Parent-Adolescent Discrepancies Regarding Adolescents’ Peer-Related Loneliness: Associations with Adolescent Adjustment

• Published in: Journal of youth and adolescence 2017-05, Vol.46 (5), p.1104-1116
• Main Authors: Spithoven, Annette W. M., Vanhalst, Janne, Lodder, Gerine, Bijttebier, Patricia, Goossens, Luc
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adjustment; Adolescent; Adolescent Behavior - psychology; Adolescent Development; Adolescents; Aggression; Aggression - psychology; Aggressiveness; Behavior; Behavior Rating Scales; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Behavioral Science Research; Behavioral Sciences; Check Lists; Child and School Psychology; Child Behavior; Child development; Children & youth; Clinical Psychology; Emotional Adjustment; Emotional Response; Empirical Research; Female; Health Psychology; History of Psychology; Humans; Interpersonal Competence; Late Adolescents; Law and Psychology; Loneliness; Loneliness - psychology; Male; Mental health; Mothers; Mothers - psychology; Observer Variation; Parents; Parents & parenting; Parents - psychology; Peers; Prosocial Behavior; Psychology; Psychology, Adolescent; Questionnaires; Regression analysis; Researcher subject relations; Researchers; Resistance (Psychology); School Psychology; Self Report; Social Adjustment; Social behavior; Social research; Teenagers
• ISSN: 0047-2891; 1573-6601
• DOI: 10.1007/s10964-017-0662-z

Because loneliness is a subjective experience, it is often examined using self-reports. Yet, researchers have started to use other-reports to examine loneliness. As previous research suggests that discrepancies between self- and other views might have important implications for adolescents’ mental health, the current study examines discrepancies in multi-informant reports on adolescents’ loneliness in relation with prosocial behavior, aggression, and adolescents’ parent-related loneliness. The sample consisted of 374 mother-adolescent dyads and 318 father-adolescent dyads (41.80% male, M age  = 15.67 years, SD  = 1.25). Results indicated that informants used different reference points to assess adolescents’ peer-related loneliness, but were otherwise comparable. Moreover, informant discrepancies were associated with greater adolescents’ reported parent-related loneliness. The current study did not provide evidence that discrepancies were related to prosocial or aggressive behavior. The current study adds to the notion that other-reports on loneliness show substantial convergence with self-reports. In addition, this study indicates that the discrepancy between other- and self-reports on loneliness holds valuable information for adolescent socio-emotional adjustment.