The Effect of Parenting Efficacy on the Social-Emotional

Development of Children in B-Class Kindergarten

Evania Yafie

Faculty of Education, State University of Malang, Malang, Indonesia

Keywords: Parenting Efficacy, Social-Emotional, Early Childhood.

Abstract: Family is the first informal institution in which children grow and develop, internalizing values, norms and

beliefs as well as a place in which disciplines are applied to form principles of the mental and self in the

future, and for children to get the required attention and love from the parents and the family which can raise

their potentials and development. One of the ways to measure the parents' parenting skills is by parenting self-

efficacy, that is, a self-evaluation towards their ability in playing the parenting roles to give positive effects

to the behaviours and developments of the children. This study aims to examine the effect of parenting

efficacy on children's social-emotional development. The research method used in this study is descriptive

quantitative with explanatory method. The sample was taken by random sampling technique with 100 students

from 4 B-class kindergartens in Malang Regency. The data are analysed using simple regression analysis with

a result showing that parenting efficacy has positive and significant effects on children's social-emotional

development. The higher the parent's efficacy level, their children's social-emotional development gets higher

too. Parenting efficacy needs more attention in order to maximally improve children's development.

1 INTRODUCTION

Parenting skill has an important role as it is one of the

most influencing factors in a child's growth and

development. Kazdin (1987), found that parenting

skill program is usually based on social-learning

principles with a notion that reinforced actions will

occur more often. One of the main cognitive elements

in parenting competence is parenting-self-efficacy

which defines as a self-referent estimation towards

one's ability/competence in playing the parenting role

to give positive effects on their children's

development and behaviour (Coleman and Karraker,

2003). Parenting efficacy or the belief of the parents

in doing their job has a big role in forming the way

they treat their children, including shaping their

children's development in the future because the

parents are the main player in dealing with family

lives and the people in it (Berndt, 1997b, 1997a).

Researches proven that mothers with lower levels

of self-efficacy tend to be more aggressive in

interacting with their children (Jeynes, 2003).

Coleman and Karraker (2003), further show that

parenting self-efficacy refers more to the ability of the

mother in playing her role as the caregiver compared

to the father. Besides, it is also believed that higher

levels of parenting self-efficacy is strongly associated

with the parents' capacity in providing adaptive,

stimulating and nurturing environment for the

children. However, this parenting self-efficacy level

will decrease as the children get older (Coleman and

Karraker, 2003). Then, if the parents face some

difficulties in the (parenting) process, negative effects

will happen to them (Coleman and Karraker, 2003).

Some of these negative effects were found in research

about parenting self-efficacy and depression on the

parents, like defensive and controlling parenting

techniques, high levels of stress, passive and negative

stress-controlling acts in parenting, as well as feelings

of helplessness and frustration (Coleman and

Karraker, 2003).

Parenting efficacy seems like a critical factor that

influences the child's development in the family

system. Parents' perception about their competence in

parenting plays an important role in building a strong,

affectionate parent-child relation. It is their love and

affection that are believed to form the basic cognitive

structures in the child's psychological development

and interpersonal function (Trunzo, 2006).

Various cases have been found in this area,

ranging from small cases to the big ones. For

example, a mother complains about her whiny child,

Yaﬁe, E.

The Effect of Parenting Efﬁcacy on the Social-Emotional Development of Children in B-Class Kindergarten.

DOI: 10.5220/0008408000780083

In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Learning Innovation (ICLI 2018), pages 78-83

ISBN: 978-989-758-391-9

disagreeing or disobedient, difficult to ask for naps,

difficult in bathing or eating, stingy so a fight often

happens, a child who likes to bang its head on the

floor when what it doesn't get what it wants, up to the

points about "beyond-normal" juveniles delinquency.

There are many of these mothers hitting their kids as

a form of punishment when they seem tough to be

controlled. There are even some who still continue

physically hurting their kids even after they

apologized.

