Differences in family functioning in grandparent and parent-headed households in a clinical sample of drug-using African American adolescents

Grandparents play a critical role in African American families, providing support and important leadership functions. Little is known, however, about family functioning in grandparent-headed households with a drug-using adolescent. Such knowledge is particularly salient for researchers and therapists who work with drug-using adolescents and their families. Using a clinical sample of convenience, analyses were conducted to identify similarities and differences in adolescent substance use and behavior problems, family relationships, and family social ecology relationships between African American grandparent-headed (n=12) and parent-headed (n=54) households. Results indicated that adolescents from the 2 household types reported similar levels of problem behaviors, but that grandparents reported less delinquency with peers than did parents. Primary caregivers in grandparent-headed households reported less monitoring and supervision of peers and less within-family conflict. Implications for treatment are discussed.     

The Effect of Parental Responsiveness on Differences in Psychological Distress and Delinquency between Singleton and Non-Singleton Chinese Adolescents

We assessed the differences in psychological distress and delinquent participation between singleton and non-singleton Chinese adolescents and the extent to which parental responsiveness (mother’s vs. father’s) might account for such differences. Using survey reports of 1,924 7th and 8th graders from three middle schools in the outskirts of Fuzhou, China, we observed small but significant differences between singleton and non-singleton adolescents. Singletons reported lower levels of psychological distress and delinquent participation than non-singleton adolescents. Furthermore, singletons received higher levels of parental responsiveness, which was inversely related to psychological distress and delinquent participation, respectively. The difference in psychological distress between singletons and non-singletons was completely mediated by both maternal and paternal responsiveness. Paternal responsiveness alone fully mediated the difference in delinquent participation between singleton and non-singleton adolescents. We discussed these results in light of both theoretical literature and empirical implications.     

The relationship between positive parental involvement and identity achievement during adolescence

Parental support and provision of structure are linked to positive outcomes in adolescents, yet the influence of parental involvement on identity development during adolescence has not been clearly established. The present study examined the relationship between adolescent identity achievement and parental support, social monitoring, and school monitoring among 10th and 12th graders. It was hypothesized that parental support and monitoring would be associated with higher identity achievement. It was also our goal to clarify the relationship between gender and adolescent identity achievement. The girls in this study reported higher levels of each of the positive parental involvement factors than did boys, but there were no gender differences in identity achievement. Parental support and monitoring of social and school activities were significant predictors of identity achievement across age and gender. Results also suggested that the association between parental involvement and identity achievement differs by gender and it changes as a function of age.     

Is there a Relationship between Family Structure and Substance Use among Public Middle School Students?

We investigated the relationship between family structure and substance use in a sample of 2,138 public middle school students in a southern state. The CDC Middle School Youth Risk Behavior Survey was utilized and adjusted logistic regression models were created separately for four race/gender categories (African American females/males, and Caucasian females/males) to examine associations among selected drug use variables (tobacco, alcohol, marijuana and inhalants). Analyses were adjusted for social economic status. Results suggested differences (p ≤ .05) among race/gender groups for the protective effect of living in an intact family (both mother and father, real or adoptive) regarding substance use among middle school students. In addition, family structure appeared to have a stronger relationship with substance use for Caucasians as opposed to African American adolescents. Caucasian adolescents living in cohabitated family households were more likely to report substance use, when compared to those living in intact two-parent households. Adolescents who are undergoing parental divorce may need special attention as they transition into new family structures.     

青少年的自主期望、对父母权威的态度与亲子冲突和亲合

通过对704名城乡高一和高三年青少年的问卷调查,探讨了高中阶段青少年－父母关系、青少年的行为自主期望和对父母权威的态度的特点,以及青少年—父母关系与青少年的行为自主期望和对父母权威的态度之间的关系。结果显示,我国城乡青少年对父母权威的认同程度较高,而期望获得行为自主的年龄较晚;青少年的行为自主期望、对父母权威的态度与青少年—父母冲突与亲合在某些方面存在城乡、性别和年级差异;青少年对父母权威的认同程度越高,对与父母发生分歧的接受性越高,其与父母的关系越亲密;那些期望在较晚年龄获得行为自主的青少年,与父亲的冲突较多,但与母亲较亲密     

Socioeconomic status, schooling, and the developmental trajectories of adolescents

The socioeconomic stratification of American society profoundly influences how the life course unfolds by shaping various developmental pathways as well as the connections among these pathways. Drawing on a nationally representative sample of American adolescents, this study charted trajectories of personal control and parental consultation from middle school to the end of high school and then examined how various combinations of these trajectories were associated with math/science course taking in high school across socioeconomic strata. Results indicated that low and/or decreasing levels of personal control were associated with the accumulation of fewer math/science credits, as were declining levels of parental consultation no matter what the initial level. Mismatches between control and consultation trajectories (e.g., high, stable control with low, stable consultation) were also associated with fewer math/science credits. These patterns tended to be less predictive of math/science credit accumulation at the highest and lowest ends of the socioeconomic spectrum.     

