RELATIONS OF PARENTAL SUPERVISION AND MONITORING TO CHILDRENS FUNCTIONING IN VARIOUS CONTEXTS - MODERATING EFFECTS OF FAMILIES AND NEIGHBORHOODS

Interactions among supervision and monitoring, maternal marital status , and neighborhood safety and their relations to child outcomes were e xamined using a sample of 355 third- and fourth-grade students in a la rge midwestern city. Three levels of supervision were considered: no a dult supervision or monitoring, no adult supervision with distal paren t monitoring, and full-time adult supervision. Results show that, alth ough supervision and monitoring do not produce any main effects on chi ldren's social, emotional, and cognitive functioning, interactions bet ween supervision and contextual variables do produce significant effec ts. These effects differ according to the outcome variable studied. Ne ighborhood crime rates were found to moderate the effects of supervisi on on children's behaviors, peer relations, locus of control, and lang uage achievement. Although children in dangerous neighborhoods who exp erience low supervision and monitoring showed good behaviors and langu age skills, they also showed lower self-efficacy. Maternal marital sta tus moderated effects of supervision on children's school achievement, with a lack of supervision and monitoring relating to low achievement for children in single-parent but not married-parent households. Resu lts are discussed in terms of the importance of considering centextual factors when searching for effects of parenting practices on children 's development.