OF MULTIDISCIPLINARY: APPLIED BUSINESS AND EDUCATION Mothering Practices of Filipino Generation Z: Correlations with Personal Characteristics and State of Well-being

This study aimed to describe authoritative Filipino Generation Z mothers' mothering practices, including their concept of authority, parent-child communication, and reward-punishment practices. Eighty (80) Gen Z mothers, ages 18 to 24, with at least one child, completed a self-adminis-tered questionnaire using purposive and snowball sampling. The findings indicated that mothers have highly authoritative parenting styles and have very healthy overall well-being. The mother's completed education level showed weak inverse correlations with parent-child communication (r = -0.432, p = 0.000) and concept of authority (r = -0.283, p = 0.011). The moth-er's monthly income had a weak inverse relationship with her concept of authority (r = -0.269, p = 0.016). Furthermore, the number of household members had weak inverse correlation with parent-child communication (r = -0.227, p = 0.042) and positive correlations with reward and punishment practices (r = 0.437, p = 0.000). Results imply that mothers with a lower level of education value more authority and communication with their children. The findings show weak negative correlations between the mother's concept of authority and social well-being (r = -0.289, p = 0.009), implying that less concern for authority meant better social health. Fur-thermore, open lines of communication between mother and child have positive effects on their psychological health (r = 0.380, p = 0.001). Rewarding has shown to improve their psychological health (r = 0.257, p = 0.021) and overall well-being (r = 0.232, p = 0.038). The results could promote strategies that make Gen Z mothers use effective mothering practices in child-rearing.


Introduction
Parenting styles have an effect on a child's health and development. In this study, variables such as sociodemographic characteristics, family characteristics, and the mother's state of well-being are examined in relation to her authoritative parenting style. A person's sociodemographic profile includes information about their sex, socioeconomic status, marital status, family size, education, migration, and background (Hall & Dornan, 1990). By contrast, a person's family characteristics include family ties and relationship status with their family.
Moreover, a person's overall well-being is a combination of feeling good and functioning well (Ruggeri et al., 2020). Psychological, emotional, and social development all contribute to a person's state of well-being. Additionally, Generation Z, or Gen Z, born between 1997 and 2012, is the most recent generation currently maturing and will eventually dominate the world for several decades (Wiedmer, 2015). It brought a new generation of mothers, and the growing number of Gen Z mothers has piqued the public's interest. Due to the fact that they are from a relatively young generation, there is a dearth of research on Gen Z mothers, particularly in the local context of the Philippines. As a result, additional knowledge about them is required, specifically the relationship between a Filipino Generation Z mother's parenting styles and her sociodemographic, family, and state of well-being characteristics.
Furthermore, the majority of studies on the subject focused on parenting a Generation Z child rather than on the mothers themselves. Almost all of them adhered to Diana Baumrind's 1971 parenting style classification: Authoritative, Authoritarian, Permissive, and Neglectful. This study focuses on the authoritative parenting strategies and practices of Filipino Gen Z mothers. An authoritative parenting style is extremely demanding and responsive toward the child; it balances warmth with establishing limits and boundaries. Additionally, it is consistently associated with positive parenting and child development outcomes such as psychosocial competence and academic achievement (Lamborn et al., 1991;Steinberg et al., 1994, as cited in Kuppens andCuelemans, 2018).
The research findings may contribute to society's new understanding and awareness of authoritative Generation Z (1997-2012) mothers' parenting practices and how these practices correlate with their sociodemographic, family, and state of well-being characteristics. Notably, the Philippines has its unique sociodemographic profile and family characteristics. Countries with similar cultural contexts and populations to the Philippines can use the findings better to understand Gen Z mothers and their parenting strategies.
The purpose of this study was to ascertain and characterize the parenting practices of authoritative Filipino Generation Z mothers residing in the Philippines, taking into account their concepts of authority, parent-child communication, and reward and punishment. Additionally, it sought to ascertain the relationship between their authoritative parenting practices and their personal characteristics and state of well-being.