Trajectories of Parenting Processes and Adolescent Substance Use: Reciprocal Effects

Drawing on transactional theories of child development, we assessed bidirectional links between trajectories of adolescent substance use and parenting processes from early through mid adolescence. Hierarchical generalized models estimated trajectories for 3,317 adolescents from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, exploring both between- and within-individual effects. Between individuals, adolescents reporting more regular family activities and greater father and mother knowledge of friends and teachers experienced lower levels of substance use through mid adolescence. Similarly, adolescents with more frequent substance use reported lower family activities, father knowledge, and mother knowledge, though these differences dissipated over time. More conservative within-individual differences indicated a prospective protective effect of family activities, with increases in adolescent participation in family activities predicting later declines in substance use. Results support the central importance of engagement in regular family activities, and suggest the need for further exploration of transactional processes between parents and children in the development of risk behaviors.     

Adolescent Adjustment to Parental Divorce: An Investigation from the Perspective of Basic Dimensions of Structural Family Therapy Theory

This study, conducted within the framework of concepts of structural family therapy, examined the relationship of four family-based, clinical dimensions to the adjustment of 45 adolescents during the first 18 months of parental separation. There were two samples of mother-custody families: an Aided group that applied for treatment, and an Unaided group of paid volunteers. The inclusion of this variable addressed a major methodological deficit of previous studies. There was a significant association between perceived postseparation family structure and adolescent adjustment, demonstrating that individual adolescent adjustment is contingent on structural features of the contemporary postseparation family. Further, Aided families were perceived as more chaotic, disengaged, and enmeshed than Unaided families, while Aided adolescents were characterized by more behavior problems than Unaided adolescents. This suggests that divorce, as an unscheduled transition, might be within the realm of adaptation for many families and adolescents and is not necessarily "disastrous."     

Mother-Adolescent Relationship Quality and Autonomy as Predictors of Psychosocial Adjustment Among African American Adolescents

This study investigated the role of mother-adolescent relationship quality and autonomy in the psychosocial outcomes in a sample of African American adolescents drawn from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. The results indicated that positive mother-adolescent relationship quality and greater autonomy were associated with higher self-esteem, fewer depressive symptoms, and less delinquent behavior. Moreover, adolescents who were older, female, or from households with less income reported more depressive symptoms. In addition, adolescents who were younger or female reported fewer delinquent behaviors. Being male was associated with higher self-esteem. Adolescents’ age, family income, and mother-adolescent relationship quality did not moderate relations between autonomy and the outcome variables.     

The Role of Rigidity in Adaptive and Maladaptive Families Assessed by FACES IV: The Points of View of Adolescents

Previous studies using Olson’s Circumplex Model and FACES IV, the self-report assessing family functioning, did not clarify the role of rigidity, a dimension of this model. Rigidity emerged as ambiguous: it was considered either as a functional or as a dysfunctional dimension. Building upon the results of previous studies, we provided a contribution intended to disambiguate the role of rigidity considering adolescents’ perceptions and using a non-a priori classification analysis. 320 Italian adolescents (13–21 years) participated in this study and responded to a questionnaire containing scales of the study variables. A latent class analysis was performed to identify the association of rigidity with the other dimensions of Olson’s model and with indicators of adaptive family functioning in adolescence: parental monitoring and family satisfaction. We found six clusters corresponding to family typologies and having different levels of functioning. Rigidity emerged as adaptive in the typologies named rigidly balanced and flexibly oscillating; it was associated with positive dimensions of family functioning, i.e. flexibility, cohesion, parental monitoring, and high levels of family satisfaction. Differently, when rigidity was associated with disengagement, low cohesion and flexibility, and lack of parental supervision, emerged as maladaptive. This was the case of two typologies: the rigidly disengaged and the chaotically disengaged. Adolescents of these families reported the lowest levels of satisfaction. In the two last typologies, the flexibly chaotic and the cohesively disorganized, rigidity indicated a mid-range functionality as these families were characterized by emotional connectedness but lack of containment. Clinical implications are discussed.     

