Parent Influences on Adolescent Peer Orientation and Substance Use: The Interface of Parenting Practices and Values

• Published in: Child development 1998-12, Vol.69 (6), p.1672-1688
• Main Authors: Bogenschneider, Karen, Wu, Ming-yeh, Raffaelli, Marcela, Tsay, Jenner C.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescence; Adolescent; Adolescent Behavior - psychology; Adolescent Development; Adolescents; Adult; Alcohols; Biological and medical sciences; Child Development; Child psychology; Child Rearing; Children; Children & youth; Developmental psychology; Drinking; Drug abuse; Drug Use; Epistemology; European Americans; Family (Sociological Unit); Family, School, and Community; Fathers; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Individuation; Influences; Male; Mothers; Parent Child Relationship; Parent Influence; Parent-Child Relations; Parenting; Parenting Skills; Parenting Styles; Parents; Parents & parenting; Path Analysis; Peer Group; Peer Groups; Peer Influence; Peer relations; Peer Relationship; Peer relationships; Peers; Pragmatics; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Puberty; Research Methodology; Semiotics; Smoking; Social Values; Socialization; Substance abuse; Substance-Related Disorders - diagnosis; Substance-Related Disorders - psychology; Theories; Values
• ISSN: 0009-3920; 1467-8624
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.1998.tb06184.x

This study examines how experiences in the family domain may magnify or mitigate experiences in the peer domain, and how processes in both milieus may influence adolescent substance use. The data derived from 666 European American mother-adolescent dyads and 510 European American father-adolescent dyads. Consistent with individuation-connectedness theory, mothers' responsiveness lessened their adolescents' orientation to peers, which, in turn, reduced adolescent substance use. This process was moderated by maternal values regarding adolescent alcohol use; that is, the relation of maternal responsiveness to adolescent substance use depended on the extent of maternal approval or disapproval of adolescent alcohol use. Among fathers, closer monitoring was directly associated with less adolescent substance use, with stronger effects among fathers who held more disapproving values regarding adolescent alcohol use. Theoretical, methodological, and pragmatic implications are given.