Agreement with night-waking strategies among community mothers of preschool-aged children

Objective: To explore the night-waking schemas of mothers of preschool-aged children, using a new measure of agreement with night-waking strategies (Night-waking Vignettes Scale; NVS). MethodA community sample of 203 mothers (M age=32 years, SD=5.1) of 2- to 5-year-olds (M age=3.4 years, SD=1.0) provided demographic information and completed the NVS and measures of night-waking and general parenting behavior. Results: Few mothers endorsed strong agreement or disagreement with limit-setting, active comforting, or rewards; mothers generally disagreed with punishment. Significant associations between agreement with night-waking strategies, child sex, and maternal educational attainment were observed; only agreement with punishment was correlated with general parenting. Agreement with night-waking strategies differed across the night-waking behaviors depicted in the NVS vignettes. Agreement with limit-setting and agreement with active comforting were correlated with night-waking. Conclusions: Mothers may be ambivalent about common night-waking strategies. Night-waking schemas appear to be complex. © 2011 The Author. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society of Pediatric Psychology. All rights reserved.