Parenting and Chinese Adolescent Suicidal Ideation and Suicide Attempts: The Mediating Role of Hopelessness

Various family factors are risk factors for adolescent suicidality (suicidal ideation and suicide attempts). However, little is known about the role of parenting in adolescent suicidality. The present study examined the unique relations between three parenting dimensions (parental warmth, behavioral control, and psychological control) and adolescent suicidality, as well as the mediating role of adolescent hopelessness among these relations. A total of 1529 Chinese adolescents (52 % male; mean age = 14.74 years, SD = 1.48) completed anonymous questionnaires designed to assess three parenting dimensions, hopelessness, suicidal ideation and suicide attempts. After controlling for gender, age, family structure, and socioeconomic status, it was found that parental warmth negatively predicted adolescent suicidality, whereas psychological control positively predicted adolescent suicidality. In addition, parental warmth negatively predicted adolescent hopelessness, whereas psychological control positively predicated adolescent hopelessness, which in turn enhanced adolescent suicidality. Although behavioral control did not predict adolescent suicidality, it did negatively predict adolescent hopelessness, which in turn promoted adolescent suicidality. These findings revealed the differential roles of different parenting dimensions in adolescent suicidality, and the mediation effect of adolescent hopelessness between parenting and adolescent suicidality. Future practices would benefit from incorporating both parenting and hopelessness for optimal intervention effect.     

Trajectories of family management practices and early adolescent behavioral outcomes

Stage-environment fit theory was used to examine the reciprocal lagged relations between family management practices and early adolescent problem behavior during the middle school years. In addition, the potential moderating roles of family structure and of gender were explored. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to describe patterns of growth in family management practices and adolescents' behavioral outcomes and to detect predictors of interindividual differences in initial status and rate of change. The sample comprised approximately 1,000 adolescents between ages 11 years and 15 years. The results indicated that adolescents' antisocial behaviors and substance use increased and their positive behavioral engagement decreased over time. As adolescent age increased, parental knowledge of their adolescent's activities decreased, as did parental rule making and support. The level and rate of change in family management and adolescent behavioral outcomes varied by family structure and by gender. Reciprocal longitudinal associations between parenting practices and adolescent problem behavior were found. Specifically, parenting practices predicted subsequent adolescent behavior, and adolescent behavior predicted subsequent parenting practices. In addition, parental warmth moderated the effects of parental knowledge and rule making on adolescent antisocial behavior and substance use over time.     

Parenting Styles and Gang Membership: Mediating Factors

While literature suggests that parenting has direct and indirect effects on gang membership, mediating effects have been established for the relationship between unidimensional parenting variables and gang involvement. This study fills the gap in the literature by examining how multidimensional parenting styles affect gang membership, and which factors mediate this relationship. The logistic regression models indicate a negative relationship between authoritative parenting and gang involvement, and a positive relationship between authoritarian, neglectful, and permissive parenting and gang membership. The analyses show that delinquent peers, self-control, rationalizations, and guilt are complete or partial mediators of parenting styles and gang membership.     

Correlates of aggressive and delinquent conduct problems in adolescence

The primary purpose of the study was to test a hypothetical model for aggressive and delinquent conduct problems in adolescence. A total of 168 adolescents from 121 families were studied using several questionnaires and a semi‐structured interview. The following factors were considered: obstetric complications, temperament (novelty‐seeking), self‐esteem, family influences (perceived parenting, alcohol abuse/dependence of parents, antisocial personality disorder of the father) and peer‐group characteristics (peer rejection and membership in a deviant peer group). The evaluation methods applied included correlation analyses and testing of two hypothetical models using structural equation modeling. The correlation analyses revealed significant relationships between adolescent aggressive and delinquent behavioral problems and parental antisocial behavior; perceived parental rejection and low emotional warmth; adolescent novelty‐seeking, self‐esteem, peer rejection and peer deviance. The two empirical models, separately for aggressive and delinquent behavior problems, revealed direct relationships between paternal antisocial behavior, parental rejection, adolescent novelty seeking, peer deviance, peer rejection, and offspring aggression and delinquency. There were, however, two differences with respect to the relationships between peer rejection, peer deviance, aggression and delinquency. First, peer rejection was more strongly associated with aggressive behavior and only moderately linked to delinquency. Second, deviance in the peer‐group was found to be closely related with delinquency but only moderately with aggression. Our findings suggest that several pathways for aggressive and delinquent conduct problems are comparable while others were not. Regarding the findings of the empirical models, we conclude that only intervention measures that include parents, peers and individual adolescents may help decrease the incidence of aggressive and delinquent conduct problems. Aggr. Behav. 31:24–39, 2005. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

The Mediating Roles of Adolescent Disclosure and Parental Knowledge in the Association Between Parental Warmth and Delinquency Among Korean Adolescents

