Positive parenting and child psychosocial adjustment in inner-city single-parent African American families. The role of maternal optimism.

The primary purposes of this study were to examine whether maternal optimism is related to positive parenting and child adjustment and whether it contributes beyond maternal depressive symptoms to our understanding. The participants were 141 African American single mothers and one of their children. Findings revealed that maternal optimism was associated with positive parenting and this association was only partially mediated by maternal depressive symptoms. Maternal optimism was not associated with child psychosocial adjustment, but positive parenting was associated with lower levels of both internalizing and externalizing difficulties. The utility of understanding the link between maternal optimism and parenting for prevention and intervention efforts aimed at enhancing quality of life and subsequent child adjustment is discussed, as well as directions for future research on maternal optimism.