Mothers' work conditions, income, and parenting of young children.

OBJECTIVE: In this study, we investigated the interplay of positive work conditions with parenting behaviors across children's first 4 years.

BACKGROUND: Most mothers in the United States are employed in paid work during their children's early years. Research typically has focused on the ways that such employment can conflict with the intensive demands of parenting, but it can also help mothers socially and psychologically during this important period of children's development.

METHOD: Integrating federal survey data on occupational conditions with parenting reports of job flexibility and parenting behaviors from 5,250 mothers in the nationally representative Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort, we estimated how work conditions were associated with stimulating and sensitive parenting and whether these associations were stronger for mothers with lower income.

RESULTS: Results of autoregressive modeling demonstrated that job flexibility, opportunities for mastery, and opportunities for connection were positively associated with a composite measure of stimulating and sensitive parenting. Significant interactions indicated that many associations were more pronounced for mothers with lower income.

CONCLUSION: Our results build upon prior work, demonstrating that positive work conditions can support parenting during early childhood and that this is especially true for low-income households.

IMPLICATIONS: These results bridge the work-family and parenting literatures with important policy implications, such as adopting family-friendly policies within companies.