The purpose of this study was to examine the association between parental warmth and adolescent delinquency, the potential mediating roles of adolescent disclosure and parental knowledge, and gender differences in such association among Korean adolescents. We hypothesized that (1) parental warmth would be significantly and negatively associated with delinquency, (2) adolescent disclosure and parental knowledge would mediate the association between parental warmth and adolescent delinquency, and (3) the association between parental warmth and adolescent delinquency mediated through adolescent disclosure and parental knowledge would be stronger for adolescent girls than boys. Using a sample of 3125 Korean adolescents from nationally representative and longitudinal data (Korea Youth Panel Survey), results from path analyses demonstrated that findings were consistent with US samples, suggesting a negative association between parental warmth and adolescent delinquency. Further, when Korean adolescents perceived parents to be warmer, they were more likely to disclose personal information to their parents. In turn, higher levels of disclosure were associated with higher levels of parental knowledge about their adolescent children’s activities. Finally, tests of gender differences suggested that parental warmth was more closely associated with adolescent disclosure among girls than boys. Results supported a process model through which parents may shape adolescent children’s delinquency.     

Longitudinal family and peer group effects on violence and nonviolent delinquency

Explored the longitudinal relations between family relationships and parenting characteristics, violence and nonviolent delinquency of peers, and individual delinquency and violence using data from a sample of 246 adolescent male participants in the Chicago Youth Development Study. Family and parenting characteristics were measured when participants averaged 12 years of age, peer group offending when participants averaged 14 years of age, and individual offending when participants averaged 17 years of age. Family characteristics and parenting were represented by an ordinal variable ranging from exceptional families characterized by emotional closeness, strong beliefs about family, and good parenting skills, to struggling families characterized by a lack of emotional cohesion, deviant beliefs, and poor parenting. Peers' violence but not nonviolent delinquency predicted individual violence and nonviolent delinquency, and family types predicted peer deviance as well as individual violence and delinquency. Effects varied somewhat due to gang membership and ethnicity.     

Impulsivity Moderates Promotive Environmental Influences on Adolescent Delinquency: A Comparison Across Family, School, and Neighborhood Contexts

The present study examined moderating effects of impulsivity on the relationships between promotive factors from family (family warmth, parental knowledge), school (school connectedness), and neighborhood (neighborhood cohesion) contexts with delinquency using data collected from N?=?2,978 sixth to eighth graders from 16 schools surrounding a major city in the Midwestern United States. More than half of the respondents were non-Caucasian (M _age ?=?12.48; 41.0 % male). Multilevel modeling analyses were conducted to take into account the clustering of the participants within schools. Impulsivity was positively associated with adolescent delinquency. Additionally, family warmth, parental knowledge, and school connectedness, but not neighborhood cohesion, were independently and inversely related to adolescent delinquency. Finally, impulsivity moderated relationships between family warmth and parental knowledge with delinquency but not relationships between school attachment and neighborhood cohesion with delinquency. Specifically, the negative relationship between family warmth and delinquency was significant for adolescents with high levels of, but not for those with below-average levels of, impulsivity. In addition, parental knowledge had a stronger association with decreased levels of delinquency for adolescents reporting higher levels of impulsivity. The moderating effects of impulsivity did not differ for males and females or for minority and non-minority participants. Findings indicate that impulsivity may have greater impact on adolescents’ susceptibility to positive family influences than on their susceptibility to promotive factors from school or neighborhood contexts. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

The Relation of Parental Qualities to Psychological Well-being,School Adjustment,and Problem Behavior in Chinese Adolescents with Economic Disadvantage

Adolescents with economic disadvantage ( N = 229) were asked to respond to instruments measuring their perceptions of parental qualities, psychological well-being, school adjustment, and problem behavior. Measures of parental qualities include perceived parenting styles, support and help from parents, and conflict and relationship with the parents. Results showed that perceptions of parental qualities were in general related to better adolescent psychological well-being (including existential well-being, life satisfaction, mastery, self-esteem, and general psychiatric morbidity), school adjustment (perceived academic performance and school conduct), and problem behavior (substance abuse and delinquency). Relative to maternal parenthood qualities, paternal parenthood qualities were found to have stronger relationships with measures of well-being and problem behavior in adolescents with economic disadvantage.     

