HC5 - The role of parents in the prevention of risk behavior and addiction

Adolescence is characterised by:

• Maturity gap

• Autonomy
  They want to have more autonomy

• Identity
  Developing your identity

• Independence
  More independence

• Impulsive
  Higher impulsivity

• Social context more important than provinding knowledge about risk behaviors

Risk behavior in adolescence is normative for adolescents: how can I be part of a group? What feels right? Who am I? Who do I want to be?

Three different ways parents can influence their digital media and substance use of kids

1. General parenting
   Ecological model
   Self-determination theory
   Not related to specific outcomes

2. Behavior-specific parenting
   Parential mediation theory
   It is outcome specific

3. Parental modeling
   Social learning theory

Parenting practices

Practices that shape the understanding of actions, behaviours and rules, parents exert to regulate the personal and social acts of the child

Important things about socialization

• It is a two-way street (bi-directional)
  Parents influence their children and their children influence them

• Changes over time (dynamic proces)
  Vb, you can say to a 6 year old, because I say so → does not work for a 60 year old

Bi-directional socialization: example alcohol

Parental attitudes about alcohol: to what extend do parents think it is okay for minors to drink alcohol

If kids drink alcohol and parents know about it → they lower their strictness, it is more aligned with their children

Socialization is a dynamic process

Dynamic developmental theories

• age graded theory (Sampson& Laub, 2005)
  Depending on the age and the level of involvement in certain behaviors (bi-directional behaviors) → parents response differently → parenting behaviors change over time

Depending on age and/or level of involvement in behavior (e.g. alcohol use):
E.g. level of rule-setting / autonomy granting

Summary of relevant considerations in the study of parenting:

Socialization:

• Takes place in different ways

• Bi-directional direction

• Is a dynamic process

  • Changes over time, yet remains important!

General parenting

Is the balance between control and support

Four different parenting styles:

• Authoritarian: much control, little support

• Authoritative: much control, much support

• Neglectful: little control, little support

• Permissive: little control, much support

Authoritative is the most effective parenting style

Behavior-specific parenting

Explicit acts that parents engage in to discourage or prevent their offspring’s smoking or drinking behavior

Behavior-specific parenting distinguishes into:

• Rules about …

• Frequencey of communication about …

• Quality of communication about …

Alcohol-specific parenting influences alcohol use indirectly

Alcohol-specific parenting → individual characteristics → alcohol use adolescent

This is a mediation
The impact of parenting on alcohol use is mediated by individual characteristics
BV. different drinking behaviors between siblings

Little is known about the indirect effect of parenting

Rules about alcohol + quality of communication → how? → alcohol use

Self-control

The ability to override or change one’s inner responses, as well as to interrupt undesired behavioral tendencies (such as impulses) and refrain from acting on them

The impact of self-control on alcohol use

Socialization has an impact on self-control (the self-determination theory)

Indirect effect of alcohol-specific rules on adolescents’ alcohol use

Rules about alcohol at 13 predict higher self-control at 14, which predicts a lower alcohol use at 15
This is a mediation

Differential effects on self-control mediation

Quality of communication has an influence (moderation)

• High quality level of communication → report this indirect effect of higher self-control, which influence their drinking behavior

• Low quality level of communication → report high level of self-control, but this is not related to their drinking → maybe they are not motivated to use their self-control in regard to drinking

Parental drinking profiles influence on:

• Initiation: only group 5 (M occasionally, F heavy) has an impact -> kids start to drink at an earlier age compared to other groups

• Change (amount of drinking over time): group 5 (M occasionally, F heavy) and 6 (M and F heavy weekend) have an impact → kids increase in their levels of drinking faster than other groups’

Parental alcohol use (parental modeling)

Heavy drinking has a stronger effect on alcohol use of:

• Boys -> they can relate more to their fathers

• Youth in lower levels of education

• Youth with tolerant parents

Quantity is more important than frequency

Strict rule setting is important to lower the impact of heavy drinking

Summary of parenting and substance use

(Behavior-specific) parenting:

• Strict rules about alcohol use are crucial

  • Set in a supportive context

• Higher quantity of parental alcohol use predict earlier and more alcohol use in adolescent

Parenting and PSMU

All studies show a protective relation of supportive, responsive parenting practices AND parent-child relationships with PSMU

Inconsistent and controlling parenting is related with more PSMU

… strategies appeared to mitigate PSMU, while … approaches were associated with increased PSMU

Proactive limit-setting, reactive approaches

General vs media-specific parenting

Controlling (media-specific part) and supportive (general support) parent practices → it is abou balance between these

Internet-specific parenting takes place in …

the general socialization context

Internet-specific parenting

Proactive limit-setting strategies appeared to mitigate problematic social media use, while

reactive approaches were associated with increased social media use.

Parental phubbing

Parents’ internet use while being in interaction with your child

Internet-specific parenting and phubbing

• Protective: rules about when, where and how long adolescents were allowed to use social media

• Negative: reactive restrictions (i.e. active intervening), parental phubbing → increase risk of their child having PSMU

• Mixed effects: active mediation (i.e. supporting and guiding social media use)

Parental screen time + parental phubbing …

increases the at risk/problematic use of social media of their children

Take-home messages

Parents have a major influence on adolescents substance and internet use.

• Usually these effects are indirect

  • Mediating mechanisms are important

• These influences differ across subgroups of adolescents

  • Moderation by different individual and contextual factors

Particularly for the role of parents in adolescents’ online behavior, more research is needed