Effects of different facets of paternal and maternal control behaviour on early adolescents' perceived academic competence

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine how different aspects of paternal and maternal control behaviours influence the perceived academic competence of early adolescents indirectly via their engagement with school. The analyses are based on a longitudinal study with two waves that were separated by 12 months. The participants were 228 early adolescents (50.4% girls) with an average age of 11.62 years (SD = .41) at the outset. Structural equation modeling analyses using bootstrapping procedures revealed that parental supervision was indirectly related to the perceived academic competence of adolescents via their engagement with schools, whereas parental authoritarian control was only linked to engagement with school. The discussion focuses on the multifaceted nature of parental control and the importance of both parents for the academic success of adolescents.

Keywords::

• Academic competence
• School engagement
• Parental supervision
• Parental authoritarian control
• SEM
• Longitudinal study

Acknowledgements

We thank the families who volunteered to participate in the study. This research was supported by grants [SNF 100013-116500/1; SNF 100014-132278/1] awarded by the Swiss National Science Foundation to the second author.