Effects of perceived parental school support and family communication on delinquent behaviors in latinos and white non-latinos

The authors examined the roles of perceived parental school support and family communication in the context of delinquent behaviors in Mexican American and White non-Latino adolescents. Family communication was defined as the degree to which adolescents endorsed that they communicated with their parents about a variety of topics. The Parental School Support scale was administered to assess adolescents' perceptions of parental support for academic pursuits. Data analysis included the relationship between these variables and their predictive relationship to delinquency, and the relationship to gender and ethnicity. Results demonstrated that adolescents' perceptions of family communication and parental school support were related to the likelihood of committing delinquent acts. There were no significant differences in gender or ethnicity in perceived levels of family communication and parental school support.     

Emotional Functioning in Children and Adolescents with Elevated Depressive Symptoms

Difficulties with emotion and its regulation are of central importance to the etiology and course of depression. The current study investigated these constructs in relation to childhood and adolescence by comparing the emotional functioning of 170 9- to 15-year-olds reporting high levels of depressive symptoms (HD) to a matched sample of 170 children and adolescents reporting low levels of depressive symptoms (LD). Compared to LD, HD participants reported significantly greater shame proneness, poorer functioning on emotion regulation competencies (emotional control, self-awareness and situational responsiveness), less healthy emotion regulation strategy use (less reappraisal and greater suppression), and lower levels of guilt proneness. Empathic concern did not differ between the two groups. The findings enhance current knowledge by providing a more comprehensive profile of the emotional difficulties experienced by children and adolescents with elevated depressive symptoms.     

Family Therapy with Unmarried African American Mothers and Their Adolescents

Almost two-thirds of African American births are to unmarried mothers, and these single parents are among the most economically vulnerable in the United States. The effects of chronic stressors such as poverty can compromise the ability of these mothers to parent effectively, particularly during the developmental period of adolescence, typically a stressful phase of parenting. This article describes a multidimensional family therapy (MDFT) approach to working with African American adolescents who have drug and/or behavior problems. It is maintained that addressing the intrapersonal functioning of African American single mothers is vital if they are to re-establish the attachment bonds necessary for the maintenance of essential parental influence in the lives of their adolescents. Through systematic attention to the parent as an individual, leading to a balance between self-care and care for others, parental supervision is more easily achieved and relational impasses between parent and adolescent more equitably resolved.     

The gendered nature of family structure and group-based anti-egalitarianism: a cross-national analysis

Using 4 samples of adolescents from 3 nations (Australia, Sweden, and the United States), the authors explored whether the gendered nature of the family socialization environment affected young people's level of group-based social egalitarianism. It was hypothesized that the greater the father's influence in the family, the greater the children's level of group-based social anti-egalitarianism. The results were consistent with the authors' expectations. Children from father-headed households had the highest level of group-based social anti-egalitarianism; children from mother-headed households had the lowest level of group-based anti-egalitarianism; and children from dual-parent households were in between. Similarly, children from homes in which the father had the greatest decision-making power tended to exhibit the highest levels of anti-egalitarianism, whereas children from homes in which the mother had the greatest decision-making power displayed the lowest levels of social anti-egalitarianism. Family structure did not interact with either the nationality or gender of the child.     

Parent–Adolescent Discrepancies in Perceived Parenting Characteristics and Adolescent Developmental Outcomes in Poor Chinese Families

We examined the relationships between parent–adolescent discrepancies in perceived parenting characteristics (indexed by parental responsiveness, parental demandingness, and parental control) and adolescent developmental outcomes (indexed by achievement motivation and psychological competence) in poor families in Hong Kong. A sample of 275 intact families having at least one child aged 11–16 experiencing economic disadvantage were invited to participate in the study. Fathers and mothers completed the Parenting Style Scale and Chinese Parental Control Scale, and adolescents completed the Social-Oriented Achievement Motivation Scale and Chinese Positive Youth Development Scale in addition to paternal and maternal Parenting Style Scale and Chinese Parental Control Scale. Results indicated that parents and adolescents had different perceptions of parental responsiveness, parental demandingness, and paternal control, with adolescents generally perceived lower levels of parenting behaviors than did their parents. While father–adolescent discrepancy in perceived paternal responsiveness and mother–adolescent discrepancy in perceived maternal control negatively predicted adolescent achievement motivation, mother–adolescent discrepancy in perceptions of maternal responsiveness negatively predicted psychological competence in adolescents experiencing economic disadvantage. The present findings provided support that parent–child discrepancies in perceived parenting characteristics have negative impacts on the developmental outcomes of adolescents experiencing economic disadvantage. The present study addresses parent–child discrepancies in perceived parental behaviors as “legitimate” constructs, and explores their links with adolescent psychosocial development, which sheds light for researchers and clinical practitioners in helping the Chinese families experiencing economic disadvantage.     

