The Relations Among Types of Parentification, School Achievement, and Quality of Life in Early Adolescence: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

Children who experience parentification may have trouble performing developmental tasks due to being overwhelmed by their family caregiving roles and responsibilities. Past studies have found that parentification is negatively associated with academic achievement. However, most of these studies are limited in that they are retrospective and examine the association but not the mechanisms shaping them. The aim of the study was to explore to what extent diverse types of parentification relate to academic achievement and to what extent these relations are mediated by self-reported quality of life among adolescents. The study sample was composed of Polish early adolescents (N = 191; age: M = 14.61; SD = 1.26). Types of parentification were measured with the Parentification Questionnaire for Youth, and quality of life was assessed with KidScreen27. School achievement was measured based on mean semester grade. We explored the associations among study variables and performed six mediation models in the planned analyses. Overall, bivariate relations were significant in a theoretically expected way, although the effect sizes for these associations were rather small. In the mediation analyses, the results showed that four of the six models were not significant. Different from previous studies, instrumental parentification was positively related to school achievement. Additionally, this positive association was mediated by adolescents’ general quality of life. Taken together, the findings were similar and different from the empirical literature base on types of parentification and select outcomes.

Exploring Resiliency and Parentification in Polish Adolescents

“…The results of the current study show that the distinguishing positive correlate of parentification in the group of Polish adolescents was perseverance and determination (as a dimension of resilience). Although there are no studies that would directly indicate the relationship between the two discussed variables, there are those that show that parentification correlates with academic motivation [ 57 ], academic achievement [ 57 , 66 ], effective task planning and goal-oriented coping strategies [ 54 ], as well as with self-efficacy [ 67 ], which are indirectly related to persistence and determination. Additionally, long-term observations of Meichenbaum [ 68 ] show that overcoming the difficulties that arose in a child’s life may foster his or her resistance.…”

“…Therefore, it is important to provide care and support to adolescents who may be at risk of parentification in order to monitor the dynamics of their development and their family situation. Reports indicating the importance of perceiving the situation of parentification and giving it meaning [ 66 , 70 ] may suggest that participation in cognitive-behavioral therapy may be beneficial for people who experienced parentification in childhood and adolescence.…”

Parentification as a Social Determinant of Health: Implications for School Counselors

“…Although many barriers exist to supporting parentified students in the school setting, perhaps one of the greatest is identification. Two research-supported self-report inventories for youth include the Filial Responsibility Scale (FRS) for youth (Jurkovic et al, 2000) and the Parentification Inventory (PI) for youth (Borchet et al, 2021). Both instruments assess instrumental and emotional parentification and are designed for use with adolescents.…”

“…Culture and socioeconomic status are significant considerations in the discussion of parentification (Arellano et al, 2018; Borchet et al, 2021). Certain cultures have different perspectives on filial responsibility, and parentification may be the necessary result of impoverishment.…”

“…These roles can promote increased autonomy and competence (Hooper, 2008). Alternatively, they can contribute to significant developmental challenges for the child (Borchet et al, 2021; Hooper, 2007). With an emphasis on meeting the physiological needs of the family, families may place less emphasis on typical social development and academic achievement.…”