The Impacts of Mindfulness of parents and their Socio-demographic Factors on the Mental Health Condition of their Adolescents in Some Selected Secondary High Schools in Addis Ababa
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Date
2013-05
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The purpose of this research was to investigate the relationships between
mindful parenting, the socio-demographic factors of the parents and the
mental health condition of the adolescents. In this study, parental
mindfulness in the parenting practices was defined and measured .athe
level of awareness, openness and non-judgementality and non reactwIty of
the parents during parent-adolescent interactions as measured by the IEM-P
scale. The socio-demographic factors of the parents were operationally
defined and measured as the parents' age, religion, income per year in birr
and level of education. The mental health condition of the adolescents also
was defined and measured as the level of general psychological well-being of
high school student adolescents as measured by the SRQ-24 scale. 350
participant adolescents, ages 13-19, from three (3) Sample high schools,
chosen purposively were selected randomly and took the questionnaire
consisting of the above mentioned two scales and the socio-demographic
factors of their parents. Participants completed this questionnaire consisting of the Scales of IEM-P and SRQ-24 and their socio-demographic variables as
well as of their parents. As hypothesized, results indicated that the level of
mindfulness of parents has an impact on the mental health condition of the
adolescents. The more mindful parents are, the less the level of the mental
health problems of their adolescents .ar-e: It was also found that the parents'
socio-demographic variables overall have significant effect in influencing their
level of mindfulness in their parenting practices .Finally, the findings from the
multiple regression implied that both the level of mindfulness of the parents
and their education level are impacting or predicting significantly and
inversely the level of the mental health problem of their adolescents. The posthocanalyses also indicated additional support for the relationships between the socio-demographic factors of the parents and their level of mindfulness.
Findings of this study provided further support for the benefits of mindfulness' in parenting and added to the emerging body of research indicating the beneficial effects of mindfulness of parents in preventing and/ or alleviating ...)~ the mental health problems of their adolescents1f!mplications of these findings 't:r"C".
include practical utility in both clinical and ri'on-clinical populations, using tN.1<- tJmindfu parenting skills to attenuate them to the psychological needs and ~ tunature of their adolescents during parenting practices, to enhance effective ~,parenting. The findings of this study offered support for the need of increasing mindful parenting, which is established to be highly beneficial for the adolescents' mental health through: enhancing mindful parenting practices and thereby increasing nonjudgmental acceptance, flexibility, more positive parent-adolescent relationship and responsiveness inside the dynamics of home and parenting as well as reducing parenting reactivity, parenting stress and other related problems like unhappy marriage life of the parents so that the psychological well-being and mental health condition of their adolescents can be safeguarded and/ or improved as a consequence.
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Keywords
Socio-demographic Factors, Mental Health Condition