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Emerging Adults’ Stress and Health: The Role of Parent Behaviors and Cognitions

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Abstract

Although parent behaviors and cognitions are important for stress/health outcomes throughout development, little research examines whether cognitions mediate the relationship between parent behaviors and stress/health outcomes. As a result, the current study examined the reports of 160 emerging adults regarding their mothers’ and fathers’ behaviors (via the Parental Bonding Instrument and Alabama Parenting Questionnaire), their cognitions (via the Stress Appraisal Measure, Negative Mood Regulation Scale, Life Orientation Test-Revised, General Self-Efficacy Scale, and Ruminative Response Scale-Abbreviated), and their stress/health outcomes (via the Perceived Stress Scale and Short-Form Health Survey). Results of this study suggested that emerging adults’ cognitions partially mediated the relationship between their mothers’ behaviors and their stress/health outcomes and fully mediated the relationship between their fathers’ behaviors and their stress/health outcomes. Future research should examine parent behaviors as important distal variables in emerging adults’ stress/health outcomes but should examine cognitions as more salient, immediate predictors of their stress/health outcomes.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Drs. Jeffrey Bedwell and Richard Gilson for their comments on the original manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Clinical and Health Psychology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, 32610, USA

    Reesa Donnelly

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Central Florida, P.O. Box 161390, Orlando, FL, 32816, USA

    Kimberly Renk

  3. Department of Psychology, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS, 39762, USA

    Cliff McKinney

Authors
  1. Reesa Donnelly
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  2. Kimberly Renk
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  3. Cliff McKinney
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Correspondence to Kimberly Renk.

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This manuscript is based on the dissertation of the first author under the supervision of the second author.

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Donnelly, R., Renk, K. & McKinney, C. Emerging Adults’ Stress and Health: The Role of Parent Behaviors and Cognitions. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev 44, 19–38 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-012-0309-y

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