Temperament, parenting styles and the intensity of early maladaptive schemas: assessment of correlations in a non-clinical adult group

Background:Prior research has partially verified the significance of child temperament and styles of upbringing for schema intensity. However, there is still a lack of understanding of the inter-relations between them.Aim:The present study examined how temperament (stable and labile) and style of parenting (positive and negative) are related to each other, and to early maladaptive schemas.Method:Participants (395 healthy adults) completed the Young Schema Questionnaire YSQ-S3 and the Retrospective Assessment of Parents’ Attitudes and Formal Characteristic of Behaviour – Temperament Inventory (FCB-TI). Structural equation modelling was used to verify hypotheses.Results:Temperament and parental styles together explain more than 59% of the variance of schema intensity. The obtained path coefficients show one-way directions of inter-relations. Stable temperament connects to schemas directly with a negative path coefficient. Labile temperament shows a significant positive association with negative parental attitudes, but not directly with schemas. Negative parenting is positively connected with schemas. A positive style of parenting is not significantly connected with temperament and schemas.Conclusions:Results show evidence that negative style of parenting and labile temperament features are more important for schema developing and may be treated as risk factors. Because temperament seems to be a relatively persistent feature, it may play a similar role in adulthood, reinforcing emotions and feelings in the context of environment, and then maintain the schemas.