Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, Vol. 31, No. 5, October 2003, pp. 485–494 ( C  2003) Mothers’ Overreactive Discipline and Their Encoding and Appraisals of Toddler Behavior Michael F. Lorber, 1 Susan G. O’Leary, 1,3 and Kimberly T. Kendziora 2 Received April 23, 2002; revision received September 12, 2002; accepted November 10, 2002 The relations of observed overreactive discipline with mothers’ tendencies to notice negative, relative to positive, child behavior (preferential negative encoding), and mothers’ negative appraisals of neutral and positive child behavior (negative appraisal bias), were examined in mothers of toddlers. The mothers rated both their own children’s and unfamiliar children’s behavior. Negative appraisal bias with respect to mothers’ own (but not unfamiliar) children was related to mothers’ overreactivity, independent of child misbehavior. Overreactivity was not related to mothers’ preferential negative encoding either of their own or of unfamiliar children’s behavior. However, in the case of mothers’ own children, preferential negative encoding moderated the relation between negative appraisal bias and overreactive discipline, such that the negative appraisal bias-overreactivity relation was significant only in the context of high preferential negative encoding. KEY WORDS: parenting; cognition; overreactivity; appraisal; child. A large body of literature implicates harsh or over- reactive discipline as a key causal or maintaining influ- ence on early childhood externalizing problems (Belsky, Woodworth, & Crnic, 1996; Campbell, Pierce, Moore, Marakovitz, & Newby, 1996; Denham et al., 2000; Fagot & Leve, 1998). Although definitions vary somewhat, the common core of such parenting includes behavior directed at the child that is excessively angry, irritated, and/or phys- ically rough (Arnold, O’Leary, Wolff, & Acker, 1993). Given its association with externalizing problems, over- reactive parenting in families of toddlers is of particular importance, as early-onset externalizing problems appear to be especially stable (Campbell, 1995; O’Leary, Slep, & Reid, 1999), and because parents have the greatest influ- ence on the socialization of young children (Kendziora & O’Leary, 1992; Reid, 1993). Furthermore, interventions for externalizing problems that modify parents’ behavior as a means of changing child behavior are most effective in young children (Dishion & Patterson, 1992). Gaining a 1 Department of Psychology, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, New York. 2 American Institutes of Research, Washington, District of Columbia. 3 Address all correspondence to Susan G. O’Leary, Department of Psy- chology, SUNY—Stony Brook, Stony Brook, New York 11794-2500; e-mail: susan.oleary@sunysb.edu. better understanding of overreactive discipline in parents of toddlers should improve our ability to help parents in their efforts to alter the problematic trajectories of children with early-onset externalizing problems. Parenting is a multiply determined phenomenon, sub- ject to influence by intra- and interpersonal variables, as well as by contextual factors (Belsky, 1984). Researchers concerned with the correlates of and possible etiological influences on overreactive parenting have begun to look to theories of social information processing (MacKinnon, Lamb, Belsky, & Baum, 1990; Milner, 1993). Rather than being thought of as alternative theories of parenting, to be compared against the current dominant models (e.g., so- cial learning, attachment), social information processing theories are probably best conceptualized as complemen- tary to these theories (MacKinnon et al., 1990; Patterson, 2002). Dodge’s (1991; Crick & Dodge, 1994) model of social information processing and emotion—originally de- veloped to explain children’s information processing pat- terns in peer contexts—may hold special promise for ad- vancing our knowledge of overreactive discipline. Crick and Dodge theorized that cognition mediates the rela- tions between environmental events and behavior. Social information processing begins with the encoding stage, 485 0091-0627/03/1000-0485/0 C  2003 Plenum Publishing Corporation