Augustine W Kang1, Tayla R Ash2, Alison Tovar3, Kim M Gans4, Jared Minkel5, Noereem Z Mena6, Patricia M Risica7. 1. Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown School of Public Health, Providence, RI, USA. Electronic address: Augustine_kang@brown.edu. 2. Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown School of Public Health, Providence, RI, USA. 3. Department of Nutrition and Food Sciences, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI, USA. 4. Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown School of Public Health, Providence, RI, USA; Department of Human Development and Family Studies, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA. 5. Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, RI, USA. 6. Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, USA. 7. Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown School of Public Health, Providence, RI, USA; Department of Epidemiology, Brown School of Public Health, Providence, RI, USA.
Abstract
PURPOSE: Poor sleep quality is associated with childhood obesity, and Latinx children have the highest prevalence of obesity in the United States. Parents are key agents to ensuring good sleep quality among children, but limited research has examined sleep parenting among Latinx working parents who may have added responsibilities. DESIGN AND METHODS: Working Latinx parents of 2-to-5-year old children participated in in-depth interviews exploring parenting and familial contexts of child sleep. Main topics in the interview guide included sleep-related parenting practices, social support, cultural influences, and intervention service delivery and content preferences. Thematic analysis was used to analyze data. RESULTS: Twenty parents completed the interview. The following themes emerged: Sleep parenting, sleep knowledge, impact of familial structures, family commitments, child temperament, and broader contextual factors on sleep, and intervention content and design ideas. Across participants, employment was reported to be a barrier to effective sleep parenting. Parents also reported engaging in practices that may interfere with sleep quality such as using screen time as a distraction and reducing naptime during the weekends to increase the amount of family time. Family-level factors such as co-parenting and spousal support were reported to facilitate sleep parenting. Participants also indicated the need for more sleep parenting knowledge and a preference for mobile platforms and social media to deliver information. CONCLUSIONS: Results not only fill critical gaps in the literature, but also highlight the variability in parents' approaches to sleep parenting and an urgent need for intervention/programming efforts to target Latinx parent's sleep knowledge and parenting.
PURPOSE: Poor sleep quality is associated with childhood obesity, and Latinx children have the highest prevalence of obesity in the United States. Parents are key agents to ensuring good sleep quality among children, but limited research has examined sleep parenting among Latinx working parents who may have added responsibilities. DESIGN AND METHODS: Working Latinx parents of 2-to-5-year old children participated in in-depth interviews exploring parenting and familial contexts of child sleep. Main topics in the interview guide included sleep-related parenting practices, social support, cultural influences, and intervention service delivery and content preferences. Thematic analysis was used to analyze data. RESULTS: Twenty parents completed the interview. The following themes emerged: Sleep parenting, sleep knowledge, impact of familial structures, family commitments, child temperament, and broader contextual factors on sleep, and intervention content and design ideas. Across participants, employment was reported to be a barrier to effective sleep parenting. Parents also reported engaging in practices that may interfere with sleep quality such as using screen time as a distraction and reducing naptime during the weekends to increase the amount of family time. Family-level factors such as co-parenting and spousal support were reported to facilitate sleep parenting. Participants also indicated the need for more sleep parenting knowledge and a preference for mobile platforms and social media to deliver information. CONCLUSIONS: Results not only fill critical gaps in the literature, but also highlight the variability in parents' approaches to sleep parenting and an urgent need for intervention/programming efforts to target Latinx parent's sleep knowledge and parenting.