A mixed methods approach to developing a scale on parents' practices to reward and punish their children

Abstract

This exploratory mixed method research aimed to develop parent and child forms of a scale to measure parents' practices to reward and punish their children. For the qualitative strand, semi-structured interviews were conducted with parents (n = 54) and their children (n = 39). The qualitative analysis revealed four major themes regarding parental rewarding practices (material rewards, activity-based rewards, permission, and verbal and emotional rewards) and three major themes regarding parental punishment practices (response cost, verbal and emotional punishment, and corporal punishment), which were used to develop two sets of prospective items. At the quantitative strand, EFA and CFA analysis were performed using data obtained from a total of 701 parents and 620 children to test the psychometric properties. As a result of the research, both Parent (PRPS-P) and Child (PRPS-C) forms of Parental Reward and Punishment Scale (PRPS) were developed for use at the K-12 level with favorable psychometric properties.