Parental perceptions of behaviour change: A circle of security® parenting™ perspective

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to describe perception changes experienced by parents through participation in Circle of Security® Parenting™ (COS-P); specifically changes to their perceptions of their child’s behaviour and to their perceptions of their own responses to their child’s behaviour. Qualitative description was used to investigate changes in parent’s perceptions of their own and their child’s behaviour following participation in COS-P. Five themes and eleven sub-themes emerged from 27 pre and post COS-P interviews. The findings reveal that after participation in COS-P parents perceived their responses to their child’s behaviour as more empathetic, understanding, and flexible. Parental perception of their child’s behaviour after participation in COS-P changed in that parents clearly voiced that their child’s behaviour had changed, was communicative in nature, and that the understanding that behaviour was communication changed both how the parent responded to the child and the behaviour from the child.