Late adolescent perceptions of parent religiosity and parenting processes

The current investigation examined the relations between adolescent reports of parent religiosity and parenting processes, using both a dimensional and a typological conceptualization of parenting. Self-report data were collected from 357 late adolescents. Partial correlations indicated that parent religiosity was associated with both parenting dimensions and parenting styles in conceptually expected directions. Regression analyses provided evidence that the dimensional conceptualization of parenting explained additional variability in perceived parental religiosity above and beyond parenting style effects. Findings suggest that a dimensional conceptualization of parenting processes extends the literature on parent religiosity because it yields more nuanced information about how parental religiosity may be related to differentiated parenting behaviors. Potential therapeutic implications of the findings are discussed.     

Adolescent sexuality and love

Adolescent love in its approach to human sexuality emphasizes freedom, to the exclusion of responsibility. Less than twenty percent of the adolescent couples who engage in sexual relations use any type of contraception, and three-quarters of all pregnancies occur prior to marriage. Further, children born out of wedlock from such unions suffer frequently from social, economic, health, and educational handicaps. In addition, there are the problems of increasing abortions and venereal disease for the young parents, along with child abuse and a suicide rate among teenage mothers ten times that of the general population. Four possible ways to aid in the solution of these problems are suggested.The Rev. John A. Clippinger, Ph.D., Professor and Chairman of the Psychology Department of Baker University, is a minister of the United Church of Christ, a member of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors, and a certified clinical psychologist. He is the author of eighteen articles in books and periodicals in the fields of psychology, psychiatry, religion, and sexual research. He is also listed in theInternational Directory of Sex Research and Related Fields and is associate editor ofCorrective Psychiatry and Journal of Social Therapy.This paper was originally presented at the Fall Conference, 1977, of the Central Region of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and the 1978 national meeting in Chicago of the A.A.P.C.     

Adolescent sexuality and public policy

In recent decades, various attempts have been made to determine the level of sexual activity among adolescents. This information has been used in the planning and evaluation of sex-related programs. However, there is a flaw in using only the initial estimates of the behavior--that a sexually active person is defined as one who has had sexual intercourse. This narrow definition distorts the perception of adolescent sexual behavior. Sexual activity can more accurately be designated by focusing on the actual frequency with which teenagers have sex. In this research report, adolescents were considered sexually active if they had had sex within the last four weeks. Using this definition, adolescents were found to be substantially less sexually active than has been previously reported. This finding was then used to look at various policy decisions in the areas of sex education, family planning, and sexually transmitted disease prevention.     

Cognitive development and aspects of adolescent sexuality

Difficulty with adjustment to sexuality by adolescents has been of increasing concern to both educators and human service professionals in recent years. The cognitive development and behavior of adolescents as it pertains to sexuality and the implications for helping them overcome maladaptive sexual behavior is discussed.     

The influence of parent negative emotional expression on adolescents' perceptions of their relationships with their parents

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between parent affective expression in interactions and adolescent perceptions of their relationship. Observational and self-report data were collected on 85 intact families with adolescents in grades 5 to 9 (n = 44 males, 41 females). Each parent and adolescent took part in two 8-minute conversations–one about an activity they reported enjoying together and one about a disagreement or area of conflict. Conversations were coded on a speaker turn basis for positive, negative, neutral, mixed, and altered affect (kappa = .76). Physical maturation was related to adolescent perceptions of increased negative communication quality in all parent-adolescent dyads. Stepwise regression analyses indicated that expression by fathers of negative and mixed affect significantly predicted adolescent perceptions of communication quality, psychological autonomy, and firm/lax control, in addition to the effects of adolescent pubertal maturation. Mother affective expression in interactions was less consistently related to adolescent perceptions of relationship satisfaction. Implications for the salience of father versus mother affective expression in interactions with adolescents are discussed.     

Mother and daughter perceptions of their relationship: the influence of adolescent pregnancy status

This investigation focused on the perceived relationships between 95 mothers and their adolescent daughters. It sought to determine if there was a significant difference in the mother-daughter relationship as perceived by pregnant versus nonpregnant adolescents, and whether the mothers of these two groups, when compared to each other, differed in their feelings for their daughters. In contrast to other investigations, no striking differences between the groups in intimacy, attachment, and strength of feeling as indicated by a questionnaire were found, though results were generally in the predicted direction. Nevertheless, a strong correlation between daughters' and mothers' answers was found, indicating an overall positive perception by both toward their relationship.     

