Bidirectional Relationships between Parental Anxiety, Internalizing Symptoms, and Peer Victimization and Aggression among Early Adolescents

Abstract

There have been few studies on the bidirectional interaction between the parental and the offspring’s psychological symptoms. It is important to fill in this lacuna to understand the development and vicious cycles of psychological symptoms in the familial context. The objective was to study the bidirectional relationships between parental anxiety, early adolescents’ internalizing symptoms, and peer victimization and aggression. 288 early adolescents (54% girls) between 9 and 15 years ([Formula: see text] = 12.84 and SD = 1.22) and their parents participated in a two-wave bidirectional study. Path analyses showed bidirectional relationships between early adolescents’ internalizing symptoms and peer victimization. Maternal anxiety was preceded by the offspring’s internalizing symptoms. The hypothesized model differed by gender but not age, indicating that the path from peer victimization to peer aggression was stronger in girls. These results contribute to the study of parental and early adolescent symptoms from a multi-informant perspective.