Beliefs about children's upbringing: The views of Turkish mothers and preschool teachers

Child-caregiver relationship is of critical importance for the child's social-emotional development. Earlier studies on caregivers' sensitivity beliefs have focused on parents' childrearing beliefs and behaviors. Although there are some studies on beliefs of some childcare providers such as child psychologists, parenting counselors, and family therapists, the question if parents' caregiving beliefs are consistent with the beliefs of preschool caregivers regarding upbringing has not been studied. So, the main goal of the present study was to compare the views of the mothers' and to those of their children's teachers at preschool about caregiving sensitivity. The sample consisted of a total of 87 caregivers (36 preschool teachers and 51 mothers). Mothers' and teachers' views about the ideal sensitive mother were measured by the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort Version 3.1 (MBQS) and their views were compared with a criterion sort provided by the experts in the field. Additional comparisons were done to examine if the mothers' sensitivity beliefs differed in relation to their education level or their children's psychological difficulties which were measured by mother- and teacher-reported Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). The results indicated both similarities and differences in beliefs about sensitive behaviors. Although they shared similar views with experts and with each other, they showed some differences in how descriptive they found the behaviors indicated in MBQS. Education level was found to be as an important indicator of the sensitivity. Hypotheses of the study and the results will be discussed in line with the related literature.