Daily perceptions of romantic partner autonomy support and undermining of health behavior.

OBJECTIVE: This study examined accuracy and bias in daily perceptions of a romantic partner's autonomy support and undermining of health behaviors and the associations between misperceptions and both partners' daily experiences. DESIGN: A sample of 106 cohabiting couples from the community completed daily reports (N = 2377) of their own and their partner's autonomy support and undermining, and their daily experiences. RESULTS: We found tracking accuracy and projection in perceptions of provider's autonomy support and undermining, and evidence of misperceptions: people over-perceived the provider's undermining and under-perceived the provider's autonomy support. Misperceptions were linked with more negative experiences, indicating support and undermining may have the most benefit and least harm when more accurately perceived. CONCLUSION: Although there is some accuracy in daily perceptions of provider support and undermining of health behaviors, there are also biases at play in perceptions and misperceptions are linked with more negative experiences, indicating that support and undermining have the most benefit and least harm to both perceiving and providing partners when such behaviors are accurately perceived.

Assessing Children's Relationships with Pet Dogs: A Multi-Method Approach.

Relationships with pet dogs are thought to provide substantial benefits for children, but the study of these relationships has been hindered by a lack of validated measures. Approaches to assessing the quality of children's pet dog relationships have tended to focus on positive relationship qualities and to rely on self-report questionnaires. The aim of this study was to develop and test multiple measures that could be used to assess both positive and negative features of children's relationships with pet dogs. In a sample of 115 children ages 9-14 years who were pet dog owners, we assessed six qualities of pet dog relationships: Affection, Nurturance of Pet, Emotional Support from Pet, Companionship, Friction with Pet, and Pets as Substitutes for People. All qualities were assessed with child questionnaires, parent questionnaires, and child daily reports of interactions with pets. We found substantial convergence in reports from different observers and across different measurement approaches. Principal components analyses and correlations suggested overlap for many of the positive qualities, which tended to be distinct from negative relationship qualities. The study provides new tools which could be used to test further how relationships with pets contribute to children's development.

Perceptions of partner social control: accuracy, bias, and daily experience.

OBJECTIVE: We examined accuracy and bias in people's perceptions of their romantic partner's daily social control attempts of daily health behaviours and how misperceptions of partner daily social control are related to both partners' daily experiences. DESIGN: 106 cohabiting couples from the community reported on their own and their partner's daily social control attempts (i.e., persuasion, pressure) and their daily experiences (i.e., positive and negative affect, autonomy, relationship satisfaction) across 14 consecutive days (N = 2377 reports). Multilevel path models examined tracking accuracy, projection, and mean-level bias in perceptions of partner health social control attempts, and associations between mean-level bias and daily experiences. RESULTS: Perceptions of provider influence contained significant tracking accuracy, projection, and mean-level accuracy in provider use of social control. Underperceptions of persuasion were associated with negative outcomes for the perceiver and no outcomes for the provider. Overperceptions of persuasion were associated with negative outcomes for providers and marginally higher positive affect for perceivers. Misperceptions of pressure were associated with negative outcomes for both perceivers and providers. CONCLUSION: Results suggest that social control may have the most benefit and least harm to both partners when people accurately perceive the mean-levels of such influence attempts on their health behaviours.

Anxiety, academic achievement, and academic self-concept: Meta-analytic syntheses of their relations across developmental periods.

This systematic review examined how anxiety symptoms and anxiety disorders relate to academic achievement, school dropout, and academic self-concept. Studies with children or adult samples were included in seven meta-analyses (ks for number of samples ranged from 5 to 156; N's for participants ranged from 780 to 37, 203). Results revealed significant but very small effect sizes for the relations between anxiety and overall academic achievement (r = -.06), language achievement (r = -.07), and math achievement (r = -.09), and a nonsignificant effect size for science achievement (r = -.01). Participants with greater anxiety were also significantly more likely to not complete high school (r = .11). They also had a poorer overall academic self-concept (r = -.25) and mathematics self-concept (r = -.30). Few methodological moderators (e.g., study design, age) were significant. Results show that anxiety does not strongly hinder academic achievement, but it is an important correlate of dropout and academic self-concept, which in turn could contribute to poorer life outcomes. Interventions and preventive programs need to consider ways to ameliorate the relations of anxiety with academic outcomes, especially school continuation and academic self-concept. Future studies should identify risk factors that may amplify these relations.

Parental emotion socialization: Relations with adjustment, security, and maternal depression in early adolescence.

