Kompetencja rodzicielska. Użyteczny konstrukt w badaniach nad rolą rodzicielskich oddziaływań w rozwoju dziecka

The aim of the considerations is to present the usefulness of the construct of “parenting competence” according to the understanding of Teti and Huang (2004) in research on the role of parenting influence in child development. Through a critical analysis of definitions of such concepts as “parental attitude” or “parenting style,” the construct of parenting competence (PC) will be shown as allowing for a more precise, and at the same time, coherent and comprehensive characteristics of the most important components of parenting. PC will be presented as a construct which contains three important elements of parenting, namely: parental warmth, control and quality of communication. By presenting the potential usefulness of this construct, we will show that PC can be treated as a kind of social competence possessed by the parent. PC makes it possible to analyze parenting in the context of parent-child interaction, and at the same time takes into account the variability of parenting, which is culturally conditioned and, in this context, is strongly related to the developmental period, i.e., the child’s age.