Postawy rodzicielskie a wypalenie rodzicielskie. Mediacyjna rola aleksytymii, depresji i podejmowanych strategii radzenia sobie ze stresem

Aim: The aim of the study was to analyse the relationship between parental burnout and parental attitudes taking into account the mediating role of alexithymia, depression and coping strategies. Parental attitudes defined on the dimensions of acceptance, autonomy, demands and inconsistency are related to the level of parental burnout towards own children. Alexithymia, depression and an emotion-focused coping style were assumed to be important contributory factors. Method: The study was conducted with 112 parents (M = 39.16; SD = 5.39) with children aged 3 to 15 years.  The following questionnaires were used to verify the research hypotheses: Parental Burnout Assessment Questionnaire (PBA); Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20); Retrospective Parental Bonding Questionnaire (KPR-Roc), Beck Depression Scale (BDI), Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (CISS). Results: Statistical analyses revealed a relationship between mother’s parenting attitude and parental burnout.  Furthermore, alexithymia, depression and coping styles were found to be significantly related to parental burnout. What followed was an analysis of the mediating effect of the aforementioned variables on the relationship between retrospective parenting attitudes on the part of mothers and parental burnout. A multiple mediation analysis was performed using a custom macro for SPSS PROCESS (Hayes,2018), which was found to be statistically significant for demands, inconsistency, and autonomy and acceptance on the part of the mother. Significant mediators in each model were alexithymia, depression, and emotion-focused coping style. Similar relationships were not demonstrated for the relationship with the father. Conclusions: The study indicates that there are strong relationships between mother’s parenting attitudes and parental burnout towards their own children. Alexithymia, depression and emotion-focused coping style increase the risk of parental burnout.