second, the father's childcare activities directly affected the children's school readiness. Third, the mother's warm parenting behavior directly affected children's school readiness. Fourth, the couple's characteristics and the father's childcare activities indirectly affected the children's school readiness through the mediation of the mother's warm parenting behavior. The result of verifying the significance of the indirect effect through bootstrapping showed it to be significant.