Abstract
Parental reports of disagreements and serious disagreements about rules were examined in 200 families with seventh-grade boys and girls. No gender differences were found: Mothers did not report more disagreements than fathers; no more disagreements were reported for girls than boys. Disagreements about personal habits and family obligations were more common than disagreements about peer relations. Disagreements and serious disagreements, in general, were significantly correlated (positively) with parental reports of child oppositionalism and (negatively) with parents' satisfaction with parenting the target child, although some dyadic differences were found. Children's reports of parental acceptance were negatively correlated with disagreements only for the father-daughter dyad. Support was found for some of Baumrind's ([1968] “Authoritarian vs. Authoritative Control,”Adolescence 3: 255–272) notions regarding relations between rule frequency, child participation in rule making, and disagreements about rules, especially for the father-daughter dyad.
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The research reported here was funded in part by Father Flanagan's Boys Home, Inc., and by a grant to the senior author from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, “Family Relations in Early Adolescence.”
Received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Harvard University. Interests are the social psychology of adolescence and psychosocial adaptation to biological change.
Received his Master of Science from Virginia Commonwealth University. Interests are family relations during adolescence, sex roles and their development, pediatric psychology, and statistical applications in psychology.
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Hill, J.P., Holmbeck, G.N. Disagreements about rules in families with seventh-grade girls and boys. J Youth Adolescence 16, 221–246 (1987). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02139092
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02139092