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Adolescents’ Conflict Management Styles with Mothers: Longitudinal Associations with Parenting and Reactance

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Abstract

Adolescents’ conflict management styles with parents are assumed to have an important impact on the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship and on adolescents’ psychosocial development. Longitudinal research investigating possible determinants of these conflict management skills is scarce. The parenting context and adolescents’ tendency to reject maternal authority are expected to shape adolescents’ conflict management styles. Therefore, the present three-wave longitudinal study focuses on how parenting and adolescents’ reactance relates to adolescents’ conflict management styles and conflict frequency with mothers over time, and whether reactance may also explain the associations between parenting and certain conflict variables. We addressed these research questions by using a hybrid cross-lagged panel model with parenting as a latent variable (i.e., supportive parenting) and the other variables as manifest variables. Supportive parenting was measured by four well-known parenting dimensions: autonomy support, responsiveness, psychological control, and harsh control. Four conflict styles were investigated: positive problem solving, withdrawal, conflict engagement, and compliance. Questionnaires were completed by 812 adolescents at three annual waves (52% girls at Time 1). Supportive parenting was associated with fewer conflicts, more positive problem solving, and less compliance and reactance over time. Reactance was associated with more conflicts, conflict engagement and withdrawal, and less compliance. We did not find evidence for the mediating role of reactance in the over-time associations between parenting and adolescents’ conflict management and frequency. Both parenting and reactance appeared important and unique determinants for adolescents’ conflict management styles and frequency.

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Author Contributions

L.M. conceived of the study, participated in its design and coordination, performed the statistical analyses, and drafted the manuscript; K.L. conceived of the study, provided assistance with the statistical analyses, and helped to draft the manuscript; S.B. and S.V.P. assisted with the interpretation of the data, critical reading and feedback on the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Funding

This study was not funded by any research grant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. KU Leuven, School Psychology and Development in Context, Tiensestraat 102 - box 37, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    Lies Christine Missotten & Koen Luyckx

  2. Utrecht University, Youth and Family, Heidelberglaan 1, 3584, CS, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Susan Branje

  3. Université de Lausanne, Center de recherché sur la famille et le développement, Quartier UNIL-Mouline, Géopolis, CH-1015, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Stijn Van Petegem

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  1. Lies Christine Missotten
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  2. Koen Luyckx
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  4. Stijn Van Petegem
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Correspondence to Lies Christine Missotten.

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Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

This study was approved by the ethical review board of the faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, KU Leuven, Belgium.

Informed Consent

All parents and adolescents were informed about the content and procedure of the study in advance. Parents could refuse their child’s participation in the study. On the day of the data collection, informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Table 2

Table 2 Correlations among all study variables
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Missotten, L.C., Luyckx, K., Branje, S. et al. Adolescents’ Conflict Management Styles with Mothers: Longitudinal Associations with Parenting and Reactance. J Youth Adolescence 47, 260–274 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-017-0634-3

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