How parents approach and teach their children about emotions are key determinants of children's healthy adjustment (Denham, 2019). Parental emotion socialization has been mostly studied in parents of young children. Our study identified emotion socialization (ES) strategies used by parents of early adolescents (Study 1) and then examined the relations of ES strategies with early adolescent adjustment, parent-child attachment, and maternal depression (Study 2). Study 1 included 171 parents of 9- to 14-year-old children who completed an open-ended questionnaire about their reactions to their children's negative emotions, which was content coded for ES strategies. We found that parents do use the 6 traditional ES strategies (problem solving, emotion focused/comforting, encouragement, minimizing, punitive, and distress) with early adolescents, while also using 3 approaches not identified in studies of parents of younger children (self-regulation, parent seeking information, parent explaining). We also found that some ES strategies are context and gender specific. Study 2 included 218 mother and child dyads (children aged 9- to 14- years). Mothers completed the Revised Coping with Children's Negative Emotions Scale, adapted to include items assessing the 3 new strategies, and measures of child adjustment, attachment, and maternal depression. The ES strategies loaded on 3 factors: Collaborative Coping, Negative Reactions to Child's Distress, and Low Expectation for Child's Self-Regulation. Negative Reactions to Child's Distress showed associations with children's internalizing, externalizing, and prosocial behavior, and child attachment, while Collaborative Coping was related to prosocial behavior. Our results point to the importance of investigating additional ES strategies in early adolescence. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Parent-Child Attachment Security and Depressive Symptoms in Early Adolescence: The Mediating Roles of Gratitude and Forgiveness.

Although greater parent-child attachment security is linked with children's lower levels of depressive symptoms, little research has evaluated potential explanatory mechanisms. We investigated whether dispositional gratitude and interpersonal forgiveness explain the relation between attachment security with parents and early adolescents' depressive symptoms. Early adolescents (N = 105; M age = 12.3 years; 51% girls) completed questionnaires assessing their attachment security to mother and father figures, depressive symptoms, and dispositional gratitude, and an interview assessing interpersonal forgiveness. Results revealed that greater attachment security to mothers and fathers was associated with fewer depressive symptoms and greater levels of dispositional gratitude and interpersonal forgiveness. Further, dispositional gratitude and interpersonal forgiveness were negatively associated with depressive symptoms. Dispositional gratitude emerged as a mediator between attachment security with each parent and depressive symptoms. Our findings suggest that greater parent-child security may promote early adolescents' appreciation of positive events, which in turn may relate to fewer depressive symptoms.

A Meta-Analysis of Friendship Qualities and Romantic Relationship Outcomes in Adolescence.

Romantic relationships are one of the most significant interpersonal ties in adolescence, thus understanding factors that may contribute to their formation and quality are important. The current meta-analysis focuses on links between friendship quality and romantic relationship outcomes for adolescents up to 18 years. In a series of meta-analyses (k = 28 studies, N's = 946-4,040), friendship qualities were not related to romantic involvement. However, we did find robust evidence of continuity between friendship qualities and romantic relationship qualities. Additionally, adolescents experienced more negative quality in their romantic relationships than in their friendships. These findings suggest that friendships have implications for adolescents' romantic relationships, although more research is needed on specific quality associations, and the mediators of these relations.

Parent-child attachment and children's experience and regulation of emotion: A meta-analytic review.

Attachment relationships serve as contexts within which children develop emotional capacities. This meta-analytic review assessed the strength of associations of parent-child attachment patterns with the experience and regulation of emotion in children under age 18 years. In a series of meta-analyses (k = 72 studies, N's ranged from 87 to 9,167), we examined children's positive and negative affective experiences (assessed either globally or elicited in specific contexts), emotion regulation ability, and coping strategies. More securely attached children experienced more global positive affect and less global negative affect, expressed less elicited negative affect, were better able to regulate emotions, and more often used cognitive and social support coping strategies. More avoidantly attached children experienced less global positive affect, were less able to regulate emotions, and were less likely to use cognitive or social support coping strategies. By contrast, more ambivalently attached children experienced more global and more elicited negative affect, and were less able to regulate emotions. More disorganized children experienced less global positive affect and more global negative affect. These robust findings provide evidence that attachments to parents have implications for children's emotional development, although more research is needed on whether insecure attachment patterns are associated with distinct emotion profiles. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Perceptions of Parent-Child Attachment Relationships and Friendship Qualities: Predictors of Romantic Relationship Involvement and Quality in Adolescence.

Relationships with parents and friends are important contexts for developing romantic relationship skills. Parents and friends may influence both the timing of involvement and the quality of romantic relationships. Three models of the joint influence of parents and friends (direct effects model, mediation model, and moderator model) have been proposed. The present study uses data from a longitudinal study (n = 1012; 49.8% female; 81.1% Caucasian) to examine how attachment and friendship quality at age 10 years predict romantic relationship involvement and quality at ages 12 and 15 years. The results supported the direct effects model, with attachment and friendship quality uniquely predicting different romantic relationship outcomes. The findings provide further support for the important influence of family and friends on early romantic relationships.