Low Birth Weight and Parenting Stress During Early Childhood

Identified factors associated with parenting stress among theparents of low birth weight children participating in a prospectivelongitudinal study. The child's developmental status and thequalify of the infant-parent relationship contributed to earlychildhood parenting stress beyond the contribution of neonatalmedical risk, which was a significant predictor until the concurrentmeasure of child developmental status was entered in the regressionanalysis. Results are consistent with a model of processes underlyingthe experiences of parents of medically vulnerable infants presentedby the Goldberg and Marcovitch (1986) model. Replication ofthese findings among parents of specific subgroups of low birthweight children represents a direction for future research.