Annual of social work, Vol. 21 No. 1, 2014.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.3935/ljsr.v21i1.14
RELATION BETWEEN PARENTAL CONFLICT AND PSYCHOSOCIAL PROBLEMS AMONG YOUNG ADOLESCENTS
Ivana Macuka
orcid.org/0000-0002-8753-8991
; Department of Psychology, University of Zadar, Zadar, Croatia
Marina Jurkin
orcid.org/0000-0002-1559-6826
; Department of Psychology, University of Zadar, Zadar, Croatia
Abstract
Hostile and constructively unresolved conflicts between parents are damaging for the positive family environment and, therefore, can have a negative impact on the psychosocial functioning of their children. The impact of the interparental conflict on children depends on the way in which parents express and resolve their disagreement and, also, in the way in which children interpret its meaning and its implication for their wellbeing. Thus, this paper seeks to examine the extent in which a child's perceptions of the interparental conflict explain the disorder in psychosocial adjustment of a child. In other words, various dimensions of a parental conflict were examined (i.e. conflict characteristics, their appraisals of threat and self-blame) to explain the presence of internal (depression symptoms) and external (proactive and reactive aggression symptoms) problems in young adolescents.
The research was carried out on 352 school children who were at an average of 13 years of age (of which 192 were girls and 160 were boys). The analyses examining the differences between boys and girls show that boy are more likely to express proactive and reactive types of aggressive behaviour and to self-blame for the interparental conflict. More so, results of the regression analysis show that frequent exposure to a highly hostile internparental conflicts and aggression can result in a proactive aggressive behaviour in boys. On the other hand, perceptions of threat during the interparental conflict significantly explain the reactive aggressive behaviour in girls. More so, the perception of threat dimension further explains presence of the depression symptoms in boys and girls. Furthermore, the self-blame dimension has been another significant depression symptoms predictor in girls.
Keywords
characteristics of parental conflict; perceived threat; self-blame in children; internal and external problems
Hrčak ID:
128000
URI
Publication date:
16.6.2014.
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