Instrumental and social/relational correlates of perceived maternal and paternal attachment in adolescence

Dynamic characteristics of parent-adolescent closeness: Predicting adolescent emotion dysregulation

Emotion dysregulation is linked to adolescent psychological problems. However, little is known about how lability in daily closeness of parent-adolescent dyads affects the development of emotion dysregulation. This study examined how closeness lability with parents was associated with emotion dysregulation 12 months later. The sample included 144 adolescents (M = 14.62, SD = 0.83) who participated in a baseline assessment, 21-day daily diaries, and a 12-month follow-up assessment. Parents and adolescents both reported adolescent emotion dysregulation at baseline and follow-up assessments, while adolescents reported daily parent-adolescent closeness. Results indicate that lability in father-adolescent closeness was associated with increased emotion dysregulation at 12 months reported by adolescents. However, lability in mother-adolescent closeness was not associated with adolescent emotion dysregulation. Moreover, when baseline father-adolescent closeness was high, greater lability in father-adolescent closeness was associated with decreased emotion dysregulation. Findings indicate that daily fluctuations in father-adolescent closeness are a key family characteristic that links to long-term adolescent emotion dysregulation.

Interpersonal Competence: A Mediator Between ODD Problems and Parent-Child Relationship Discord

A central requirement of Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) consists of difficulties with interpersonal relationships. As emerging adults' transition into adulthood and seek more autonomy from parents, it is important to examine how ODD problems and parent-child discord are indirectly associated through interpersonal competencies. The current study examined the indirect effects between ODD problems in emerging adults and parent-child discord through multiple interpersonal competencies as well as the additional differences among parent-child gender dyads. Emerging adults (N = 599 individuals aged 18 to 25 years; M = 19.60, SD = 1.40; 68% females) were recruited via an online research platform and completed online survey measures of ODD problems, parent-child relationship discord, and interpersonal competence. Indirect effects were significant for the mother-daughter dyad only. Additional results, limitations, and implications are discussed.

Linking Parent-Child and Peer Relationship Quality to Empathy in Adolescence: A Multilevel Meta-Analysis

Empathy, which is the ability to feel concern for and to understand others’ feelings, is thought to develop in high quality relationships with parent and peers, but also to facilitate the quality of these relationships. While a wide literature has addressed this aspect, the heterogeneity of primary studies, in which different indicators of relationship quality (e.g., support, conflict) and empathy (i.e., affective and cognitive) have been examined, makes it difficult to draw conclusive answers. Therefore, it remained ambiguous how parent–child and peer relationship quality are associated with adolescents’ empathy. In order to increase the understanding of these associations, a multilevel meta-analysis was performed, which allowed for including multiple effect sizes from each study. By a systematic literate search, 70 eligible studies were found that provided 390 effect sizes from 75 independent samples. The results showed a small positive correlation between parent–child relationship quality and empathy, and a small-to-moderate positive correlation between peer relationship quality and empathy, which was significantly stronger than the correlation with parent–child relationship quality. Hence, the meta-analytic results indicate that adolescents with higher quality relationships, especially with peers, indeed tend to show more concern for and understanding of others’ emotions than adolescents with lower quality relationships. Moreover, the moderation analyses showed stronger correlations for the positive dimension of relationship quality than for the negative dimension, and stronger correlations for composite scores of affective and cognitive empathy than for separate scores of the empathy dimensions. However, no differences in correlations were found between the affective and cognitive empathy dimension, and no moderation effects were found for gender and age. Thus, this meta-analysis demonstrates robust positive associations between parent–child and peer relationship quality and empathy in adolescence, implying that good empathic abilities may be a protective factor for experiencing poor relationships.

Parental Relationship Quality and Masculine Gender-Role Strain in Young Men

Research has demonstrated that experiences with attachment to and psychological separation from parents predict men's reports of masculine gender-role stress and conflict. This article extends the literature by examining possible variations in these links that may be accounted for by men's core personality characteristics. The author hypothesizes that Big Five personality traits mediate the association between parental relationship quality and masculine role strain. Results from structural equation modeling with data from 307 young men generally were consistent with these hypotheses, with several key findings: (a) Replicating past research, the author observed several associations between parental relationship quality and masculine role-strain variables; (b) as expected, indirect effects were obtained for neuroticism, agreeableness, and conscientiousness, though those for openness and extraversion were not statistically significant; (c) comparison of alternate models suggested that a fully mediated model fit the data reasonably well; and (d) this model accounted for a large proportion of variance in masculine role strain (41%).