Adolescent sexuality: values, morality and decision making

The first section of this paper presents a theoretical basis of morality and value formation which provides the background for an examination of adolescent sexual and cognitive development. Data from a study of influences on the sexual decisions of five hundred 13- to 19-year-olds are analyzed in the remainder of the article. Relationships between individual characteristics and the importance of various influences are interpreted in light of the structure of values and moral development.     

Televised sexual content and parental mediation: Influences on adolescent sexuality

Little research has been conducted to examine the influence of exposure to televised sexual content on adolescent sexuality or how parental intervention may reduce negative effects of viewing such content. This study uses self-report data from 1,012 adolescents to investigate the relations among exposure to sexually suggestive programming, parental mediation strategies, and three types of adolescent sexuality outcomes: participation in oral sex and sexual intercourse, future intentions to engage in these behaviors, and sex expectancies. As predicted, exposure to sexual content was associated with an increased likelihood of engaging in sexual behaviors, increased intentions to do so in the future, and more positive sex expectancies. Often, parental mediation strategies were a significant factor in moderating these potential media influences.     

Child and parent predictors of perceptions of parent--child relationship quality

OBJECTIVE/METHOD: Predictors of perceptions of parent-child relationship quality were examined for 175 children with ADHD, 119 comparison children, and parents of these children, drawn from the follow-up phase of the Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD. RESULTS/CONCLUSION: Children with ADHD perceived their mothers and fathers as more power assertive than comparison children. Children higher on depressive symptomatology also perceived their mothers and fathers as less warm and more power assertive. Mothers perceived themselves as more power assertive and fathers perceived themselves as less warm if they were higher on depressive symptomatology themselves or had children with ADHD or higher levels of depressive symptomatology. Several interactions indicated that the association between child factors and parental perceptions of warmth and power assertion often depended on parental depressive symptomatology. The findings resolve a previous contradiction in the literature regarding the relationship between child depressive symptoms and parental perceptions of parent-child relationship quality.     

Mexican-American adolescent sexuality and sexual knowledge: an exploratory study

This article reports the findings of a study designed to examine the sexual knowledge, attitudes, and practices of low-income Mexican- American adolescents. The participants in the study were all about to begin a sex education program in a community health organization in East Los Angeles. The study involved 84 adolescents aged 14-19, 97% of who identified themselves as Mexican-American (the remainder identified themselves as Latino). 51 of the subjects were female and 33 male. The participants completed a 43-item questionnaire concerning demographics, sexual experience and contraceptive use, knowledge of birth control methods, and attitudes towards sexuality and birth control. Only 18 (21%) of the subjects indicated ever having sex. But among this group, 83% reported not using contraception during their last intercourse, and 61% reported never using contraception. Only 22% reported using contraception regularly. Concerning the knowledge of different birth control methods,many of the participants were able to list several methods, but their responses indicated a lack of accurate and specific knowledge about contraceptive methods. In addition to the 43-item questionnaire, 27 of the subjects also completed a sexual and contraceptive knowledge questionnaire. The topics included contraceptive effectiveness, the menstrual cycle, and fertilization. The scores on the questionnaire were low, with an average score of 33% of correct answers. Finally, all 84 participants responded to a sexual attitude questionnaire, which revealed a generally traditional attitude toward the importance of have children, virginity, and the relationship between sex and love.     

Adolescent alcohol and substance abuse: parent and peer effects

There has been considerable research into the effects of peer and parent drug usage on substance abuse by the adolescent. A correlation has been shown to exist between parent usage and increased adolescent substance usage. The parental attitude toward illicit substance use has been positively correlated with adolescent substance use. Once the adolescent starts using illicit drugs, the influence of parents decreases, and the peer influence increases. The research provides further support to Kandel's theory of stages of substance use. In addition, it provides support to the theory that adolescent substance usage is learned, in part, by modeling and imitation. The results are not as conclusive in predicting personality characteristics of the adolescent and parental influence that predate adolescent substance abuse.     

