Communication Processes that Predict Young Adults’ Feelings of Being Caught and their Associations with Mental Health and Family Satisfaction

Abstract

In this study, the degree to which young adults felt caught between their parents was tested as a mediator between marital conflict behaviors and young adults’ mental health and family satisfaction. Participants included 1170 young adult children from first marriage and postdivorce families in four different states. Using structural equation modeling, the results revealed that parents’ symbolic aggression, demand/withdraw patterns, and negative disclosures were positively associated with young adult children's feelings of being caught. Such feelings, in turn, were inversely associated with children's reports of family satisfaction and mental health. Although young adult children from divorced families witnessed, on average, more marital aggression, negative disclosures, and demand/withdraw patterns than those from nondivorced families, the associations in the model were relatively comparable across both family types. Further, tests of mediation revealed that feeling caught served primarily as a partial mediator for family satisfaction and as a full mediator for mental health, though such feelings suppressed the positive effect of parental disclosures on family satisfaction for children in nondivorced families. Finally, children's closeness with both parents moderated the associations in the model.

Keywords:

• Mental Health
• Feeling Caught
• Demand/Withdraw Patterns
• Aggression
• Disclosure

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Alan Sillars and two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions on this manuscript. This paper was presented at the National Communication Association's annual convention in San Antonio, Texas.

Notes

1. The initial sample consisted of 1419 adolescent and adult children from four different states. Given that the number of adolescents (n=8) and older adult children (n=22) prevented adequate statistical comparisons, the sample was reduced to include only young adult children between the ages of 18 and 25. Moreover, the present study focused on children's perceptions of both parents’ communication behaviors, and thus, children who had a deceased parent (n=107) or who no longer had contact with their nonresidential parent (n=112) were excluded from further statistical analyses.

2. The disclosure items used for the current study include the following (the same items were used for fathers as for mothers): “My mother often talks openly to me about her troubles.” “My mother often talks openly to me about her finances or money.” “My mother often talks openly to me about her relationship problems.” “My mother talks badly about my father to me.” “When my mother is lonely, she often talks about these feelings to me.” “When my mother is down or sad, she often talks to me about these feelings.” “My mother tells me about difficulties she is having with my father.”

3. Although the 11 items from the Huston et al. scale are typically not averaged (the first 10 items are averaged and then added to the single global satisfaction item and divided by two), averaging all 11 items has produced similar results in previous research (e.g., Afifi & Schrodt, 2003a) with correspondingly high reliability.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Paul Schrodt

Paul Schrodt (PhD, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, 2003) is an Assistant Professor at Texas Christian University

Tamara D. Afifi

Tamara D. Afifi (PhD, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, 1999) is an Assistant Professor at the University of California–Santa Barbara