Υoung Adults’ Assertiveness in Relation to Parental Acceptance-Rejection in Greece and in Bosnia and Herzegovina

This study explored the relation between assertiveness and parental behavior as perceived by young adults through parental acceptance-rejection and behavioral and psychological control. Αssertiveness is a mode of personal behavior and communication characterized by willingness to stand up for one’s own needs and interests in an open and direct way. Inappropriate parenting may be associated with assertiveness difficulties and as evidence-based findings from many surveys have shown that assertive skills can be improved, it seems to be of great importance to examine the relation between assertiveness and parental rejection along with lack of support, and vice versa. In this study, assertiveness was investigated using the Rathus Assertiveness Schedule and parental behavior was studied using the Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection/Control Questionnaire. Psychosocial personality traits and psychological control were assessed through the Adult Personality Assessment Questionnaire and the Psychological Control Scale, respectively. The sample consisted of 1,117 university students from Greek universities in Athens, Greece, and in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H). For all measures and their psychometric structure, factor equivalence for the two countries was verified through congruence coefficients and through confirmatory factor analyses. Findings showed that in respect to the Greek sample (but not the B&H sample), assertive-behavior skills are more common among men than women. Assertiveness for all participants is correlated with maternal psychological control and paternal acceptance and also with self-evaluation and worldview. Apparently, maternal psychological control and paternal acceptance-rejection seemed to be associated with young adults' levels of assertiveness to a greater degree than with the other parental behavior parameters assessed in the present research.

Παρουσία του Πατέρα στην Οικογένεια και Αντιλαμβανόμενη Γονική Αποδοχή-Απόρριψη

Interpersonal Acceptance-Rejection Theory (IPAR Theory), recently renamed from Parental Acceptance-Rejection Theory (PART), entails that children react crossculturally with consistence to the types of behavior perceived as “acceptance” and “rejection” primarily by their parents. The majority of studies also showed that the higher degree of father’s presence as caregiver within family, the more children feel to be accepted by both parents (Rohner, 1986). This study explores the relationship between the presence of father as caregiver and the perceived acceptancerejection in childhood, by using the short version of the Adults Parental Acceptance-Rejection/Control questionnaire (Adult PARQ/C. Rohner, 2005. Rohner & Khaleque, 2008). 1117 students from various universities in Athens, Greece and in Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina participated in this research. The multivariate analyses of variance findings suggest a fairly strong relationship between maternal and paternal perceived acceptance and father’s physical presence within family activity, as well as his involvement in raising a child duties. These findings are discussed in relation to empirical studies of the international literature of perceived paternal acceptance-rejection.

Ultraorthodox Jewish Fathers in Israel: Predictors of Involvement and Acceptance

Based on Belsky’s model of parenting determinants, paternal involvement and acceptance were compared among 134 ultraorthodox Jewish fathers and 144 secular Jewish fathers. The predictors examined were experiences of care and control from own fathers, perceived parental competence, and social support and child characteristics as moderators. Results show that, although the two groups of fathers did not differ in their involvement with and acceptance of their children, experiences of care and control from own fathers had affected their paternal practices differently—yielding greater power among the ultraorthodox fathers. Finally, child difficulty moderated the link between perceived paternal competence and paternal involvement, as well as between experiences of control of own father and paternal acceptance. The findings were discussed in within the cultural context of the ultraorthodox family.

Loneliness With Regard to Maternal and Paternal Acceptance-Rejection and Sibling Relationship Quality

The aim of the study was to predict loneliness with regard to parental acceptance-rejection and sibling relationship quality after controlling for gender, age, grade, school type, field of study, birth order, and number of siblings. The UCLA Loneliness Scale, Maternal and Paternal Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire, and Sibling Relationship Questionnaire were administered to 1,451 high school students, and multiple hierarchical regression analysis was conducted. Results showed that 1.7% of variance was explained by model 1, including demographic variables, but model 1 was not significant. After adding mother and father acceptance to model 2, the explained variance increased to 18.1%. In model 3, sibling variables were added and the explained variance was 19.6%, which were both significant results. Mother acceptance was the best predictor of loneliness, followed by father acceptance. Parental variables explained loneliness better than sibling and demographic variables. Understanding the family predictors of loneliness may be seen as the first step for a subsequent intervention.