Age and sex differences in the influence of attachment relationships on adolescent psychological health

The quality of adolescent attachment with mothers, fathers, and peers, and the impact of these relationships on psychological health and self-esteem is examined in a sample of 615 high school students. Using an attachment theory perspective, it is argued that different attachment relationships have different affects on adjustment depending on age and gender. Results support the view that attachment develops in peer relationships before withdrawing from parental relationships in adolescence and that this process occurs at different ages and has different consequences for self-esteem and depression. Mother attachment had a greater impact on psychological adjustment for girls while father attachment had a greater impact for boys. It is concluded that while an attachment framework is useful for understanding developmental changes in relationship networks during adolescence, further individual difference and developmental factors may need to be considered.

The Self-Report Assessment of Adolescent Attachment: A Systematic Review and Critique

The assessment of attachment beyond infancy remains a controversial issue. Over the past 20 years adolescent attachment has been assessed in a variety of ways but no ‘gold standard’ for its measurement has emerged. Considering the complexity of attachment theory and the implications for measuring such relationships during adolescence, this article undertakes a review of self-report attachment measures utilised for this age group. Results of a comprehensive PsycInfo literature search are examined with regard to studies reporting the measurement of adolescent attachment. A total of 822 citations were retrieved for the years 1990 to 2012; 394 of these abstracts were further scrutinised for use in the current review. Descriptive data from citations are reported for the measure of attachment used, sample size, age range, and psychometric properties. Following this, the most commonly used self-report measures of attachment for adolescents are reviewed in detail. Theoretical and methodological concerns regarding the measurement of adolescent attachment are discussed and recommendations made regarding key issues to consider for the development of new instruments grounded in contemporary theory and evidence.

Relations among early adolescents' parent-adolescent attachment, perceived social competence, and friendship quality

To assess whether the relation between attachment and friendship quality may be explained by social competence, 113 students in Grades 7 and 8 from the Baltimore metropolitan area completed self-report questionnaires on the variables of interest. In hierarchical regression analyses, both maternal Affective Quality of Attachment and the interaction of School with paternal Affective Quality of Attachment predicted social competence. Also, the interaction of School with paternal Affective Quality of Attachment predicted negative friendship features, whereas social competence predicted positive friendship features. These findings provide support for a pathway between adolescents' attachment to both parents and adolescents' perceived social competence and, in turn, their friendship quality.

The impact of parental gender, catastrophizing and situational threat upon parental behaviour to child pain: a vignette study

BACKGROUND

This study examined which parents report to be solicitous or discouraging in response to their child's pain, and when they do so.

METHODS

Using a vignette methodology, mothers (n = 472) and fathers (n = 271) imagined their child in pain situations varying in duration (1 day or several weeks) and cause of pain (known or unknown biomedical cause).

RESULTS

In general, fathers demonstrated similar tendencies toward solicitousness than mothers, but reported to engage more in discouraging behaviours. In line with expectations, parents who catastrophized about their child's pain reported a higher inclination to engage in solicitous behaviours. Only for fathers, high catastrophizing was also related to a higher report of discouraging behaviours. However, the effects of catastrophizing differed across situations varying in duration and cause of pain. Specifically, the effect of parental catastrophizing upon self-reported solicitous behaviours was particularly strong when imagining their child in pain with unknown biomedical cause. Further, high catastrophizing in fathers only translated in a higher inclination for discouraging responses when imagining their child in pain of short duration.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings of the current study highlight the importance of parental catastrophizing in explaining parental behavioural tendencies in response to their child in pain. Further, reported behaviours were found to vary across pain situations, attesting to the importance of studying parental behaviour 'in context'.

God attachment, mother attachment, and father attachment in early and middle adolescence

The present study examined the interplay of attachment to God, attachment to mother, and attachment to father with respect to adjustment (hope, self-esteem, depression) for 130 early and 106 middle adolescents in Singapore. Results showed that the parental attachments were generally linked (in expected directions) to adjustment. God attachment, however, had unique results. At the bivariate level, God attachment was only linked to early adolescents' self-esteem. When considered together with parental attachments (including interactions), God attachment did not emerge as the key moderator in attachment interactions and yielded some unexpected results (e.g., being positively linked to depression). These results are discussed viz-a-viz the secure base and safe haven functions that God and parental attachments may play during adolescence.

