The purpose of this study was to contribute to family nursing aimed at reducing stress and improving the coping abilities of parents with kindergarten or early primary school aged children. Data were col lected through self-reported questionnaires over a period of one month between November 1994 and December 1994 in the Kyoung-in area. The subjects consisted of 198 parents(99 mothers and 99 fathers) of children attending 1 elementary school and 2 kindergartens. The levels of general stress and of parental role stress were measured with the General stress scale and the Parental role stress scale, respectively, while the Coping scale was used to measure the level of coping. The data were analyzed by a SAS program using paired t-test and oneway ANOVA. The results were as follows; 1. The level of general stress was significantly higher in mothers than in fathers. Mothers experienced significantly greater level of parental role stress than fathers did. In contrast, fathers revealed significantly greater scores in coping than mothers. 2. General stress experienced by fathers was dif-ferent according to education, occupation, health status, satisfaction with family life and support from spouse. Occupation, health status, satisfaction with family life, satisfaction with spouse and support from spouse influenced parental role stress experienced by fathers. There was no correlation between level of coping and general characteristics. 3. In mothers, the level of general stress was different according to their health status, family type, and number of children, while parental role stress was related to satisfaction with family life, satisfaction with spouse and family type. There was no correlation between level of coping and general characteristics. The above findings indicate that the mothers did not develop more coping strategies than the fathers, despite their experience of greater stress than the fathers. Hence, nursing intervention for managing stress and improving coping abilities should be provided for mothers. In particular, fathers should actively participate in parenting, and support their spouse.