Role of mothers’ and fathers’ Internet parenting for family climate

Within today’s families, there is a growing relevance of children’s Internet use as an important and conflictual educational issue, especially during early and middle adolescence. The family climate can be seen as a sensor on how well families handle such Internet-related conflicts. We extended prior research by investigating the role Internet parenting plays for the perceived family climate of 952 nuclear families using a multiactor design. Moreover, we examined whether families’ educational background moderates the expected association between Internet parenting and family climate. The results confirmed that mothers and fathers with higher parenting confidence more often co-used the Internet with their child, which was found to positively influence the family climate. With regard to the education background, we found that the parental co-use of the Internet was a significant mediator, especially for middle- and lower educated fathers. Overall, the findings underline the relevance of parent–child shared Internet activities as a positive resource of family life