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Chapter Eight: The Parent-Provider Relationship: Two Perspectives
Family child care is characterized by the intimacy of the relationship between the parent and the provider. Because of the small size of family child care homes and the central importance of the provider herself in defining the nature and quality of that home, the parent knows the provider and most probably chooses the family child care home because of the provider. Parents and providers may be friends before the provider cares for the child and, in the case of relative care, there is certainly a prior relationship between parent and provider before the child care arrangement is made. Once a parent decides to use a particular provider, there are possibilities for positive and negative consequences as a result of the closeness of the parent-provider relationship. Providers and parents may become friends as a result of sharing the care of the child, and this situation may strengthen their relationship, or there may be new strains on their relationship because of disagreements about rearing the child, payments, the child care schedule, or other issues.
The interviews with parents and providers focused in part on the relationship between the parent and provider. Because we talked with both parts of this pair, we were able to look at the relationship from both perspectives—to see how parents view providers and vice versa.
Friendship and Conflict between the Parent and Provider
When parents and providers were asked about their relationship in the three months preceding the interview, the similarity of their responses was remarkable (Exhibit 8-1). In general, the majority of parents and providers reported regular communication about how the child is doing (more than 90% of each group) and also about their own personal feelings or concerns (more than 70% of each group). The majority of parents and providers (83% and 70% respectively) considered the other a friend, and over half of both groups reported seeing the other socially. About half of the parents reported that their provider had made special arrangements to help them out with work or family problems or had helped them out in other ways, such as lending them a car.
Parents reported a low incidence of critical interactions or disagreements. Eleven percent said that their provider had been critical of them as a parent or as a person and about 9 percent reported having had any disagreement with their provider. Slightly more providers reported disagreements (18%), while somewhat fewer reported that parents were critical of them (7%).
The relationship between parents and providers was quite different for parents and providers who were related versus pairs who were not related (Exhibit 8-2). When parents and providers were related, there were stronger feelings, both positive and negative. Related parents and providers reported stronger friendships and more disagreements than parents and providers who were not related. Regardless of their relationship, however, virtually all parents and providers reported regular communication about how the child was doing.
|
Providers | Parents | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| % | % | |||
| Previous relationship | Friendly before child cared for by provider | 32.1 | ||
| Positive Feelings | Talk about how child is doing | 94.4 | 93.2 | |
| Share personal feelings | 70.2 | 71.4 | ||
| Consider other person a personal friend | 72.5 | 82.6 | ||
| Get together socially | 54.2 | 58.3 | ||
| Provider makes special arrangements to help parent with work/ family problems | -- | 52.7 | ||
| Provider helps parent in other ways (transportation, equipment, etc.) | -- | 42.0 | ||
| Negative Feelings | Any disagreement | 17.7 | 9.2 | |
| Disagreement about child rearing | 10.5 | 8.6 | ||
| Disagreement about money | 6.0 | 4.0 | ||
| Disagreement about late pick-up time | 7.8 | 5.0 | ||
| Been critical of each other as person or as parent/provider | 7.3 | 11.0 | ||
| Provider resents parent as working mother | -- | 3.3 | ||
| Sample size | 673 | 642 | ||
| Sources: Parent Interview, Provider Interview |
Provider Attitudes about Parents of Children in Care
The Provider Attitude Scale assesses providers’ attitudes towards the childrearing practices of parents, their friendship with and mutual respect for parents, and their communication with parents. On the five-point scale (where 5 is “strongly agree” and 1 is “strongly disagree”) the mean score across all of the items on the scale was 4.1 out of 5, indicating that providers felt generally positive about parents, i.e., they agreed, although not strongly, with most of the statements. The scores for the four sections of the scale were quite similar, all around the overall mean of 4.1. There were only minor differences in the average ratings by providers who were related to the focus child’s parent and those who were not (Exhibit 8-3).
