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Effects of Parental Acceptance-Rejection on Children’s Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors: A Longitudinal, Multicultural Study

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Abstract

Grounded in Interpersonal Acceptance-Rejection Theory, this study assessed children’s (N = 1315) perceptions of maternal and paternal acceptance-rejection in nine countries (China, Colombia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, and the United States) as predictors of children’s externalizing and internalizing behaviors across ages 7–14 years. Parenting behaviors were measured using children’s reports on the Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire. Child externalizing and internalizing behaviors were measured using mother, father, and child reports on the Achenbach System of Empirically-Based Assessment. Using a multilevel modeling framework, we found that in cultures where both maternal and paternal indifference/neglect scores were higher than average–compared to other cultures–children’s internalizing problems were more persistent. At the within-culture level, all four forms of maternal and paternal rejection (i.e., coldness/lack of affection, hostility/aggression, indifference/neglect, and undifferentiated rejection) were independently associated with either externalizing and internalizing problems across ages 7–14 even after controlling for child gender, parent education, and each of the four forms of parental rejection. Results demonstrate that the effects of perceived parental acceptance-rejection are panculturally similar.

Highlights

  • Studied effects of parent coldness, hostility, neglect, and rejection on age 7–14 mental health in 12 cultural groups.

  • In cultures where mother and father neglect was higher than average, children’s internalizing problems persisted.

  • Higher than culturally-average levels of the 4 parenting behaviors predicted higher externalizing/internalizing problems.

  • These between- and within-culture parenting effects persisted controlling for child gender and parent education.

  • Results demonstrate that the effects of perceived parental acceptance-rejection are panculturally similar.

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Funding

This research was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development grant RO1-HD054805, Fogarty International Center grant RO3-TW008141, and an International Research Fellowship with the Centre for the Evaluation of Development Policies at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, London, UK, funded by the European Research Council under the Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No 695300-HKADeC-ERC-2015-AdG).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Child and Family Policy, Duke University, Durham, USA

    W. Andrew Rothenberg, Jennifer E. Lansford, Kenneth A. Dodge, Patrick S. Malone & Ann T. Skinner

  2. Mailman Center for Child Development, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Miami, USA

    W. Andrew Rothenberg

  3. The State University of New York College at Oneonta, Oneonta, USA

    Sumbleen Ali

  4. University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA

    Sumbleen Ali, Ronald P. Rohner & Preston A. Britner

  5. Università di Roma “La Sapienza”, Rome, Italy

    Laura Di Giunta & Concetta Pastorelli

  6. Maseno University, Kisumu, Kenya

    Paul Oburu

  7. University West, Trollhättan, Sweden

    Emma Sorbring

  8. Temple University, Philadelphia, USA

    Laurence Steinberg

  9. King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Laurence Steinberg

  10. Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand

    Sombat Tapanya & Saengduean Yotanyamaneewong

  11. Universidad San Buenaventura, Bogotá, Colombia

    Liliana Maria Uribe Tirado

  12. Ateneo de Manila University, Quezon City, Philippines

    Liane Peña Alampay

  13. Hashemite University, Zarqa, Jordan

    Suha M. Al-Hassan

  14. University of Naples “Federico II”, Naples, Italy

    Dario Bacchini

  15. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Bethesda, USA

    Marc H. Bornstein

  16. UNICEF, New York, USA

    Marc H. Bornstein

  17. Institute for Fiscal Studies, London, United Kingdom

    Marc H. Bornstein

  18. University of Macau, Macau, China

    Lei Chang

  19. University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, USA

    Kirby Deater-Deckard

Authors
  1. W. Andrew Rothenberg
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  2. Sumbleen Ali
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  3. Ronald P. Rohner
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  4. Jennifer E. Lansford
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  5. Preston A. Britner
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  6. Laura Di Giunta
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  7. Kenneth A. Dodge
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  8. Patrick S. Malone
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  9. Paul Oburu
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  10. Concetta Pastorelli
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  11. Ann T. Skinner
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  12. Emma Sorbring
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  13. Laurence Steinberg
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  14. Sombat Tapanya
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  15. Liliana Maria Uribe Tirado
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  16. Saengduean Yotanyamaneewong
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  17. Liane Peña Alampay
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  18. Suha M. Al-Hassan
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  19. Dario Bacchini
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  20. Marc H. Bornstein
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  21. Lei Chang
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  22. Kirby Deater-Deckard
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to W. Andrew Rothenberg.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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All procedures performed in our study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committees at respective sites and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The Duke University IRB approved the entire data collection, and local institutional IRBs approved data collection at each site.

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Table 4 Zero-order correlations among study variables
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Rothenberg, W.A., Ali, S., Rohner, R.P. et al. Effects of Parental Acceptance-Rejection on Children’s Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors: A Longitudinal, Multicultural Study. J Child Fam Stud 31, 29–47 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-021-02072-5

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