The influence of parent conflict style on children

Families constantly manage tension between autonomy from and connection to family members (T. C. Sabourin, 2003). Family conflict is an important maintenance behavior where this tension often plays out. Specifically, we hypothesized that the negotiation of family conflict between parents and children will be an important factor in the willingness of a young adult child to identify with family. Using a sample of young adults from 2 U.S. locations, regression analysis indicated that conflict styles mediated the association between family communication patterns and shared family identity. Specifically, the level of conformity orientation within the family emerged as moderator of the pattern of mediation. Additionally, findings suggested the avoiding conflict style may be particularly detrimental to shared family identity.     

Family interaction and the course of adolescent psychopathology: An analysis of adolescent and parent effects

This study focused on evaluating the utility of three family measures for predicting outcome in a sample of disturbed but nonpsychotic adolescents: (a) the affective quality of the adolescents' voice tone when communicating with his/her parents; (b) the predominant affective quality of the parents' voice tones when communicating with the adolescent, and (c) the affective quality of the content of the parents' verbalizations to the adolescent. These measures were derived from 5-minute face to face discussions between parents and their disturbed adolescent. Results indicated that adolescents using positive or neutral voice tones during emotionally laden discussions with their parents tended to show relatively adequate levels of psychosocial adjustment as young adults, while adolescents using exclusively negative voice tones tended to show sufficient adjustment difficulties in early adulthood to warrant diagnoses within the extended schizophrenia spectrum. Although adolescent voice tone was associated with outcome, considering both adolescent and parent affective response led to improved prediction, with consideration of adolescent and parent variables leading to accurate prediction of outcome for 30 of the 33 sample cases.     

Teacher,parent and student perceptions of the motives of cyberbullies

Understanding the motivation of students who cyberbully is important for both prevention and intervention efforts for this insidious form of bullying. This qualitative exploratory study used focus groups to examine the views of teachers, parents and students as to the motivation of students who cyberbully and who bully in other traditional forms. In addition, these groups were asked to explain their understanding of what defines bullying and cyberbullying. The results suggested that not only were there differences in definitions of cyberbullying and bullying between the three groups, but also that there were differences in perceptions of what motivates some youth to cyberbully. The implications of these results are discussed for both prevention and intervention strategies.     

Child and parent perceptions of children's psychopathology in psychiatric outpatient children

This study investigated the clinical utility of multitrait-multimethod assessments of internalizing and externalizing symptoms in child psychiatric outpatients. Mothers tended to rate all symptoms of psychopathology at higher levels of severity than their children. In contrast to studies of inpatients, much stronger convergent validity of child and mother ratings was obtained. Overall, findings yielded little evidence of discriminant validity, although mothers appeared better able to discriminate between internal and external symptomatology than their children. Methodological and theoretical explanations of these findings are discussed.     

Mexican adolescent sexuality: attitudes,knowledge, and sources of information

Data from a study of the attitudes, knowledge, and sources of information of Mexican adolescents are presented. 24 male and 57 female unmarried adolescents of mean age 16.2-16.5 years (range 14-19 years) from Cuernavaca and Guadajara responded to a 66-item questionnaire. Participants were from a broad range of socioeconomic levels and 86% self-identified as being Catholic. 12 males and 4 females had experienced sexual intercourse. Responses to the questionnaire indicate that 85% had received some sex education in school, yet only 8% thought that teachers should be responsible for sex education. Further, the majority were satisfied with what they knew about sex, but the greatest mean score was 5.5 on a series of 9 knowledge questions. The youths were generally conservative, holding that people, especially females, should be married before having sex and that sex without love is unacceptable. The author hopes that these findings will help health education providers plan programs for this population in Mexico and the US.     

Adolescent perceptions of friendship and their associations with individual adjustment

This study of 282 dyads examines early- and mid-adolescents' perceptions of friendship quality and their association with daily disagreements, self- and mother reports of behaviour problems, and school grades. Actor and partner analyses identify unique associations between perceptions of friendship quality and perceptions of daily conflict. Actor effects reveal links between friendship negativity and self-perceptions of conflict affective intensity, relationship impact, post-conflict interaction, and post-conflict separation, and between friendship positivity and self-perceptions of relationship impact. Partner effects reveal links between friendship negativity and partner perceptions of conflict outcomes. Perceptions of relationship quality were also associated with self- and mother reports of behaviour problems and with school grades, such that individual and dyadic views of friendship negativity were linked to detrimental outcomes. The worst outcomes tended to be reserved for dyads in which one or both friends reported high levels of relationship negativity.