Aims: To provide an overview of the parental, child, and socio‐contextual factors related to general parenting self‐efficacy (PSE) in the general population.Design: Systematic review.Data sources: Medline Ovid, Web of Science, Embase, and PsycINFO Ovid were systematically searched for studies published between January 1980‐June 2020.Review Methods: Studies were included if they described associations between factor(s) and PSE among parents of children aged 0–18 years old in the general population, and published in an English language peer‐reviewed journal. Studies with participants from specific populations, studies describing the development of instruments for PSE, qualitative studies, reviews, theses, conference papers and book chapters were excluded. Belsky's process model of parenting guided the data synthesis.Results: Of 3,819 articles, 30 articles met the inclusion criteria. Eighty‐nine factors were identified. There was evidence of associations between child temperament, maternal parenting satisfaction, parenting stress, maternal depression, household income, perceived social support and PSE. Evidence was inconsistent for an association of educational level, parity, number of children in the household and PSE in mothers. There was no evidence of an association for child gender, age, marital status and PSE in both mothers and fathers; ethnicity, age, employment status in mothers; household income in fathers; and educational level, parenting fatigue in parents.Conclusion: A range of factors studied in relation to PSE was identified in this systematic review. However, the majority of the factors was reported by one or two studies often implementing a cross‐sectional design.Impact: There is some evidence for an association between some potentially modifiable factors and PSE in the general population, this information may be used by health and social professionals supporting child health and well‐being. Future longitudinal studies are recommended to study parental, child and socio‐contextual factors associated with PSE to inform the development of intervention strategies.

Little is known about the complex associations of socioeconomic status (SES) and healthy lifestyle with cognitive dysfunction. Using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) [2008-2020] and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) [2004-2018], SES was constructed by latent class analysis using education level, total household income and wealth. Overall healthy lifestyle was derived using information on never smoking, low to moderate alcohol consumption (drinks/day: (0, 1] for women and (0, 2] for men), top tertile of physical activity, and active social contact. A total of 12,437 and 6565 participants from the HRS and ELSA were included (40.8% and 46.0% men and mean age 69.3 years and 65.1 years, respectively). Compared with participants of high SES, those of low SES had higher risk of incident dementia (hazard ratio 3.17, 95% confidence interval 2.72-3.69 in the HRS; 1.43, 1.09-1.86 in the ELSA), and the proportions mediated by overall lifestyle were 10.4% (7.3%-14.6%) and 2.7% (0.5%-14.0%), respectively. Compared with participants of high SES and favorable lifestyle, those with low SES and unfavorable lifestyle had a higher risk of incident dementia (4.27, 3.40-5.38 in the HRS; 2.02, 1.25-3.27 in the ELSA) and accelerated rate of global cognitive decline (β = -0.058 SD/year; 95% CI: -0.073, -0.043 in the HRS; β = -0.049 SD/year; 95% CI: -0.063, -0.035 in the ELSA). Unhealthy lifestyle only mediated a small proportion of the socioeconomic inequality in dementia risk in both US and UK older adults. This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82088102 and 82370819), the National Key R&D Program of China (2023YFC2506700), the Shanghai Municipal Government (22Y31900300), the Shanghai Clinical Research Center for Metabolic Diseases (19MC1910100), the Innovative Research Team of High-Level Local Universities in Shanghai, the Special Project for Clinical Research in Health Industry of Shanghai Municipal Health Commission (202340084), and Ruijin Hospital Youth Incubation Project (KY20240805). Y.X. is supported by the National Top Young Talents program.

