IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v17y2020i16p5808-d397395.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Parental Involvement in Children’s Sleep Care and Nocturnal Awakenings in Infants and Toddlers

Author

Listed:
  • Benedetta Ragni

    (Department of Human Studies, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy)

  • Simona De Stasio

    (Department of Human Studies, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy)

Abstract

Background: Sleep regulation and consolidation represent critical developmental processes that occur in the first years of life. Recent studies have highlighted the contribution of caregivers to sleep development. However, the majority of them have primarily focused on maternal behaviors, overlooking fathers. The main goal of the present study was to investigate the associations between paternal and maternal involvement in children’s sleep care and the number of night awakenings reported by both parents in infants and toddlers. Methods: One-hundred-and-one families of infants aged 8 to 12 months and 54 families of toddlers aged 18 to 36 months filled out the following self-report questionnaires: The Brief Infant Sleep Questionnaire and an ad hoc questionnaire to assess parental involvement in sleep care for children. A moderate actor–partner interdependence (APIM) with path analysis was performed to test the predictive role of parental involvement on the children’s sleep (no. of nocturnal awakenings) and the moderation role of age on these relationships. Results: Paternal involvement in children’s sleep care was associated with the number of night awakenings reported by both parents. Moreover, a significant interaction effect emerged between the children’s age and paternal involvement in children’s sleep care for predicting nocturnal awakenings. Conclusions: The main outcomes of this study point to the protective role of paternal involvement in children’s sleep during the first years of life.

Suggested Citation

  • Benedetta Ragni & Simona De Stasio, 2020. "Parental Involvement in Children’s Sleep Care and Nocturnal Awakenings in Infants and Toddlers," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(16), pages 1-11, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:16:p:5808-:d:397395
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/16/5808/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/16/5808/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Simona De Stasio & Francesca Boldrini & Benedetta Ragni & Simonetta Gentile, 2020. "Predictive Factors of Toddlers’ Sleep and Parental Stress," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-10, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Tamar Simon & Anat Scher, 2023. "Maternal Differentiation of Self and Toddlers’ Sleep: The Mediating Role of Nighttime Involvement," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(3), pages 1-8, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tamar Simon & Anat Scher, 2023. "Maternal Differentiation of Self and Toddlers’ Sleep: The Mediating Role of Nighttime Involvement," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(3), pages 1-8, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:16:p:5808-:d:397395. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.