“My friends are better parents than me”: Comparison and shaming, social support, and parental burnout

J Fam Psychol. 2026 Jul 16. doi: 10.1037/fam0001495. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Parental burnout has gained global attention in recent years due to its effects on family functioning and the well-being of both parents and children. While numerous risk and protective factors have been identified, limited research has examined how group dynamics relate to parental burnout. Our current cross-sectional, cross-cultural study investigated the associations and underlying mechanisms linking perceived social support, parents’ personal social comparison, and critical comparison and shaming by family members (CCS) to parental burnout. The sample included 1,373 parents from the United Kingdom and Vietnam (M_age = 37.90, SD = 7.93 years). Our results indicated that perceived social support was negatively correlated with parental burnout, whereas personal social comparison and critical comparison and shaming by family members were positively correlated with parental burnout, with similar patterns observed across both countries. We also tested an exploratory moderation model and found that, in the Vietnamese sample, but not the U.K. sample, the protective effect of perceived social support was stronger among parents with higher levels of personal social comparison. These findings underscore the importance of incorporating group-dynamic factors (e.g., perceived social support and comparison) into prevention and intervention programs for parental burnout and offer new directions for future research in this field. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

PMID:42461606 | DOI:10.1037/fam0001495