Longitudinal impact of parental and adolescent personality on parenting

This study provides a test of how personality may shape social behaviors in a long-lasting dyad: the parent-adolescent relationship. In a large Belgian community sample, it was examined which parent Big Five characteristics were related to parenting and whether adolescent Big Five characteristics elicited certain parenting behaviors. Further, the proposition that individual differences are amplified under stress was examined by exploring whether parent personality was differentially related to parenting for parents of "easy" versus "difficult" adolescents. Moreover, possible differences in associations across parental and adolescent gender were explored. Mothers (N = 467) and fathers (N = 428) reported on their personality using the Five-Factor Personality Inventory; adolescents (N = 475) assessed their personality with the Hierarchical Personality Inventory for Children. Two types of parenting behaviors, overreactive discipline and warmth, were assessed 2 years later by parent self-reports, partner reports, and adolescent reports, from which multi-informant latent factors were created. Results indicate that parental personality was more relevant than adolescent personality for explaining overreactivity, but parent and adolescent personality were similarly relevant in explaining warmth. Especially parental and adolescent Agreeableness and adolescent Extraversion were important predictors of both types of parenting. Associations between parental personality and parenting were similarly related to parents of easy versus difficult adolescents, and for mothers and fathers parenting daughters or sons. Together, results show that parent characteristics as well as adolescent characteristics importantly affect dysfunctional and adaptive parenting.     

The influence of perceptions of own parenting on sociomoral reasoning,attributions for criminal behaviour,and self-reported delinquency

This study considers the relationship of perceptions of parenting with moral reasoning, causal attributions about criminal behaviour, and self-reported delinquency in a sample of young people. Correlations revealed that perceived parental rejection and emotional warmth, and causal attributions based on temptation were significantly related to self-reported delinquency. The most significant predictors of delinquency scores were paternal emotional warmth, and causal attributions based on temptation and mental instability.     

Verbal Problem Solving in Families of Father-Absent and Father-Present Delinquent Boys

An observational method was used to investigate the relationship of juvenile delinquency and father absence to family problem-solving communicatian. Subjects included 18 intact (mother- father-son) and 18 father-absent (mother-son) families. In support of recent programs that have used probIem-solving interventions with families of deviant adolescents, the results indicated that adolescent delinquency was associated with lower rates of maternal problem solving. Members of families with delinquents also showed less emotional warmth, but not more conflict or attitudinal differences, than members of families with nondelinquents. Father-absence was associated with higher rates of maternal and adolescent problem solving. The theoretical and clinical implications of these findings are discussed.     

行为抑制性、母亲养育方式和学步儿问题行为的关系

采用实验室观察及问卷法,考察学步儿行为抑制性、母亲养育方式和问题行为的关系。结果发现:(1)行为抑制性正向预测内隐问题行为;母亲拒绝正向预测外显问题行为;母亲保护担忧负向预测外显问题行为。(2)性别能调节母亲养育方式与问题行为之间的关系,母亲鼓励独立负向预测男孩内隐问题行为;母亲拒绝正向预测女孩内隐问题行为;保护担忧负向预测男孩外显问题行为;母亲惩罚正向预测男孩外显问题行为。     

Estimating the effect of gang membership on nonviolent and violent delinquency: a counterfactual analysis

This study reconsiders the well‐known link between gang membership and criminal involvement. Recently developed analytical techniques enabled the approximation of an experimental design to determine whether gang members, after being matched with similarly situated nongang members, exhibited greater involvement in nonviolent and violent delinquency. Findings indicated that while gang membership is a function of self‐selection, selection effects alone do not account for the greater involvement in delinquency exhibited by gang members. After propensity score matching was employed, gang members maintained a greater involvement in both nonviolent and violent delinquency when measured cross‐sectionally, but only violent delinquency when measured longitudinally. Additional analyses using inverse probability of treatment weights reaffirmed these conclusions. Aggr. Behav. 36:437–451, 2010. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

电脑游戏与青少年问题行为、家庭各因素的关系研究

本研究着眼于探讨6、8、10年级的中学生的电脑游戏活动,以及游戏时间、游戏暴力程度、行为问题、父母教养方式、家庭收入等因素的相互作用。结果显示,6年级学生较之8和10年级学生有较少的行为问题。研究也发现,学生玩游戏时间越多,玩游戏的历史越长,具有行为问题的可能性越多。此外,那些游戏暴力指数较高的学生所得到的来自父母的温暖指数较少,有较多的问题行为。在游戏的暴力指数方面,女孩比男孩要低得多。父亲教养方式中的温暖和惩罚因子、母亲教养方式中的温暖、椎绡和惩罚因子可用于预测孩子的问题行为。     

The Relationship Between Parenting and the Economic Orientation and Behavior of Norwegian Adolescents