Parental Acceptance and Academic Achievement of Tribal and Non-Tribal Children of Bangladesh

The present study designed to explore the relationship between parental acceptance and academic achievement of tribal and non tribal children of Bangladesh. For this purpose, Bangla Version (Uddin, 2011) of PARQ/CQ (Short Form) for mother and father (Originally by Rohner, 2005) was administered on 96 respondents (48 tribal and 48 non-tribal) selected purposively from Khagrachari district, Bangladesh. Results indicated significant negative correlations between maternal acceptance scores and academic achievement scores and between paternal acceptance scores and academic achievement scores. Furthermore, results revealed significant differences in maternal acceptance, paternal acceptance and academic achievement between tribal and non-tribal children. From the results parental acceptance (maternal and paternal acceptance) found to be a stronger predictor of academic achievement where maternal acceptance created 8.3% variations and paternal acceptance created 10.3% variations in academic achievement of tribal and non-tribal children. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/jles.v8i0.20137 J. Life Earth Sci., Vol. 8: 31-39, 2013

Sex Differences in Relations among Remembered Parental Behavior in Childhood, Adults' Current Psychological Adjustment, and Career Indecision

The goal was to assess sex differences in career indecision's association with different levels of self-reported psychological adjustment and with different remembrances of maternal and paternal acceptance and behavioral control in childhood. 126 participants responded to the Career Decision Scale, the Adult version of the Parental Acceptance-Rejection/Control Questionnaire, and the Adult version of the Personality Assessment Questionnaire. Results showed that career indecision among women but not men was significantly correlated with remembered maternal and paternal acceptance in childhood, as well as with self-reported psychological adjustment and age. Only women's self-reported psychological adjustment made a unique contribution to variance in reported career indecision. No predictor variables were significantly associated with career indecision among men.

PERCEIVED PATERNAL AND MATERNAL ACCEPTANCE AND CHILDREN'S OUTCOMES IN COLOMBIA

The relationship between perceived paternal and maternal acceptance and children's adjustment was analyzed. The sample consisted of 234 children and 234 parental figures (mother or primary female caregiver, and father or primary male caregiver) living in two-parent nuclear families in Colombia. The children's age range was 7 to 13 (M = 9.7). Children completed the Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire (Child PARQ mother and father versions; Rohner, 1990), and the Personality Assessment Questionnaire (PAQ; Rohner, 1990). Parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; Achenbach & Edelbrock, 1983). The analyses revealed that perceived paternal and maternal acceptance were both related to self-reported children's psychological adjustment. Perceived acceptance from mothers, but not from fathers, was directly related to children's behavioral problems as reported by parents. Results suggested that the effect of perceived paternal acceptance on children's behavioral problems is indirect, and that maternal acceptance mediates the effects of paternal acceptance.

Gender, anxiety-depressivity and self-image among adolescents

Two groups of non- and “quasi-depressives”—the latter corresponding to high depression scorers—German adolescents were examined to determine the effect of gender and depression in predicting physical ailments, self-image and attitudes towards parents. Quasi-depressive adolescents displayed higher frequencies of physical complaints across all five subscales of the Giessen physical complaints inventory compared to the non-depressive counterparts. Females generally reported more ailments (exhaustion, gastrointestinal, circulatory, and colds) than males. In contrast to males who showed scarce difference between depressives and non-depressives, female depressives exhibited substantially higher gastrointestinal ailments than non-depressive females. Depressives emerged as displaying inferior self-images, lower paternal acceptance, and somewhat higher maternal rejection, compared to non-depressives. Female adolescents displayed lower self-image, lower paternal acceptance (but not maternal rejection/acceptance), lower mathematical competency, and higher linguistic competency, when compared to male adolescents.