Parenting efficacy will also have an influence to

all aspects of the children's development. These

aspects are associated with the development of their

physic-motor, cognition, language, norms and values,

spiritual beliefs, art and social-emotion. These

aspects do not develop independently, but rather as an

integrated system, a harmony. If one of them faces an

obstruction and is "late," it will affect the other as well

(Dabrowska and Pisula, 2010). One that is most

probable to be obstructed is the child's social-

emotional development. Goleman (1995) notes that

emotional development appears earlier than social or

cognitive ones. As a baby, this skill is a tool to

communicate with their environment. During early

childhood, the child's emotion reaches maturity.

Children start to become aware of the things their

emotion can cause. They begin to develop the

understanding of other's feelings, such as how others

would feel when they get hurt so they start learning to

control their emotion.

Through this research I want to evaluate how far

the effect of parenting efficacy on children's social-

emotional development goes. This particular

developmental stage is very important because social-

emotional behaviours will certainly have relations to

their lives in the future. The stronger the

pressure/stress emotion gives, the harder it is for them

to balance their body to do certain actions. If the

action matches their emotion, they will gladly do it

and will mentally increase their concentration while

their psyche gives positive support(s) in improving

motivation and interest in pursuing and learning this

particular thing they like. Gardner (1983) also states

that a positive state a child encounters, where he/she

likes what they do, has the persistence, and feels

involved in what they are learning, will further

develop a more optimal competition. By building

emotional bond, that is creating fun learning and

eliminating threats in the atmosphere, the students'

active role in studying will improve (Mashar, 2011).

The child's social-emotional development can be

seen from their interaction skill with others in social

contexts using specific methods that are socially

acceptable or norms which at the same time useful to

them as well as others (Coolahan et al., 2000). Their

social-emotional development should constantly

receive stimuli so that they have a feeling of empathy,

by which they express their caring of others,

generosity and teamwork. Toddlers start to have the

capability to adapt, moving from being egocentric to

being cooperative or socio-centric. Social-emotional

development of 5/6-year-olds is also observable from

their interaction and blending abilities to form groups

of friends in doing children's social activities. They

begin to work as a team, create and follow rules inside

their group(s), understand others and build friendship

(Williams and Monsma, 2006). Based on

observations in kindergartens across Malang

Regency, I found that socialization on the matter and

children's tendencies to share and cooperate are still

minimal. They are still egoistic and always want to

win in playing their games. There are even a few that

dominate certain games or toys. This is by no doubt a

form of social-emotional problems occurring in

children. We need a correct method so that their

social-emotional competence develops optimally.

This is where stimuli need to be given through fun

and relaxed teaching techniques. One method is role-

playing. As for the purpose of this study is to examine

the effects or influences of parenting efficacy on the

social-emotional development of children in B-class

kindergarten.

Based on the matter explained above, the

hypothesis of this study is as follows:

 H0: There are no effects parenting efficacy

gives to the social-emotional development of

children in B-class kindergarten in Malang

regency.

 H1: There is an effect/there are some effects

parenting efficacy gives to the social-emotional

development of children in B-class

kindergarten in Malang Regency..

2 METHOD

The research method used in this study is descriptive

quantitative with explanatory method (explanatory

research). Singarimbun and Effendi (2009), defines

explanatory research as a research in which the

researcher explains the cause-and-effect relation

among variables through the testing of the hypothesis.

This study uses quantitative approach because

numbers are used throughout the analysis. The data

are collected using questionnaires which are then

analysed to find the effect(s) the variables give using

regression analysis.

The Effect of Parenting Efﬁcacy on the Social-Emotional Development of Children in B-Class Kindergarten

There are two variables in this study: independent

and dependent variables. The independent variable in

this study is parenting efficacy, while the dependent

one is social-emotional development.

According to the theoretical concept defined

above, the variables, indicators and items presented in

this study is as explained in the Table 1.

Table 1: Dimension and indicator social-emotional variable.

Dimension

Indicator

a. Able to interact with friends of the

same age and adults

1. Willing to play with friends of the same age without discriminating (skin

color, breed, hair, religion, etc.)

