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About this paper symposium
| Panel information |
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| Panel 14. Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships |
| Paper #1 | |
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| Parenting, Mental Health, and Envisioning a Meaningful Future among Sri Lankan Youth | |
| Author information | Role |
| Nigel Gray, Harvard University, United States | Presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Parenting practices play a crucial role in shaping adolescents’ developmental trajectories, influencing both positive outcomes like a sense of purpose, future orientation, and well-being, as well as more adverse outcomes like anxiety. In collectivist cultures like Sri Lanka, where education is often framed as a vehicle for familial and societal success, parental involvement in education is particularly critical in shaping these outcomes. This cultural prioritization of education may create an environment where adolescents feel a dual responsibility – to meet personal goals whilst upholding familial expectations. How parents communicate the importance of education and its connection to future success can potentially influence adolescents’ commitment to their goals and overall well-being. Given the salience of education for upward mobility, parental expectations for achievement can easily slip into pressure and be felt as criticism. Excessive parental pressure or unrealistic expectations could undermine adolescents’ well-being, constrain exploratory behaviors, or cause emotional distress. However, in some cultural contexts, strict parenting and pressure to achieve can seem normative. Further, as adolescents make sense of the value of educational pursuits, parents may communicate this value by helping you link their educational pursuits to future success and careers. This study examines how different dimensions of parenting influence adolescents’ purpose exploration, purpose commitment, future orientation, well-being, and anxiety in Sri Lanka. We analyzed data from 193 Sri Lankan adolescents (55% Female, 45% Male), focusing on two main predictors: Parents Linking Education to Future Success, which reflects how parents connect education with future goals, and Perceived Parental Pressure, which captures the high expectations and demands for achievement placed on adolescents by their parents. The results from a series of five regression analyses are presented in Table 1. Perceived Parental Pressure was not significantly associated with any of our outcomes, nor did it vary by gender. In contrast, Parents Linking Education to Future Success was positively associated with Purpose Commitment, Future Orientation, Well-Being, and Anxiety. However, this predictor did not significantly impact Purpose Exploration. This suggests that while linking education to future goals may strengthen commitment to established goals and purposes, it does not stimulate the exploration of new directions. Taken together, when Sri Lankan parents help adolescents see the linkages between school and their future, it has a largely positive impact; however, it does make youth feel more anxious. No significant gender interactions were found for the effect of linking education to future success on any of the outcomes. Despite that parental pressure was not associated with future oriented outcomes, analyses of focus group discussions documented the real pressure that these youth experience. One participant shared, “No matter how much you improve, they [parents] want you to do better than others. There’s never an ‘I’m proud of you’ moment.” Another remarked, “They [parents] want you to be the best person in the room, otherwise you’re nothing,” reflecting the emotional weight some adolescents feel in response to high parental standards. These findings underscore the importance of supportive parental involvement that emphasizes the long-term value of education in fostering positive developmental outcomes. |
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| Paper #2 | |
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| Parenting in Rural and Urban Vietnam: Adolescent Mental Health and Envisioning a Meaningful Future | |
| Author information | Role |
| My Hong Hoang Do, M.Ed., Harvard University, United States | Presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Vietnam is witnessing a cultural shift in the relative endorsement of interdependent and independent ideologies. With globalization and urbanization, this shift is creating diverging experiences between urban and rural regions. Urban areas gradually endorse more Western independent cultures, while rural areas remain culturally interdependent. This cultural divergence may drive distinctions in parenting practices and their relations to adolescents’ outcomes (Lansford, 2022; Markus & Kitayama, 1991) . We expected developmental processes for urban Vietnamese adolescents to align with previous Western studies, while the same associations between parenting and rural adolescents’ outcomes might be stronger due to the interdependent and traditional family structures prevalent in rural areas. The first study examined measurement and predictive validity of two adolescent-reported parenting scales in Vietnam and their associations with mental health and purpose development. The second study examines variations between rural and urban Vietnamese adolescents. Study 1: 527 adolescents (M_age=16.09) attending an urban high school in Southern Vietnam completed the survey in 2023. 