Parenting Styles and Child Nutritional Outcomes Among Households in Plateau State: A Mediating Analysis

This study conducts a mediating analysis of the relationship between parenting styles and child nutritional outcomes among households in Plateau State, North Central Nigeria, examining the mediating role of responsive feeding practices. Parenting style, encompassing authoritative, authoritarian, permissive, and uninvolved approaches, shapes child feeding environments through responsiveness, structure, and emotional climate. Using a cross-sectional analytical design, the study targets 350 mothers of children aged 2 to 5 in Jos North and Barkin Ladi local government areas. Data were collected using the Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire, the Responsiveness to Child Feeding Cues Scale, and anthropometric measurements. Objectives include classifying parenting styles, measuring responsive feeding practices, assessing child nutritional status, and testing the mediated pathway from parenting style through feeding practices to nutritional outcomes. Analytical methods include structural equation modelling, mediation analysis using bootstrapping, and ANOVA. The Parenting Style and Child Nutrition Framework provides the theoretical scaffold. Recent literature from sub-Saharan Africa confirms that authoritative parenting is significantly associated with optimal child dietary diversity through improved responsive feeding behaviour. Findings are expected to establish responsive feeding as a significant mediator of the parenting-nutrition relationship. Recommendations address child nutrition specialists, family welfare counsellors, and Home Economics educators in Plateau State. Keywords: parenting styles, child nutritional outcomes, responsive feeding, mediation analysis, Plateau State.