2. Willing to appreciate others

3. Asking friends to play/study together

4. Playing together (e.g. halma, snakes & ladders, etc.)

5. Communicating to older people when doing something (e.g. baking

cookies, cooking, etc.)

6. Communicating with friends when having problems (e.g. getting sick, sad,

etc.)

b. Able to show their confidence

1. Dare to ask and/or answer questions

2. Dare to give opinions (in simple ways)

3. Making simple decisions

4. Pretending they have jobs

5. Working independently

6. Dare to tell stories

c. Able to show attitudes of independence

1. Button or zip their clothes by themselves

2. Tie or untie their shoe laces

3. Dare to go to school and back home alone (for those whose house is close

to the school)

4. Bath and do toilet stuff on their own (toilet training)

5. Do their assignments themselves

6. Play games they like

7. Taking care of themselves without the help of others (e.g. putting on

clothes, brushing their teeth, eating, etc.)

d. Able to express proper emotion

1. Willing to be parted from the mother

2. Accepting criticism and advice

3. Help solving problems

4. Expressing their feelings (e.g. anger, sadness, happiness, surprised, etc.)

e. Being used to show discipline and

obedience

1. Throwing trashes in the provided cans

2. Putting back toys on their places

3. Obeying rules

4. Being at school on time

f. Being responsible

1. Doing assignments from the teachers

2. Taking care of their own or others' belonging

3. Finishing their task

4. Responsible for orders given to them

5. Taking care of their stuff

6. Being cooperative in finishing group task(s)

g. Being used to protecting the

environment

1. Protecting the environment, for example, not scratching the walls, throwing

trashes in the provided cans, etc.

2. Saving water and electricity (using them less)

3. Doing the dishes

ICLI 2018 - 2nd International Conference on Learning Innovation

Table 2: Dimension and indicator social-emotional

variable.

Dimension

Indicator

a. Discipline

1. Parents are able to guide

their children to obey the

rules

b. Achievement

2. Teaching the children doing

their academic or non-

academic (self-improvement)

tasks

c. Recreation

3. Able to allocate the time and

provide fun activities for the

children

d. Nurturance

4. Being affectionate and loving

parents

e. Health

5. Able to perform the proper

treatments when the children

get ill/sick

The population in this study is all of the students

in 4 B-class kindergartens in Malang Regency. 100

students are taken as the sample, picked using random

sampling technique. Random sampling is a sampling

technique that randomly picks individuals in the

population as the sample in the research.

The measurement scale used is Likert Scale

format. The kinds of questions or statements

presented in the questionnaire are closed-ended with

5 options/answers for each. The data are then

analysed using simple regression analysis.

3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION

Validity testing on the research instrument is done by

comparing corrected item-total correlation values

using product-moment correlation. As for reliability,

the test is done using Cronbach Alpha. The results of

the tests shown at Table 3.

Table 3: Test results of the instrument's validity and

reliability

Variable

Correlation

Values

Cronbach Alpha

Social-emotional

development

0.609-0.888

0.830

Parenting

efficacy

0.525-0.818

0.872

From the validity test we can see that all

instruments in both parenting efficacy and social-

emotional variables have r-count value > than r-table

0.1964 obtained from (n-2) 98 sample that we can

come to a conclusion that all instruments in parenting

efficacy and children's social-emotional development

variables are valid. Meanwhile, reliability test from

table 3 also shows that the Cronbach Alpha values are

all above 0.60 which means that the research

variables are reliable and is suitable for further

research.

Next, the descriptive analysis result of parenting

efficacy is shown at Table 4.

Table 4: Descriptive analysis of parents' parenting efficacy.

Range

Category

4.21-5.00

Very High

24%

3.41-4.20

High

76%

2.61-3.40

Medium

1.81-2.60

Low

1.00-1.80

Very Low

Total

100

100%

Average

3,93

Max

4,40

Min

3,30

Standard Deviation

0,26

Table 6: Regression analysis.