85% of the mothers obtained a college degree. For study 2, data are currently being collected from youth in a rural region in Central Vietnam. Preliminary analyses can be presented here from 90 adolescents (M_age=16.46) of whom 40% of the mothers obtained a college degree. The full rural sample will be available in the next 3 months. Parenting was assessed by the Linking Education to Future Success Scale (Hill et al., 2016) and the Intense Parental Pressure subscale from the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (Frost et al., 1990). In study 1, the measurement factor structure was established using Confirmatory Factor Analysis for the two parenting scales. Based on structural equation modeling, parental pressure was associated with reduced mental well-being, and more anxiety, and was not associated with goal-oriented outcomes of purpose and future orientation. Parental linking education to the future was positively associated with well-being, future orientation, purpose commitment, and purpose engagement while not associated with anxiety (See Figure 1 for path and measurement models). Study 2 compared rural and urban samples using linear regression models and interaction effects controlling for mothers’ education and grade levels. Similar across rural and urban adolescents, parental pressure was linked to lower mental well-being while parental linking to future success was linked to higher well-being. Among the differences is the positive association between parental linking education and adolescents’ future orientation were significantly stronger for rural adolescents. While parental pressure was not associated with future orientation among urban adolescents, this association was positive and significant among rural adolescents (See Figure 2). We will confirm these findings with the fuller rural sample (n~300). This set of studies presented the first empirical evidence of the differential functioning of these two types of parenting for Vietnamese adolescents’ development. Similar to other cross-national work, perceived parental pressure was related to poorer mental health while linking education to the future was positively linked to well-being and purpose. More importantly, these studies examine within-country nuances in how adolescents perceive their interactions with parents. Preliminary findings suggest more independence in future planning among urban adolescents. |
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| Paper #3 | |||
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| Parenting, Well-Being, Envisioning a Meaningful Future in the U.S.: Considering Youth’s Identification with Parents | |||
| Author information | Role | ||
| Yixuan Cui, Harvard University, United States | Presenting author | ||
| Nancy E. Hill, Harvard University, United States | Non-presenting author | ||
| Belle Liang, Boston College, United States | Non-presenting author | ||
| Abstract | |||
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Parents play a pivotal role in supporting youth’s educational journey, from fostering a sense of purpose to influencing long-term well-being through specific practices. In the U.S., where education is often viewed as a critical avenue for upward mobility, parents’ engaging adolescents in discussions about the relevance of education and its link to future success can promote purpose exploration and enhance future aspirations. However, parental expectations may be perceived as pressure, leading to emotional distress when youth feel compelled to meet high standards. While high expectations can increase stress, they may also signal a strong parental investment in youth’s academic success and greater support for their exploratory behaviors, especially in the context of high-quality parent-adolescent relationships. Adolescents with positive perceptions of their parents may be more likely to benefit from these parenting practices than those with negative attitudes. This study examined the measurement validity of two parenting practices scales (parental pressure and parents’ linking education to future success) and their predictive validity on adolescents’ wellbeing, future orientation, and sense of purpose. Second, the study examined variations across youth gender. Are parents different in their treatment of boys and girls in relation to their thinking about the future? Finally, we examined the moderating role of youth’s positive perceptions of their relationship with parents. To what extent does adolescents’ respect for and desire to be like their parents’ impact the association of parenting practices with outcomes? The study is based on 790 adolescents (52% Female, 48% Male) from a public high school in a Northeastern region of United States. Student participants were diverse on SES and ethnicity, with Euro-Americans (57%), Latinos or Hispanics (21%), African Americans (12%), and Asian-American (7%). Confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) revealed that the measurement model had a good fit (CFI = 0.96 and 0.96). The structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses indicated that perceived parental pressure was significantly and negatively associated with diminished well-being, but also positively associated with future orientation, and purpose exploration. Parents’ linking education to future success was significantly associated with higher levels of mental well-being, along with higher levels of future orientation, purpose commitment, and purpose exploration (See Figure 1). These relationships did not vary by gender. Youths’ positive identification with parents moderated the association between linking education to future success and purpose commitment and future orientations (e.g., significant interaction effect). The associations between parents’ linking and these two outcomes were stronger for youth who perceived the relationship with their parents more positively (See Figure 2). Surprisingly, parents’ parental pressure is associated with worse mental well-being and elevated anxiety, as expected, but also positively associated with seemingly adaptive outcomes such as future orientations and purpose exploration. It is possible that when youth are focused on the future, even planfully, it triggers anxieties about the unknown. Together, these findings highlight the differential role of parenting practices in shaping adolescents’ well-being and purpose development, with positive parent-youth relationships potentially amplifying these benefits. |
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Parenting & Adolescents’ Mental Health & Envisioning Meaningful Futures: Perspectives from Sri Lanka, Vietnam, and the US
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Paper Symposium
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| Session Title | Parenting & Adolescents’ Mental Health & Envisioning Meaningful Futures: Perspectives from Sri Lanka, Vietnam, and the US |