Sampling
Eighty (80) Filipino Gen-Z mothers with authoritative parenting styles in the Philippines were invited to participate in this quantitative study via purposive non-probability sampling and snowball sampling. A prior 10-point prequalification survey was distributed online to identify authoritative mothers qualified to answer the main survey to assess the possible respondent's parenting styles. A total of 101 of the 103 respondents to the pre-qualification survey met the eligibility requirements. Additionally, of the 101 participants who qualified via the pre-qualification survey, 80 responded to the main survey (79.2 percent of the sample).

Ethical Considerations
Ethical concerns, such as participant privacy, information confidentiality, and a notice of possible sensitive and personal subject/s, were addressed in an informed consent section presented to participants before they continued with the questionnaire. Additionally, they IJMABER 1102 Volume 3 | Number 6 | June | 2022 were informed that they could opt out of the survey at any time.

Survey questionnaire
The data collection instrument was a selfadministered questionnaire answered via an online survey that utilized a 5-point Likert scale. Questions were developed to accommodate mothers with infants or toddlers. This procedure gathered data on respondents' parenting styles and their associations with their sociodemographic characteristics, family characteristics, and state of well-being. The pre-qualification survey had questions tailored to describe an authoritative parent to determine if a respondent is an authoritative mother. Its questions were inspired by the Parenting Style Questionnaire, particularly the Authoritative Parenting Style section of Robinson et al. (1995). Additionally, the same-structured 10question pre-qualification survey included a section for respondents to freely express their comments and feedback on how to improve the main survey.

Data analysis
The study processed and analyzed the gathered data using both descriptive and inferential statistics using JASP, a statistical application (JASP Team, 2022). The quantitative data from the surveys were analyzed through descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics was crucial in determining the frequencies, percentages, weighted mean, and standard deviation of data and variables. Spearman Rank Rho Correlation (inferential statistics) was used to analyze the ordinal data from the survey. The following guides were utilized in describing the results and findings: For the Par-

