The role of adolescents' perceived parental psychological control in the links between shyness and socio‐emotional adjustment among youth

Abstract

The goal of this study was to explore the moderating role of perceived parental psychological control in the links between shyness and socio-emotional adjustment in Chinese adolescents. Participants were N = 462 Grade 7 and 8 Chinese adolescents (246 boys, Mage = 13.42 years, SD = 8 months) recruited from four randomly selected public schools in Shanghai, People's Republic of China. Participants completed peer assessment measures of shyness and peer victimization, sociometric nominations of peer rejection, and self-report measures of loneliness, depression, and perceived parental psychological control. Among the results, shyness was positively associated with loneliness, depressive symptoms, and peer rejection among adolescents who perceived their parents as higher in psychological control, but no significant associations were found among adolescents who perceived lower levels of parental psychological control. Results are discussed in terms of the implications of parenting practices perpetuating adjustment problems among shy adolescents in urban China.Shyness is a temperamental trait characterized by excessive wariness, unease, and self-consciousness in contexts of social novelty and perceived social evaluation (Rubin, Coplan, & Bowker, 2009). There is a growing body of research which shows that in contemporary urban Chinese society, shyness in childhood and adolescence is now associated with greater internalizing (e.g., depression, loneliness) and peer relationship difficulties (e.g., peer rejection, peer victimization) (e.g.,

Exploring the relations between parenting practices, child shyness, and internalizing problems in Chinese culture.

“…This finding is in contrast to the results from previous studies, which showed that parental negative control interacted with children's shy temperament to contribute to internalizing problems (Van Leeuwen et al, 2004). For example, Bullock et al (2018) found that shyness was positively associated with peer rejection, loneliness, and depressive symptoms among adolescents who perceived their parents as higher in psychological control in Chinese culture. One explanation for the discrepant findings is that past studies focused specifically on parental negative control, whereas in the present study, we focused on a wider range of maladaptive parenting practices.…”

“…Furthermore, the socialization beliefs of parents in contemporary China appear to have resulted in changes in the implications of shyness. Specifically, childhood shyness in Mainland China is now concurrently and prospectively linked to a range of negative outcomes, including internalizing problems (e.g., Bullock et al, 2018). For example, Coplan et al (2017) found that shyness among Mainland Chinese elementary school children was associated with internalizing problems and poorer academic achievement.…”

Parenting Styles and Internalizing Symptoms in Adolescence: A Systematic Literature Review

“…After removing duplicates, a first screening based on title and abstracts resulted in 167 articles. Finally, after a full-text read-through, 59 studies [31,36,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50,51,52,53,54,55,56,57,58,59,60,61,62,63,64,65,66,67,68,69,70,71,72,73,74,75,76,77,78,79,80,81,82,83,84,85,86,87,88,89,90,91,92,93,94,95,96,97,98] were selected for inclusion (see Table 5).…”

The Cost and Benefit of Fear Induction Parenting on Children’s Health during the COVID-19 Outbreak

“…Developmental research has highlighted the interaction between individual characteristics and environmental influences in producing developmental outcomes (e.g., Bullock et al, 2018;. Differential susceptibility model emphasizes individual differences in developmental plasticity and sensitivity such that children of certain attributes may be more vulnerable to detrimental contextual factors, or more likely to benefit from supportive conditions, or more susceptible to both adverse and supportive environmental influences (Belsky & Pluess, 2009).…”