engleski

Parental competence - some conceptual and assessment issues

Positive parenting, which presupposes the encouragement of the child’s optimal development, is not an easy task for many parents. This is particularly relevant in the present time when parents are faced with many challenges, both in family and work environment. In order to responsibly fulfil their parental role, parents are expected to possess a certain kind of personal characteristics or qualities. In other words, parents are expected to be competent, i.e. to have developed parental competences. The aim of this paper is to present a general discussion of conceptual and assessment issues regarding the parental competence and similar phenomena central to parenting researches. To meet this aim, it is necessary to present an understanding of the concept of positive parenting first. This is followed by providing various definitions of parental competences with the attempt to clarify the meaning of this concept, as well as to point out the differences with regard to other concepts from the study of parenting. Some of the measurement scales used to assess the concepts significant for parenting researches are briefly indicated and some problems regarding the assessment of these concepts are also presented. Finally, some implications for a future research are also indicated.

parental competence; parental self-efficacy; positive parenting

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