This study examined children's peer information processing as an explanatory mechanism underlying the association between their insecure representations of interparental and parent-child relationships and school adjustment in a sample of 210 first-graders. Consistent with emotional security theory (EST;Davies & Cummings, 1994), results indicated that children's insecure representations of the interparental relationship were indirectly related to their academic functioning through association with their negative information processing of stressful peer events. Insecure interparental relationships were specifically linked with negative peer information processing patterns which, in turn, predicted increases in child maladjustment over a one-year period. These pathways remained robust after taking into account the roles of representations of parent-child relationships, trait measures of child negative affect, and socioeconomic characteristics as predictors in the analyses.Children's internal representations of how their parents get along with each other are theorized to play a key role in accounting for the variability in children's adaptation to interparental conflict (Davies & Cummings, 1994;Grych & Fincham, 1990). According to Emotional Security Theory (EST;Davies & Cummings, 1994), witnessing destructive conflicts between parents increases children's vulnerability to adjustment problems by amplifying children's negative internal representations of the consequences of interparental relationships for their own welfare and the stability of the marital system. Likewise, the Cognitive-Contextual Framework proposes that children's appraisal of the threat posed by interparental conflict is an intermediary process in pathways between exposure to marital conflict and child problems (Grych & Fincham, 1990). In support of this common prediction, research has repeatedly identified children's insecure representations of interparental relations as intervening mechanisms in the association between interparental and child functioning using both cross-sectional and longitudinal designs (Dadds, Atkinson, Turner, Blums, & Lendich, 1999;Davies & Cummings, 1998;Grych, Harold, & Miles, 2003; Harold, Shelton, Goeke-Morey, & Cummings, 2004). However, the question of how and why insecure representations of interparental relationships increase children's vulnerability to psychological problems remains largely unaddressed (Davies, Winter, & Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Sonnette M. Bascoe, Department of Clinical and Social Sciences in Psychology, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York, 14627. sbascoe@psych.rochester.edu. NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptDev Psychol. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2010 November 1. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript Cicchetti, 2006). Accordingly, the present study addresses this gap in the literature by examining children's peer information processing as a mediating mechanism in pathways between their insecure r...

This study tested whether the mediational pathway involving interparental conflict, adolescent emotional insecurity, and their psychological problems was altered by their earlier childhood histories of insecurity. Participants included 230 families, with the first of the five measurement occasions occurring when children were in first grade (Mean age = 7 years). Results indicated that interparental conflict was associated with increases in adolescent emotional insecurity which, in turn, predicted subsequent increases in their psychological problems. Childhood insecurity predicted adolescent maladjustment five years later even after considering contemporaneous family experiences. Moderator findings revealed that adolescents with relatively higher levels of insecurity in childhood evidenced disproportionately greater and reduced levels of insecurity in the context of high and low levels of interparental conflict, respectively.

This study tested whether the strength of the mediational pathway involving interparental conflict, adolescent emotional insecurity, and their psychological problems depended on the quality of their sibling relationships. Using a multimethod approach, 236 adolescents (M = 12.6 years) and their parents participated in three annual measurement occasions. Tests of moderated mediation revealed that indirect paths among interparental conflict, insecurity, and psychological problems were significant for teens with low, but not high, quality bonds with siblings. High-quality (i.e., strong) sibling relationships conferred protection by neutralizing interparental conflict as a precursor of increases in adolescent insecurity. Results did not vary as a function of the valence of sibling relationship properties, adolescent sex, or gender and age compositions of the dyad.

Translating relationship boundaries conceptualizations to the study of sibling relationships, this study examined the utility of sibling enmeshment and disengagement in predicting child adjustment difficulties in a sample of 282 mothers and adolescents (Mean age = 12.7 years). Mothers completed a semi-structured interview at the first measurement occasion to assess sibling interaction patterns. Adolescents, mothers, and teachers reported on children’s adjustment problems across two annual waves of assessment. Supporting the incremental utility of a boundary conceptualization of sibling relationships, results of latent difference score analyses indicated that coder ratings of sibling enmeshment and disengagement uniquely predicted greater adolescent adjustment difficulties even after taking into account standard indices of sibling relationship quality (i.e., warmth, conflict) and sibling structural characteristics (e.g., sex).

This study examined interparental conflict as a linear and curvilinear predictor of subsequent changes in adolescents’ negative emotional reactivity and cortisol functioning during family conflict and, in turn, their psychological difficulties. In addition, adolescents’ negative emotional reactivity and cortisol functioning during family conflict were examined as subsequent predictors of their psychological difficulties. Participants included 258 adolescents (52% girls) and their parents and teachers who participated in 3 annual measurement occasions. Adolescents were 13 years old on average (standard deviation [SD] = .57) at the first measurement occasion, were generally from middle- and working-class backgrounds, and identified mostly as White (e.g., 74%). The results of latent-difference score analyses indicated that a multimethod and multiinformant assessment of interparental conflict linearly predicted subsequent changes in observational ratings of adolescent emotional reactivity and their overall cortisol output in response to family conflict over a 1-year period. These changes, in turn, predicted increases in multiinformant reports of adolescent psychological problems over a 2-year period. However, the linear association in the first link in the cascade was qualified by the quadratic effects of interparental conflict as a predictor. Consistent with risk-saturation models, the relatively strong associations among interparental conflict and youth emotional reactivity and cortisol output at mild and moderate exposure to conflict weakened as exposure to conflict reached higher levels.