1. Objectifs

Intentions :
«The current study aimed to [examine] the effects of maternal personality traits and the quality of the child–mother relationship in addition to […] identified factors including the characteristics of the child and nature of the CSA [child sexual abuse], on maternal reactions and maternal support.» (p. 101)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
«Participants were 190 non-abusive mothers recruited in three Child Protection Services (CPS) settings in Québec (Canada). On average, participants were 36.5 years old (SD = 5.9), and reported 12.1 (SD = 2.4) years of education and 2.2 (SD = 1.0) children. Most CSA victims were girls (84.4%, n = 160) and their mean age was 10.5 years (SD = 3.7).» (p. 101)

Instruments :
Questionnaires

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

«The present findings suggested that maternal personality traits, the quality of the mother–child relationship prior to the CSA and characteristics related to the CSA were associated with maternal reactions following child disclosure of CSA, although the effects sizes of these relationships were overall small. These findings are consistent with the existing literature, that has highlighted how neuroticism traits are associated with an increased sense of responsibility […]. [Moreover,] our findings suggested that mothers with high levels of neuroticism traits might experience heightened feelings of anger towards both the offender but also towards the victim. One possible explanation for this might be that neuroticism is overall associated with a greater tendency to experience negative affect […] and that this predisposes mothers high on this trait to experiencing more anger. In addition, our findings suggested that greater maternal openness was also associated with a greater sense of responsibility with regard to the CSA experienced by the child, although this finding was not evident from the bivariate analyses. It might be that mothers with high levels of openness place greater importance on feelings towards others. Thus, the resulting empathic reaction might result in a sense of responsibility related to the CSA. […] Finally, other maternal personality dimensions such as extraversion, consciousness and agreeableness were not significant predictors of maternal reactions following CSA disclosure.» (p. 103-104)