|
Relative Care | Non-Relative Care | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Provider | Parent | Provider | Parent | |||
| % | % | % | % | |||
| Previous relationship | Friendly before child cared for by provider | 82.6 | 29.2 | |||
| Positive feelings | Talk about how child is doing | 92.4 | 92.4 | 95.6 | 93.7 | |
| Consider other person a personal friend | 96.0 | 93.3 | 57.8 | 76.6 | ||
| Share personal feelings | 81.4 | 85.2 | 63.2 | 63.5 | ||
| Get together socially | 89.3 | 94.2 | 32.4 | 38.0 | ||
| Provider makes special arrangements to help parent with work/ family problems | -- | 77.9 | -- | 38.5 | ||
| Provider helps parent in other ways (transportation, equipment, etc.) | -- | 59.9 | -- | 31.9 | ||
| Negative feelings | Been critical of each other as person or as parent/provider | 13.9 | 21.5 | 3.4 | 5.1 | |
| Any disagreement | 25.7 | 16.4 | 12.5 | 6.8 | ||
| Disagreement about child rearing | 17.9 | 14.1 | 5.9 | 5.3 | ||
| Disagreement about money | 8.7 | 5.9 | 4.2 | 3.0 | ||
| Disagreement about late pick-up time | 9.5 | 8.5 | 6.7 | 3.0 | ||
| Provider resents parent as working mother | -- | 6.1 | -- | 1.8 | ||
| Sample size | 175 | 223 | 505 | 393 | ||
| Sources: Parent Interview, Provider Interview |
| Relative Care |
Non-Relative Care | All Family Child Care Providers | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | Mean | Mean | |
| Parent child-rearing practicesb | 4.2 | 4.1 | 4.1 |
| Friendship with parentc | 4.2 | 3.9 | 4.0 |
| Mutual respect between parent, providerd | 4.0 | 4.0 | 4.0 |
| Communicatione | 4.2 | 4.3 | 4.3 |
| Total scoref | 4.2 | 4.0 | 4.0 |
| Sample size | 182 | 491 | 673 |
| a Provider rating relationship with specific parent of child in care, i.e., the parent of the focus child in the study. b 8 items rated on a five-point scale, with 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. c 12 items rated on a five-point scale, with 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. d 9 items rated on a five-point scale, with 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. e 6 items rated on a five-point scale, with 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. f All items on scale (n=41) rated on a five-point scale, with 1=strongly disagree, 2=disagree, 3=neutral, 4=agree, 5=strongly agree. Sources: Provider Interview |
Parent Attitudes Towards Their Family Child Care Provider
The parents of focus children rated their family child care provider in five areas: their relationship and communication with the provider, the provider’s ability and richness of the environment, activities in the family child care home, the warmth and quality of the provider/child relationship, and the child’s happiness in the care setting. In general, parents were very positive about their family child care provider and the child care home. On average, parent’ ratings across 40 items were 3.7 (on a four-point scale, where 4 is “always” agree and 1 is “never agree”). The items that parents rated the lowest involved the amount of television and video watching in the homes (over half of the parents indicated that they believed that children were allowed to watch too much television), and two aspects of communication--the parents’ comfort in talking with the provider about what is going on at home in the child’s family and talking about problems that parents might have with their child’s care. There was virtually no difference in the ratings of related vs. unrelated providers (Exhibit 8-4).
|
Relative Care |
Non-Relative Care | All Parents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mean | Mean | Mean | |
| Relationship and communication with providerb | 3.6 | 3.5 | 3.5 |
| Provider’s ability and richness of environmentc | 3.5 | 3.5 | 3.5 |
| Activities in the homed | 3.4 | 3.5 | 3.4 |
| Warmth/quality of provider-child relationshipe | 3.9 | 3.8 | 3.8 |
| How child is doing in child caref | 3.6 | 3.5 | 3.6 |
| Total scoreg | 3.6 | 3.5 | 3.7 |
| Sample size | 231 | 411 | 642 |
| a Parents in sample are parents of focus children in study, i.e., one per family and one per family child care home. b 8 items rated on a four-point scale, with 1=never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. c 9 items rated on a four-point scale, with 1= never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. d 10 items rated on a four-point scale, with 1= never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. e 13 items rated on a four-point scale, with 1= never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. f 3 items rated on a four-point scale, with 1= never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. g All items on scale (n=40) rated on a four-point scale, with 1= never true, 2=sometimes true, 3=often true, 4=always true. Sources: Parent Interview |
Summary of Findings
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Many parents and providers had close personal relationships, viewing each other as friends and seeing each other socially. Providers often made special arrangements to help parents with work, family or other problems.
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Providers and parents had generally positive attitudes towards each other. However, there were some points of stress; for example, half of the parents felt that their children watched too much television in the provider’s home.
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