Results and Discussion
Profile of the Respondents. Table 1 shows the average profile of the Filipino Gen Z mothers who participated in the study. Overall, the mothers were young adults (M = 21.94). They have completed some college units (62.5 percent) and do not have a monthly income. Even so, those who earn a monthly income are classified as low-income. In addition, the respondents had their first child at the age of 20 (M = 20.71) and have four household members (M = 4.338) on average.  Concept of Authority. According to Gozu et al. (2020), parental authority is positively associated with the mother's authoritative parenting style, implying that the authoritative Filipino Gen Z mothers are more likely to have a strong concept of authority, as indicated in Table 2 (M = 4.75). Moreover, 74 mothers in a qualitative study conducted by De la Cruz et al. (2001) believed that children lack reason and an understanding of reality, are impulsive, and seek immediate gratification, allowing the parental authority to grow in order for the child to be "good." Parent-child Communication. Communication between the mother and child is critical in the development of the child's characteristics and traits. When mothers communicate more with their children, the children's communication abilities improve, and they can better relate to the people around them (Runcan et al., 2012). This explains why the majority of Filipino Gen Z mothers communicate at a high level with their children (M = 4.90). This finding could be related to the child demonstrating better developmental outcomes when the mother is communicating.
Rewards and Punishment. Given adults' culturally established responsibilities and authority over their children's characteristics, both mothers and children view discipline as an expression of parental love (Ramiro et al., 2005, as cited in Jocson et al., 2012). The results in Table 2 indicates that respondents strongly believe that rewarding and punishing their children is an effective method of properly disciplining them (M = 4.03). This finding may be related to positive reinforcement, which occurs when a pleasant stimulus, in this case, material rewards or praise, is used to increase or maintain a particular behavior (Cherry, 2021).
State of Well-being of Filipino Gen Z Mothers. Overall, Table 3 indicates that the Filipino Gen Z Mothers are very healthy in terms of their overall state of well-being (M = 4.76). Psychological Well-being. While motherhood can initially feel overwhelming, it is widely regarded as a fulfilling, rewarding, meaningful, joyful, and wonderful journey (Kuipers et al., 2021). This perspective helps explain why the majority of Filipino Gen Z mothers reported having a very healthy psychological well-being (M = 4.83). Starrels (1994) asserts that a mother's responsibilities in raising her child significantly impact her psychological well-being. Additionally, mothers report greater maternal satisfaction as a result of This finding may also explain why Filipino Gen Z Mothers expressed positive attitudes toward their roles as mothers in items about their responsibilities as mothers. They expressed greater satisfaction with parenting their children (Starrels, 1994). Emotional Well-being. The Filipino Gen Z Mothers were generally very healthy in terms of emotional well-being (M = 4.85). Headey et al. (2012) found a strong correlation between a mother's happiness and the happiness of children living in the same household. This may corroborate the notion that mothers experience joy whenever they are with their children and are content with motherhood, its responsibilities, and how their children are raised. As a result, Bahrami (2017) demonstrated that life satisfaction significantly impacts positive parenting. Their conclusion implies that Filipino Gen Z mothers achieved life satisfaction through motherhood, which resulted in extremely positive responses about their outlook on life.
Social Well-being. By and large, respondents report having a very healthy state of social well-being (M = 4.60). The Filipino Gen Z mothers expressed a desire to spend time with their friends and family. Thomas et al. (2017) investigated whether effective communication plays a significant role in shaping one's well-being throughout one's life. Significant evidence supports the notion that having personal conversations with significant people in life does affect one's well-being over the course of one's life. As a result, maintaining positive relationships with others is beneficial for mothers, as they tend to have better mental and physical health and a longer life expectancy (Thomas et al., 2017). Whereas easily maintaining these relationships with people may imply how they may also benefit the parent-child relationship and mothers' overall well-being. However, two statements about relationships with people their age, particularly in terms of trust, had a lower mean. Correlations Between Personal Characteristics and Parenting Practices. The sociodemographics of the respondents that have a statistically significant relationship with their parenting practices include educational level and monthly income. There is also a significant inverse weak correlation between the finished education level of the mother and her concept of authority (r =-0.283, p = 0.011). While the relation between their finished education level and parent-child communication is a significant inverse moderate correlation (r = -0.432, p = 0.000). This signifies that a Filipino Gen Z Mother who has finished a lower level of education is more inclined to be strict with her child and more communicative with her child. The mothers who have finished lower education may be more involved and more imposing on their children because they are able to center their attention on them since they are not too occupied with finishing their studies. The same goes for the mothers being able to communicate with their children because of not being preoccupied with studying. Generation Z is exceptionally passionate about their education compared to the past generations (Gaidhani, IJMABER 1105 Volume 3 | Number 6 | June | 2022 Arora, and Sharma, 2019). Therefore, without any more education to pursue, they can focus on other aspects of their life. Lastly, a mother who has a low monthly income has a higher concept of authority toward her child (r = -0.269, p = 0.016). Suppose the mothers' monthly income is high. In that case, they tend to be less imposing toward their child because having a higher monthly income may allow the mothers to buy any object that their child desires in order for the child to behave appropriately without supervision. As a result, a significant inverse weak correlation existed between the mother's household size and her parent-child communication with her child (r = -0.227, p = 0.042). Additionally, there was a significant positive moderate correlation between the number of household members and her response to her child's reward and punishment (r = 0.437, p = 0.000).
Between household members and parentchild communication, an inverse relationship is observed. As the mother's household members add more, her attention becomes divided as she converses and interacts with more relatives. As a result, she may rarely respond to the child's mannerisms or identify the emotions implied by their reactions. Finally, this family characteristic implies that the mother lavishes more praise and punishment on her child. This relationship is consistent with the findings of Jacobien Van Holland De Graaf et al. (2018). They concluded that the child's active, rewarding, and punishing behaviors are influenced by the support of the father and mother's parents, friends, relatives, and even neighbors. Despite the fact that is rewarding (M = 4.91, M = 4.90, M = 4.70) outweighs punishment (M = 3.09, M = 2.56) in Table 4 (Reward and Punishment of Filipino Gen Z Mothers), the correlation between household members and parent-child communication and reward and punishment can be rationalized. Parenting behaviors such as timeouts, ignoring, and verbal reprimands increase child compliance, whereas praise has little effect (Leijten et al., 2018). As a result, mothers are more likely to punish in order to reinforce their child's respect for themselves and others at home. Regardless, because the data is generally more favorable to reward than punishment, the mother is also more likely to reward their child by increasing the number of people in the household to encourage them to maintain their good behavior.  (r = 0.483, p = <0.001; r = 0.380, p = <0.001; r = 0.257, p = 0.021). This finding indicates that mothers are psychologically healthy, capable of effective communication with their children, possess a strong sense of authority, and reward or punish their children more frequently. A significant negative weak correlation existed between the mother's concept of authority and social wellbeing (r =-0.289, p =.009). A mother who is socially dissatisfied has a more elevated standard of authority. Finally, respondents' attitudes toward reward and punishment had a significant positive weak correlation with their overall well-being (r = 0.232, p = 0.038), indicating that they tend to reward and punish their children more frequently.
The term "state of well-being" refers to the combination of feeling good and functioning well; the experience of positive emotions such IJMABER 1106 Volume 3 | Number 6 | June | 2022 as happiness and contentment as well as the development of one's potential, having some control over one's life, having a sense of purpose, and experiencing positive relationships (Huppert, 2009). This definition encompasses how individuals positively perceive and evaluate their lives (Tov, 2018). The majority of respondents report having effective parent-child communication, which contributes to their children's self-esteem (Bireda & Pillay, 2017).
Mothers are more receptive to parent-child communication when their psychological health is well. As a result, they are more willing to explain and communicate with their child. As mothers who are content with their lives and are aware of their own needs, they wish for their children to grow up to have these as well. This is why they become more involved in their child's upbringing, deciding and enacting what they believe is best for them-becoming an authoritative figure for their children. They are more direct in their approach to child-rearing and are more likely to reward and punish their children if their psychological state is more stable as a result of a more profound understanding that they reward and punish out of concern or love. Notably, the child expects to be rewarded by their mother for their good behavior as a result of positive reinforcement (Cherry, 2021). Additionally, misbehavior can result in a child being punished. As a result, they will understand that their negative actions have repercussions. The term "social well-being" refers to an individual's capacity to maintain positive relationships with others (Bisquerra, 2009, as cited in Chiva-Bartoll et al., 2020. As a result, a socially well-adjusted person can interact with others in a calm and peaceful manner. In this study, social well-being was found to be negatively correlated with respondents' concept of authority. This is because a mother who can interact peacefully with other people is more tolerant toward her child, resulting in a less strict or authoritative approach. On the other hand, a mother who is unable to relates well with others translates into being less tolerant toward their child and thus strict. As a result, mothers who are in good health should wish for their children to be in good health as well. By re-warding and punishing their child appropriately, they can shape their child's behavior and ensure their child's health and well-being as well.