Strengthening social support has been recognized as a potentially effective strategy to enhance parenting self-efficacy, but empirical evidence is limited. This study examined the association between perceived social support and parenting self-efficacy.Data of 647 parents of children aged 0–8 years, gathered in the CIKEO cohort study in the Netherlands, were analysed. Data were collected between October 2017 and December 2019. Multivariable linear regression models were used to examine the association between social support and parenting self-efficacy. The mean age of the participants was 33.8 years (SD = 4.9); 94.9% mothers. At the start of the study, 15.1% parents perceived low to moderate social support. Parents who experienced lower levels of social support at the start of the study reported lower parenting self-efficacy at follow-up (β: 0.13; 95% CI: 0.05, 0.21), independent of potential socio-demographic confounders. Experiencing an increase in perceived social support during the study period was associated with an increase in parenting self-efficacy (β: 0.15; 95% CI: 0.10, 0.21). Our findings indicate perceived social support is associated with parenting self-efficacy among parents of children aged 0–8 years. Future longitudinal studies need to confirm our findings and may examine which social support interventions are effective in strengthening parenting self-efficacy.

Background: A high parenting self-efficacy (PSE) has been associated with positive parenting and positive child development. However, there is limited and inconsistent information on factors associated with PSE. Objective: To investigate factors associated with PSE in parents of children aged 0–7 years old, and to explore whether the associations were different between mothers and fathers. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional analysis of the baseline data from a prospective cohort study: the CIKEO study. A total of 1012 parents (mean age = 33.8, SD = 5.0) completed self-reported measure of PSE and 18 potential factors associated with PSE. Results: Multivariable models revealed that lower parenting stress, fewer child behavior problems, better eating behavior, better parental and child general health, a smaller number of children living in the household, higher perceived level of social support and having a migration background were associated with higher levels of PSE (p < 0.05). The association between family functioning and PSE differed between mothers and fathers (p for interaction = 0.003): with beta and 95% confidence interval being: 1.29 (− 2.05, 0.87), and 0.23 (− 0.46, 3.29), respectively. Conclusions: A range of parental, child and social-contextual factors in relation to PSE were identified. The patterns of associations for most of the factors were similar among mothers and fathers. However, the association between family functioning and PSE might differ for mothers and fathers. Our findings are relevant for tailoring and implementing successful interventions and effective policy making in child care. Trial registration: Netherlands National Trial Register number NL7342. Date of registration: 05-November-2018, retrospectively registered.

Aim: Media use may strengthen parents’ capacities to deal with parenting issues. This study examined which factors are associated with media use for parenting information.Design: Cross‐sectional data of 658 parents of children aged 0–8 years, gathered in the CIKEO cohort study in the Netherlands, were analysed.Methods: Multivariable logistic regression models were used to examine which factors were associated with media use for parenting information.Results: The mean age of the participants was 33.8 years (SD = 5.0); 94.7% were mothers; 77.4% used media for parenting information. Parents with more questions or concerns (OR: 1.40, 95% CI: 1.23, 1.59), and parents who received parenting information from their social contacts (OR: 5.57, 95% CI: 3.22, 9.61), had higher odds of media use for parenting information. Older parents (OR: 0.95, 95% CI: 0.91, 1.00), and parents of older children (OR: 0.84, 95% CI: 0.74, 0.95), had lower odds of media use for parenting information.

Background: Stressful life events (SLEs) are recognized risk factors for emotional and behavioral problems, but the association is understudied among young children. Our aim was to examine the association between exposure to SLEs and emotional and behavioral problems in young children up to 7 years old. Methods: We analyzed baseline data from 959 children (mean age = 3.3 years; SD = 1.9; 47.5% girls) in the CIKEO study, a community-based longitudinal study in the Netherlands. Linear regression was used to assess the associations between the total as well as the individual exposure to SLEs experienced in the past 12 months, and emotional and behavioral problems assessed by CBCL 1.5-5. Interactions of SLEs and child age, sex, ethnic background, and socioeconomic status were explored. Results: Higher total exposure to SLEs, as indicated by the number of SLEs, was significantly associated with higher CBCL total, internalizing and externalizing problem scores (p for trend < 0.05). The results did not differ by child age, sex, ethnic background, or family SES. Six out of the 12 SLEs explored were independently associated with greater CBCL total/externalizing/internalizing scores (p < 0.05). Conclusions: Exposure to SLEs is associated with higher levels of emotional and behavioral problems in young children, and the impact of SLEs may vary depending on the types of events. Stressful life events might be a useful target for interventions to improve emotional and behavioral well-being among young children.