Abstract

The toddler years are critical for a child’s development of self-regulation and self-assertion, and for learning to balance the needs of responding to an adult’s demands with compliance or non-compliance. These skills are highly valuable in Western education systems, and children from diverse cultural background might solve this task differently. Maternal disciplining behaviors play a central role in the way a child develops self-regulation, self-assertion, compliance, and non-compliance, and this role might differ between cultural environments. This study examines the role of maternal disciplining behaviors in the development of self-assertion, self-regulation, compliance, and non-compliance in a sample of forty Latino toddlers and their mothers. The results of multiple regression analyses indicate that when controlling for age, maternal positive disciplining behaviors resulted in increases in toddler self-assertion. Maternal negative disciplining behaviors resulted in decreases in toddler self-regulation and compliance and increases in toddler refusal to comply and defiance. This study adds to the literature investigating early development in Latino children and has implications for early childhood education practices.