Parenting as a Two-way Street: Investigating Changes or Continuity in Child's Bullying Status and Its Relationship with Parenting Using the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) Waves 1 to 5

Using the data from Growing Up in Australia: the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) Waves 1 to 5, the present study investigates the relationship between changes or continuity in children's bullying behaviours and parents' parenting practices. Children were assigned to one of four groups: No bullying group (i.e., children who did not bully others across all or 4 waves); Stopped bullying group (i.e., children who did not bully others for the last 2 waves although they did at least twice in first 3 waves); Emerging bullying group (i.e., children who bullied others in the last 2 waves although they did not bully or bullied just once in the first 3 waves); and Persistent bullying group (i.e., children who bullied others across all or in 4 waves). Children in the Persistent bullying group were more likely to be victimised by their peers compared to other groups while those in the No bullying group were least likely to experience victimisation among the four groups. The results of this paper support the reciprocal nature of parent-child relationships in the context of child bullying status over eight years; that is, parents' parenting practices were associated with children's bullying statuses and, at the same time, the children's constant engagement with bullying behaviours deteriorated parents' parenting practices and their efficacy as a parent. Parents with children in the Persistent bullying group displayed the poorest parenting patterns across waves (i.e., relatively low parental warmth/low parental consistency/high parental hostility). In contrast, parents with children in the No bullying group showed more adaptive parenting patterns (i.e., high parental warmth/high parental consistency/low parental hostility). Children's bullying statuses were also related to parents' parenting efficacy. Parenting efficacy was lowest for parents of children in the Persistent bullying group while those of children in the No bullying group scored higher parenting efficacy compared to other groups. Children in the Stopped bullying group were differentiated from those in the Persistent bullying group in the context of victimisation experiences, the hostile and consistent parenting they received from their parents and their parents' parenting efficacy in the later waves.