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Families with an adolescent between the ages of 11 and 18 years participated in a study examining the relationship between parental depressive and anxiety symptomatology and parental ratings of adolescents’ functioning. This study indicated that mothers, fathers, and adolescents exhibited significant cross‐informant correspondence (i.e. correlations) and very few significant differences in ratings of adolescents’ functioning. After controlling for demographic variables and the ratings of other informants, mothers’ depressive symptomatology was a significant predictor of mothers’ ratings of adolescents’ internalizing and externalizing behavior problems and competence. With regard to fathers’ ratings, fathers’ depressive symptomatology was a significant predictor of adolescents’ internalizing behavior problems and competence, whereas fathers’ depressive and anxious symptomatology was a significant predictor of adolescents’ externalizing behavior problems. The findings of this study suggested the importance of considering maternal and paternal depressive symptomatology when parents are asked to provide ratings of their adolescents’ functioning.

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College students and a subsample of their mothers and fathers participated in a study examining their retrospective reports of childhood emotional and behavioral problems experienced by college students. College students and their mothers and fathers exhibited moderate correspondence in their recollection of internalizing and externalizing problems that college students experienced during their childhood. In contrast, college students tended to endorse significantly greater levels of both internalizing and externalizing problems relative to their mothers and fathers. Current psychological symptoms predicted the greater endorsement of childhood internalizing and externalizing problems by college students and the greater endorsement of college students' childhood internalizing problems by their mothers. Further, college students' current perceptions of their parents predicted their endorsement of childhood internalizing problems, and college students' current masculinity and femininity predicted their endorsement of childhood externalizing problems. Results of this study emphasized the importance of noting factors that may be related to retrospective reports.

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