The purpose of this study was to investigate the relative importance of children´s family impact perceived by mothers on children´s problem behaviors. Children´s family impact was concep-tualized which mothers evaluated the impact of their child in five dimensions: financial burden, mother´s attitude toward their child, restriction of mothers social activity, disagreement about parenting, and husband´s support.
Subjects of this study consisted of 370 preschool children´s mothers drawn from five child-care centers in Cheong-ju City and three in Chung-ju. The pilot study was used to examine the applicability of survey instrument. Data were analyzed by the frequency, percentage, Person correla-tion, and stepwise regression through SPSSWIN program.
The results were as following :
1. Restriction of mother´s social activity and mothers attitude toward child were significant factors predicting children´s aggressive behaviors.
2. Mothers attitude toward child and disagreement about parenting between mother and father were significant factors predicting children´s internalizing anxiety.
3. Restriction of mothers social activity, mother´s attitude toward child, and lack of husband´s support were significant factors predicting children´s immature behaviors.
4. Mothers attitude toward child, disagreement about parenting between mother and father, and restriction of mothers social activity predicted children´s disobedient behaviors.
5. Mothers attitude toward child and restriction of mother´s social activity was significantly predicting children´s inattention behaviors.
6. Children´s problem behaviors was explained by mothers attitude toward child, disagreement about parenting between mother and father, and restriction of mothers social activities.
The research suggests that mother´s attitude toward child was the strongest factor to predict children´s problem behavors followed by restriction of mother´s social activities, and disagreement about parenting between mother and father. Only for children´s immature behavor was related to lack of husband´s support perceived by mothers. The implications of this research was discussed in several ways.
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