Model

Beta

Sig.

Constant

0.133

Social-emotional

0.564

3.344

0.00

Coefficient of

determination

48.5%

As for the regression analysis, the result is positive

and significant as can be seen in the Table 6. From the

result of the regression analysis Table 6, it is clear that

there is positive and significant effect parenting

efficacy gives to children's social-emotional

development as can be seen from the significance

value 0.00<0.05 and the coefficient of determination

at 48.5%.

The analysis proves from table 6 that parenting

efficacy has an effect on the social-emotional

development of children in B-class kindergartens in

Malang Regency which are TK PGRI 5 Kromengan,

PAUD Mawar Putih Pakisaji, TK Dharmawanita

Pucang-songo, and TK Muslimat 1 Pulung-dowo,

Tumpang. This means that better parenting efficacy

will result in the better social-emotional development

experienced by children as seen from their

interactions with either friends of the same age or

adults, their willingness to show their confidence and

independence, their ability to express proper emotion,

as well as their disciplined, responsible and

environment-friendly actions.

There have been many experts who state that

children in kindergartens have unique personalities.

Some experts in education and psychology see this

period as the one that needs the best treatment or

guidance. It is looking in table 1 about dimension and

indicator variable Social and Emotional for Children.

Hurlock (2003) believes that the age of 3-6 years is a

sensitive period, that is, a period in which particular

functions need to be stimulated, guided so that they

can develop well. Kartono (2000) further explains

that kindergarten children have these unique traits: (1)

naively egocentric, (2) having social relation with

things and people that is still simple and primitive, (3)

physical and spiritual unity is a must, and (4) having

physiognomy lifestyle.

In the table 5 we can look about score

development Social Emotional Children. Social and

Emotional Children with knowledge parent about it

development will influence each child. It is very

important to future. According to Santrock (2007),

childhood is an important and precious phase; a phase

of formation in somebody's life (a noble and

malleable phase of human life). Because of this

childhood is often dubbed as the golden age for

education. It is a fundamental phase in which a

person's personality or social-emotion has the biggest

chance to shape.

Development in the social-emotional ability of

Children in B-class kindergarten in Malang Regency

is clearly observable from their willingness to have

interactions either with friends of the same age or

with adults, such as playing with friends without

discriminating, appreciating others, and daring to

invite others to play together; the ability to show their

confidence and independence, such as asking

questions, making simple decisions, telling stories in

front of friends, cleaning up themselves (taking baths)

and putting on clothes on their own; the ability to

express proper emotion, such as when they are sad,

angry or happy; the ability to show discipline, such as

throwing trashes in the cans, return their toys to the

proper places and being at school on time; the ability

to be responsible and environment-caring, such as

doing their assignments and taking care of things

either belonging to them or belonging to others.

This development cannot be separated from the

parents' role. They are the main agent that can

influence how these children will be in the future.

They will always play this role from the childhood,

post-school, up to the point where their

sons/daughters live their own lives apart from the

parents. Children get the view of life rules, morals and

social norms from their parents. Their good and/or

bad come(s) from the parents.

Parenting efficacy is a cognitive element on which

parents' treatments to their children are based. These

treatments are what will influence the children's life

in the future. By having parenting efficacy parents

ICLI 2018 - 2nd International Conference on Learning Innovation

will have the confidence that they are capable of

conducting effective parenting. Some research in

Coleman and Karraker (2003) also show that mothers

with high levels of parenting efficacy have good and

positive ways in providing what the child needs, have

positive interactions with the child, can help the child

when facing problems, and can play the role of a

mother well.

4 CONCLUSIONS

Research shows that there are positive and significant

effects of parenting efficacy on children's social-

emotional development. The higher it is results in

better social-emotional development on the children.

It can be seen from the significance value 0.00<0.05

and the coefficient of determination at 48.5%.

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The Effect of Parenting Efﬁcacy on the Social-Emotional Development of Children in B-Class Kindergarten