Attachment Quality and Bullying Behavior in School-Aged Youth

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between students’ quality of attachment to their primary caregivers and the frequency with which they bully others and are the victims of bullying. One hundred and five students in Grades 4, 6, and 8 (46 girls, 59 boys; M = 10.5 years) completed paper and pencil surveys. Results indicated that students with lower quality attachment relationships are more likely to bully others and be the victims of bullying than their peers with higher quality attachment relationships. No significant grade or sex differences were found for the attachment, bullying, or victimization variables. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

Connectedness in the lives of children and adolescents: a call for greater conceptual clarity

Studies of the role of connectedness in the health and development of children and adolescents are accumulating rapidly. Although findings are uniformly consistent in documenting its correlation with a host of health indicators, the construct is in need of substantial conceptual clarification to maximize its research and applied utility. Current conceptualizations and operationalizations inconsistently span a wide spectrum of varied elements of social experience--including the quality of a relationship, the degree of liking an environment or relationship, the quality of performance in an environment or relationship, the possession of feelings or attitude states, and a combination of states and the behaviors that antecede them--resulting in an ability to adequately understand what the construct is and how, why, and when it is most protective. This paper documents this variability in an effort to sensitize researchers, practitioners, and policy makers to the complexity of the construct. It further describes one ongoing, multicultural research project that is currently informing international health initiatives as an illustration of one approach to addressing the complexity with goals of precision, parsimony, cultural sensitivity, and applied utility.

Envolvimento materno e desempenho acadêmico: comparando crianças residindo com a mãe e com ambos os pais

Este estudo objetivou comparar o envolvimento materno de crianças que vivem com a mãe e com ambos os pais e o desempenho acadêmico de crianças que vivem nesses dois contextos e relacionar a freqüência de envolvimento materno com o desempenho acadêmico das crianças. Participaram 30 crianças com idades entre 9 e 11 anos, alunos de 3a e 4a séries, metade vivendo em famílias monoparentais e metade com ambos os pais. Para avaliar o desempenho escolar das crianças, utilizou-se o Teste de Desempenho Escolar (TDE). Para caracterizar o envolvimento materno, usou-se o Questionário da Qualidade da Interação Familiar na Visão dos Filhos. Os resultados mostraram que houve algumas diferenças significativas no envolvimento materno nos dois grupos. Além disso, o envolvimento materno no grupo monoparental apresentou uma relação muito maior com o desempenho escolar de seus filhos do que no grupo biparental.

Habilidades sociais das mães e envolvimento com os filhos: um estudo correlacional

O objetivo deste estudo foi identificar e analisar o repertório de habilidades sociais de mães e o envolvimento com seus filhos. Participaram 22 mães de alunos da primeira série do ensino fundamental, que preencheram o questionário Qualidade da Interação Familiar na Visão das Mães e o Inventário de Habilidades Sociais (IHS-Del-Prette). Os respondentes relataram bom repertório de habilidades sociais, que foi positivamente correlacionado com as medidas de envolvimento entre as mães e seus filhos. Tais resultados sugerem a importância do repertório de habilidades sociais das mães no envolvimento com os filhos e, em caso de déficits nessa área, a necessidade de programas que visem melhorar as habilidades sociais maternas.

Understanding the Sex Difference in Vulnerability to Adolescent Depression: An Examination of Child and Parent Characteristics

This study examined sex differences in risk factors associated with adolescent depression in a large sample of boys and girls. Moderation and mediation explanatory models of the sex difference in likelihood of depression were examined. Findings indicate that the factors associated with depression in adolescent boys and girls are quite similar. All of the variables considered were associated with depression, but sex did not moderate the impact of vulnerability factors on likelihood of depression diagnosis. However, negative self-perceptions in the domains of achievement, global self-worth, and physical appearance partially mediated the relationship between sex and depression. Further, girls had higher levels of positive self-perceptions in interpersonal domains that acted as suppressors and reduced the likelihood of depression in girls. These findings suggest that girls' higher incidence of depression is due in part to their higher levels of negative self-perceptions, whereas positive interpersonal factors serve to protect them from depressive episodes.

Self-image and parental attachment among late adolescents in Belize

This study investigated the relationship of ethnicity, parental education, gender, and parental attachment to multiple dimensions of self-image among 285 (161 female and 124 male) late adolescent Belizean students. Student ratings of self-image were unrelated to paternal education and student ethnicity. For maternal education, ethnic identity was higher for students whose mothers were high school graduates than for those whose mothers had completed college or a graduate degree. Female students reported more positive self-images than males in vocational attitudes. Favourable self-images were associated with secure ratings of parental attachment.

Attachment contexts of adolescent friendship and romance

The purpose of this study was to compare memories of attachments to parents, friends, and romantic partners in relation to the maintenance of high school friendships and romantic relationships. College students recorded the length of their friendships and romantic relationships during high school and rated the quality of each. They also rated their memories of attachments to parents, friends, and partners during that time. Parental attachments were the most reliable predictor of friendship outcomes and romantic attachments the most reliable predictor of romantic outcomes, but attachments to parents, friends, and partners each predicted unique variation in maintenance of romantic relationships.