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Attributional accuracy focuses on the extent to which one person accurately judges the reasons that another person acts the way they do. Research has shown that relationship quality, individual factors, and the overall context of a discussion, all play a role in the accuracy of attributions within adult relationships. However, little research has examined these patterns for parents and adolescents. Within the parent–adolescent literature, research on informant discrepancies has found agreement between family members' reports can highlight the overall functioning of the parent–child relationship but has not focused on perceptions of motives. This study assessed mothers' and adolescents' attributional accuracy during conflictual discussions and the extent to which such accuracy was associated with their relationship quality and individual perspective-taking abilities. One hundred twenty-three mother (MAge = 43) and adolescent (MAge = 14, 54% female, 52% White) dyads participated in a discussion about an issue commonly causing adolescent guilt and rated their own and their partner's motives during the discussion. They also self-reported on their relationship and perspective-taking abilities. Results showed that mothers and teens reported overall more positive discussion motives, when their relationship was better. There was also moderate agreement between mothers' and adolescents' attributed motives and their partners' self-reported motives. Adolescents' accuracy regarding both positive and negative maternal motives improved with better perspective-taking. Mothers' accuracy improved with better relationship quality, but only regarding negative adolescent motives. This study highlights individual factors may be more relevant for adolescent attributional accuracy whereas relational factors may be more relevant for mothers' accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parent–adolescent relationships are related to adolescents' disclosure and concealment, but these associations may represent between-family differences (e.g., families with more negative interactions have adolescents who disclose less) or within-family processes (e.g., when a family has more negative interactions, their adolescent discloses less). This study used cross-lagged panel modeling (CLPM) and random-intercept cross-lagged panel modeling (RI-CLPM) to separate these elements. U.S. adolescents (N = 214, Mage = 16.0, 52% female) reported on their disclosure, concealment, positive relationships, and negative interactions with mothers 3 times over a year. Consistent with prior research, adolescent disclosure was transactionally associated with more positive and less negative relationships with mothers over time in between-family (CLPM) analyses. However, in the within-family (RI-CLPM) analyses, which controlled for the fact that more positive and less negative families had adolescents who disclosed more, changes in relationship quality within a family were not linked with changes in disclosure. In contrast, negative interactions and greater concealment were reciprocally related over time both between families and within families, even when considering that families with more negative interactions also had adolescents who concealed more. Positive relationships were associated with less adolescent concealment, but only relative to other families (at the between level) and not over time. Results confirm the importance of examining disclosure and concealment as separate processes, particularly at the within-family level, and indicate that the cycle of concealment and negative interactions among troubled families may be a particularly ripe area for intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In line with increasing calls for within-family analyses of monitoring processes, this study examined profiles of (combined) adolescent information management strategies and parent knowledge-gathering strategies among 174 families with middle adolescents (Mage = 15.7 years; 164 mother-teen and 112 father-teen dyads). Three mother-adolescent profiles (open, intrusive, indirect) and two father-adolescent profiles (reserved, covert) emerged, with voluntary disclosure and snooping particularly differentiating profiles and fathers reporting gaining more knowledge from others. Profile membership was associated with adjustment and relationship quality both concurrently and over one year, controlling for prior levels. For mother-teen dyads, open communicators reported less behavioral control over time, intrusive communicators reported more negative interactions concurrently and greater depression and less maternal knowledge over time, and indirect communicators reported more problem behavior over time. For father-teen dyads, covert communicators reported more problem behavior concurrently and more negative interactions over time. Profile membership in mother-teen and father-teen dyads was not significantly associated. Results confirm the importance of disclosure and the problematic nature of snooping, while highlighting diverse ways that monitoring processes play out within families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parental induction of empathy-related guilt plays an important role in children's moral development. However, guilt induction can also be psychologically controlling and detrimental for youth adjustment. This study provided a more nuanced view of parental guilt induction by examining how the nature of a child's misdeed and the structure and content of the parental guilt inductive statement impact children's perceptions of it. Using hypothetical vignettes, this study experimentally examined the impact of the type (domain) of child behavior, highlighted victim, and focus of parental criticism on 156 children's and early and middle adolescents' (age: Ms = 8.82, 12.11, and 15.84 years) perceptions of maternal guilt induction. Attributions of guilt and shame increased most for younger children, when mothers focused on indirect harm to themselves about personal issues, and when mothers criticized their child as a person (shame only). Youth evaluated guilt induction least positively for personal issues and when mothers criticized the child's personality while focusing on indirect harm to themselves. With age, youth were less accepting of maternal guilt induction and more likely to endorse negative and parent-centered intentions, especially for personal issues. Older youth also drew less distinction between guilt induction over multifaceted and personal issues. Guilt induction over moral issues was generally perceived most positively. Additional interactions also emerged. These findings suggest that the meaning and effects of guilt induction on children's development may depend on the way in which it is enacted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parental psychological control is associated with poor adolescent outcomes, but little research has examined discrepancies between observed and perceived psychological control in predicting conversational outcomes. The present study used a multimethod, multi-informant approach to examine whether independent and joint associations between observer, adolescent, and mother perceptions of maternal psychological control during mother–adolescent conflict discussions were associated with adolescents' and mothers' perceptions of the quality of these conversations. Mother–adolescent dyads (N = 123 dyads) participated in a conflict discussion and subsequently reported on their satisfaction with the process and outcome of the discussion. Mothers' behavior was coded for psychological control and mothers and adolescents separately reported on mothers' psychological control during the discussion. Findings indicate that higher adolescent-perceived psychological control was associated with poorer adolescent- and mother-reported discussion quality controlling for overall relationship discord. Central to our hypotheses, observer, adolescent, and mother perceptions of psychological control significantly interacted with one another to predict discussion quality, though the specific pattern of findings varied across mother- and adolescent-reported discussion quality. Findings suggest that adolescent perceptions of discussion quality are poorest when adolescents attribute psychologically controlling behavior to mothers, particularly when mothers and outside observers report relatively lower levels of psychological control. This study highlights the importance of adolescent perceptions of parents' behavior and of obtaining information about behavior during parent–adolescent conversations from multiple reporters (observers, adolescents, and parents) to develop targeted interventions with parents and adolescents managing conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent advances in positive youth development theory and research explicate complex associations between adaptive functioning and risk behavior, acknowledging that high levels of both co-occur in the lives of some adolescents. However, evidence on nuanced overlapping developmental trajectories of adaptive functioning and risk has been limited to 1 sample of youth and a single conceptualization of adaptive functioning. We build on prior work by utilizing a nationally representative sample of U.S. adolescents (N = 1,665) followed from 7th grade until after high school and using a measure of adaptive functioning that was validated in a secondary sample of older adolescents (N = 93). In using dual trajectory growth mixture modeling to investigate links between developmental trajectories of adaptive functioning and delinquency and substance use, respectively, results provided evidence of heterogeneity in the overlap between adaptive functioning and risk trajectories. Males were more likely to be in the highest adaptive functioning group as well as the most at-risk delinquency class. The magnitude of negative associations between adaptive functioning and both risk behaviors decreased at Wave 3, indicating a decoupling of adaptive functioning and risk as youth aged. These findings converge in underscoring the need to generate a cohesive theory that specifies factors that promote adaptive functioning and risk in concert. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]