Little is known about the economic socialization of children and adolescents and the role of parents in this process. The authors’ purpose was to explore the role of parenting in the intergenerational transfer of economic orientation and economic behavior. More specifically, they studied the link between four parenting dimensions (parental warmth–responsiveness, behavioral control, psychological control, autonomy granting), three parenting styles (authoritative, authoritarian, and neglectful) and adolescents’ conscientiousness, future time perspective, and present hedonistic orientation. The authors also studied the relationships between these dispositions and the adolescents’ spending preferences and ability to control spending. They used data collected from 14–16-year-olds (n = 597) and their parents (n = 469) in Norway. Results showed that adolescents who perceived their parents as psychologically controlling were less future oriented and conscientious, and were more present hedonistic oriented than others, while adolescents who perceived their parents as responsive, autonomy granting, and controlling of behavior were more future orientated and conscientious than others. Adolescents’ scores for conscientiousness and future orientation were negatively associated with preferences for spending and positively with the ability to control spending, while the opposite relationships were found with respect to a present hedonistic orientation. Parental style was also found to be important for the future educational plans of adolescents, and plans for higher education were more frequent among adolescents who characterized their parents as authoritative than among those who perceived their parents as neglectful. Implications of the findings for economic socialization are discussed.     

Family functioning among returnees to Orthodox Judaism in Israel

The role of religious conversion in marriages and family functioning has been little explored. The current study examined family functioning and parenting stress among returnees to Orthodox Judaism with adolescent children. Possible explanatory factors for difficulties, such as attachment insecurity, religious discord in families, and poor community integration, were also explored. Randomly selected samples of returnee and nonreturnee Orthodox Jews with adolescent children (N = 1632) completed measures of attachment, community integration, marital functioning, and parenting stress. Results indicate that returnees report greater family disengagement (lack of warmth), family chaos (lack of control), and parenting stress. They also reported higher religious discord, higher attachment insecurity, and poorer community integration, which all correlated with higher parenting stress, family disengagement (lack of warmth), and family chaos (lack of control). Moreover, differences between returnees and nonreturnees on family functioning and parenting stress were largely mediated by differences in the explanatory factors. These results substantiate previous anecdotal reports and suggest possible avenues for intervention among Orthodox returnees with family difficulties. They also support the relevance of religious factors in family functioning.     

多巴胺系统多基因与青少年攻击行为的U型关系：母亲消极教养的调节作用

多巴胺活性与攻击相关的脑功能活动呈倒U型关系。本研究对1044名汉族青少年(初次测评时M age=13.32±0.49岁,50.2%女生)的攻击行为进行间隔一年的两次测评,采用多基因累积分范式考察多巴胺系统的多基因功能积分与青少年攻击行为间的关系以及母亲消极教养的调节作用。结果发现,多巴胺系统多基因累积分二次项与母亲消极教养交互影响两个时间点的青少年攻击行为：在较高母亲消极教养条件下,携带较多或较少低多巴胺活性相关等位基因的青少年表现出高水平的攻击行为,呈U型关系;在较低母亲消极教养条件下,多基因累积分二次项与青少年的攻击行为关系不显著。本研究为多巴胺系统基因的联合效应与母亲消极教养调节青少年攻击行为的基因作用机制提供证据。     

Chinese Dimensions of Parenting: Broadening Western Predictors and Outcomes

This study examined perceived parental styles and psychosocial adjustment in 97 Hong Kong Chinese late adolescent girls, using culturally sensitive measures of parenting (warmth, restrictive control, and attributes related to the Chinese philosophy of guan or “training”), and of adjustment. Parenting characteristics associated with guan showed coherence, correlated significantly with parental warmth, and predicted well-being. Contrary to the suggestions of other investigators, restrictive control related negatively to self-esteem and well-being. Maternal control and paternal warmth emerged as important parent style variables in relating to adaptation, and exercized their effects on well-being partly through the mediating agency of self-esteem and relationship harmony. This preliminary study provides an empirical investigation of the impact exercized by a culturally specific dimension proposed for Chinese parenting, and highlights the importance of using culturally sensitive measures of adaptation.     

Intergenerational studies of parenting and the transfer of risk from parent to child

This review describes a recent approach to studying the intergenerational processes that place families and children at risk for a broad variety of social, behavioral, and health problems. Intergenerational studies typically involve two (or more) generations of participants, observed over time. These projects are utilized to study the origins and early determinants of parenting behavior and of other environmental, health, and social conditions that place young offspring at risk for continuing behavioral, cognitive, and health problems. Convergent findings, across a broad range of research populations in several countries, suggest that problematic parenting develops in part through learning the behavior modeled by one's own parents. In addition, problematic parenting seems to be an extension of an individual's early style of aggressive and problematic social behavior. Parents with a history of childhood aggression, in particular, tend to have continuing social, behavioral, and health difficulties, as do their offspring. Conversely, parental involvement, cognitive stimulation, warmth, and nurturance appear to have important protective effects for offspring. Finally, educational achievement appears to be a powerful buffer against problematic parenting and a wide variety of difficult family circumstances, protecting families against the transfer of risk between generations.