Conclusion
The findings indicated that Filipino Gen-Z mothers exhibit a high level of authoritative parenting practices. Mothers with a lower level of education have higher maternal authority and communicate more with their children than mothers with a higher level of education. Additionally, mothers with lower monthly incomes have fewer tendencies to be authoritative. In comparison, the number of household members has a negative effect on the mother's communication with the child and has a beneficial effect on the mothers' proclivity to reward and punish their children. Additionally, the findings indicated that authoritative mothers maintain an extremely healthy state of well-being (psychological, emotional, and social). Only the psychological and social well-being of Filipino Gen Z Mothers, on the other hand, was found to be significantly associated with their parenting practices. Psychologically healthy mothers exhibit superior parenting skills, whereas socially healthy mothers exert less maternal authority over their children. Finally, Filipino Gen Z mothers who are generally happy tend to reward and punish their children more frequently.
The parenting styles of authoritative Filipino Gen-Z mothers may be largely determined by their personal characteristics and psychological and social well-being. These findings suggest that current knowledge on this subject may be expanded. Additionally, this study may provide data for future research on authoritative Generation Z parents and numerous future Filipino-based family studies. Additionally, the findings contribute to increased awareness and knowledge about the correlations between a mother's well-being and how this may affect her parenting, which may encourage several institutions to provide additional services and benefits for mothers' well-being.
Future studies may compare results garnered from an equal number of urban and rural residing respondents to see whether there is a IJMABER 1107 Volume 3 | Number 6 | June | 2022 difference between the two as their environment could affect their parenting. Another perspective is a study focusing on other parenting styles besides authoritative-permissive, authoritarian, or neglectful despite the Philippines having predominantly authoritative strategies.