Mind games: Parental psychological control and emerging adults’ adjustment

Abstract

Although parental psychological control has been consistently linked with negative outcomes in the child and adolescent literature, little is known about how it functions during the developmental time frame of emerging adulthood, which is characterized by increased freedom and instability. Consequently, this study examined the extent to which paternal and maternal psychological controls were directly and indirectly (via self-esteem) related to hallmarks of emerging adult adjustment, notably risky behaviors, life satisfaction, and feelings about adulthood status. Recruited via MTurk, participants were 310 emerging adults ( M age = 25.37; 56% female) across the U.S. who completed an online survey. Results revealed paternal psychological control had a direct effect on risky behaviors and self-esteem, whereas maternal psychological control solely had a direct effect on risky behaviors. Results also indicated indirect effects of paternal psychological control. Increases in paternal psychological control were linked to declines in self-esteem, which in turn was associated with decreased life satisfaction and endorsement of adulthood status. Altogether, findings suggest that even low levels of parental psychological control were linked to detrimental outcomes in an age-representative sample—encompassing the full age range of emerging adulthood from 18 years to 29 years—of emerging adults. Thus, findings contribute to a better understanding of parent–child relationships and the consequences of parental control during the third decade of life, which has important implications for informing parenting strategies across emerging adulthood.

Adolescent Positivity and Future Orientation, Parental Psychological Control, and Young Adult Internalising Behaviours during COVID-19 in Nine Countries

“…Although parental psychological control has been widely studied among children and adolescents, it is important to understand the impact of psychological control during later developmental stages, such as emerging adulthood. Parental psychological control continues to be relevant during young adulthood because it can be expressed from a distance and affect the individual's self-sufficiency, emotional regulation, life satisfaction, and endorsement of adulthood status (Faherty et al 2020;Manzeske and Stright 2009;Sholomskas and Axelrod 1986).…”

Parent-child relationship quality and emotional adjustment among college students: The role of parental financial support

“…In turn, these differences may contribute differently to their children’s adjustment. For example, in a national sample of U.S. emerging adults, Faherty et al (2020) found that paternal (but not maternal) psychological control was detrimental for self-esteem. In the present study, we examined whether mothers and fathers contributed differently to emerging adults’ emotional adjustment, but overall expected that high-quality relationships with both mothers and fathers would promote lower depression and anxiety symptoms.…”

The role of empathy in the mechanism linking parental psychological control to emotional reactivities to COVID-19 pandemic: A pilot study among Chinese emerging adults

“…Although parental psychological control has been robustly linked with negative developmental outcomes in the child and adolescent periods ( Barber & Harmon, 2002 ; Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2010 ), the empirical work on how it functions in emerging adults is still limited (e.g., Liga et al, 2017 ). Previous evidence demonstrated that emerging adults' perceptions of their parents' extent of parental psychological control were highly correlated with their deficits in terms of self-efficacy ( Givertz & Segrin, 2014 ), emotional regulation ( Manzeske & Stright, 2009 ), life satisfaction ( Faherty, Lowe, & Arnett, 2020 ) that conduce to coping successfully with emergency and adversity. Accordingly, we propose that parental psychological control impairs the healthy emotional reactivities to COVID-19 even for emerging adults.…”