The Effects of the STEP Program on Mothers' Self-Concept, Child-Rearing Attitudes and Children's Behavior.

STEP 부모교육 프로그램이 어머니의 자아개념, 양육태도 및 유아행동지각에 미치는 효과

Systematic Training for Effective Parenting, developed by Dinkmeyer and McKay, is a parent education program that emphasizes social-emotional development. The present research studied the applicability of STEP to Korean mothers by examining changes in mothers' self-concept, mother's child-rearing attitudes, and children's behavior. The subjects of this study were 43 mothers of a kindergarten in Chonju City. 25 mothers were assigned to the control group and 18 mothers to the experimental group. Primary observes, consisting of 43 fathers of kindergarten children, and secondary observers, consisting of 43 Woosuk University students observed mothers' child-rearing attitudes and children's behavior. Instruments included the self-concept test by Jung Woonsik, Schaefer's Maternal Behavior Research Instrument, O Kiseon's Parent Child Relationship Test, Fear's parent questionnaire, and McKay's Adlerian Parental Assessment of Child Behavior. The mothers' child-rearing attitudes and the children's behavior are recorded by the observers and were compared with mothers' responses. The data were analyzed by MANOVA (multivariate analysis of variance), and ANOVA (analysis of variance). While the MANOVA showed no significant difference between the control and the experimental groups in changing the mothers' self-concept, differences in 5 of the 8 subfactors showed that STEP implemented positive change in the self-identity, self-satisfaction, self-behavior, personal self and family self in the experimental group. The MANOVA showed a significant difference between the two groups in changing the mothers' child-rearing attitudes. That is after participating in the STEP program, the mothers of the experimental group showed more significant progress than those of the control group. Mothers' observations of positive change in children's behavior agreed with those of the primary and secondary observers.