Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore to what extent mothers and fathers differ in their disciplinary practices and to examine the relationships between quality of life and the parental disciplinary practices. The subjects of this study consisted of 220 parents(220 mothers and 220 fathers) of 5-6 years of children in Pusan. Descriptive analysis, correlation analysis, t-tests were used for data description and analysis. The major results were as follows: 1. There was a positive relationship between perceived quality of life by fathers and perceived quality of life by mothers. 2. There was a difference between fathers and mothers in relation to perceived quality of life. Fathers perceived their quality of life more highly than did mothers. 3. There were positive relations between parental educational level, household income and quality of life. 4. There were differences between fathers and mothers in relation to disciplinary practices. Fathers exhibited more effective disciplinary practices(including less overreactiveness and less verbosity) than did mothers. 5. There were no relations between parental educational level and disciplinary practices, but household income was only related to maternal disciplinary practices. 6. There were positive relations between quality of life and disciplinary practices. The higher parents perceived their quality of life, the more parents exhibited effective parental disciplinary practices.

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