Adolescent Delinquency: Is Too Much or Too Little Parental Control a Problem?

Delinquent behavior is a parental concern during the period of adolescence. Previous theories and studies suggested that high parental control relates to lower delinquent behavior. However, Nye’s social control theory suggests a curvilinear rather than a linear relationship between parental control and delinquency. This study uses Nye’s social control theory to explore a curvilinear relationship between parental control and delinquency. Data concerning parental control and delinquency from Wave I of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) was analyzed using negative binomial regression in conjunction with “Svy” estimation method. The adolescents in the sample ranged from ages 12–21 years old (M = 15.55) and varied in race/ethnicity, family structure, and socioeconomic status. The quadratic term of parental control had a significant relationship with delinquency while controlling for the linear term of the parental control variable and covariates. The results suggested that high and low parental control related to higher levels of delinquent behavior. Moderate amounts of parental control related to lower levels of delinquent behavior. The practical and clinical implications of the findings are discussed within the study.     

Peer Victimization and Parental Psychological Control in Adolescence

With a sample of 831 U.S. adolescents (49% girls) followed from 9th to 11th grade, the directionality of the association between school-based peer victimization and adolescents’ perception of their parents’ psychological control were examined. Possible mediating influences of internalizing symptoms were also explored. The results highlight the relevance of adolescent-to-parent influences during adolescence by demonstrating that physical peer victimization was predictive of increases in mother’s psychological control but parental psychological control did not predict subsequent peer victimization. These direct effects were present above and beyond the contribution of adolescent internalizing symptoms to higher parental psychological control. Practical implications of the primacy of adolescent-to-parent influences in predicting the social adjustment of victims of peer harassment are discussed.     

How urban African American young adolescents spend their time: time budgets for locations, activities, and companionship

The time budgets of a population of youth provide important information about their daily experience and socialization. This study reports data on the time budgets of a sample of 253 urban African American poor to working- and middle-class 5th-8th graders in Chicago. These youth were found to spend less time in school than other postindustrial adolescent populations, but spent no less time doing homework than White suburban U.S. young adolescents. They spent large quantities of time at home and with their families--at rates comparable to rates for young adolescents in a society with collectivist values like India. Unlike with other populations, early adolescence was not associated with major age changes in time allocations. Amount of time in schoolwork did not differ by grade, and amount of time with family did not show the decline with age that has been found for European American suburban adolescents.     

Person × environment interactions on adolescent delinquency: Sensation seeking,peer deviance and parental monitoring

Sensation seeking is a personality trait that is robustly correlated with delinquent behavior in adolescence. The current study tested specific contextual factors hypothesized to facilitate, exacerbate or attenuate this risk factor for adolescent delinquency. Individual differences in sensation seeking, peer deviance, parental monitoring and self-reported delinquent behavior were assessed in a sample of 470 adolescents. Peer deviance partially mediated the effects of sensation seeking and parental monitoring on adolescent delinquency. We also found evidence for a three-way interaction between sensation seeking, peer deviance and parental monitoring, such that the highest rates of delinquency occurred from the concurrence of high sensation seeking, high peer deviance, and low levels of parental monitoring. Results highlight the importance of considering peer- and family-level processes when evaluating personality risk and problematic adolescent behavior.     

The prospective relationship between child personality and perceived parenting: Mediation by parental sense of competence

This study examined the prospective relationship between childhood Big Five personality characteristics and perceived parenting in adolescence. In addition, we investigated whether this relationship was mediated by parental sense of competence, and whether associations were different for mothers and fathers. For 274 children, teachers reported on children’s Big Five personality characteristics at Time 1, mothers and fathers reported on their sense of competence at Time 2, and the children (who had now become adolescents) rated their parents’ warmth, overreactivity and psychological control at Time 3. Mediation analysis revealed both direct and indirect effects. No differences in associations were found for perceived parenting of mothers and fathers. This study demonstrates that child personality in late childhood is significantly related to perceived parental warmth, overreactivity and psychological control in adolescence. In addition, parental sense of competence mediates the relationship between child conscientiousness and perceived parental warmth, overreactivity and psychological control.