Parental Beliefs about Childhood and Adolescence from a Longitudinal Perspective.

Pilar Ridao,Isabel López-Verdugo,Carmen Reina-Flores

doi:10.3390/ijerph18041760

Pilar Ridao, Isabel López-Verdugo + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18041760

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Abstract

Research into family context as a socializing agent points to the need to take parental beliefs into account due to the role they play in both parenting strategies and, ultimately, in the psychosocial adjustment of children and adolescents. The present study aims to explore possible relationships between parental beliefs about childhood and adolescence from a longitudinal and qualitative perspective. The beliefs held by parents of teenagers about adolescence are compared with those they hold about childhood at that same moment, and the evolution of these ideas is charted over the course of 16 years as their children grow. A total of 102 parents participated in the longitudinal study. They completed two types of semi-structured interviews: one of them throughout the entire study period and the other once their children became teenagers. The results reveal an association between the type of beliefs parents hold about childhood and their perception of adolescence, and they indicate that these ideas change over time as more adjusted and modern beliefs about child development correlate with a more positive perception of adolescence. These results are interpreted from the perspective of their influence on beliefs about parenting styles, reflecting what is reported in the recent literature regarding the most successful styles for fostering children’s and adolescents’ psychosocial adjustment.

Highlights

Of the many factors that influence family dynamics, parental ideas or beliefs about children’s development and upbringing constitute the basis of parenting and provide a scaffold for determining how and why children act in a certain way [1,2]
The system of ideas tends towards continuity it can adapt to new circumstances [9,10], which may be triggered by elements outside the family system such as economic recessions or social crises like the current COVID-19 pandemic; these circumstances may be triggered by the evolution of the family system itself and changes linked to the developmental stages of its members, children
In accordance with their ideas about childhood, parents can be divided into three main classes: modern ideas about childhood (Modern), Traditional–Moderate and Traditional

Summary

Introduction

Of the many factors that influence family dynamics, parental ideas or beliefs about children’s development and upbringing constitute the basis of parenting and provide a scaffold for determining how and why children act in a certain way [1,2]. Influence children’s development and adjustment [3]. Just like any other cognitive conception or construct, parental beliefs are influenced by the social and cultural environment in which they are generated. The influence of parenting on children’s development and adjustment is mediated by values and ideas inherent to a specific context at a specific moment [7,8]. The present study focuses on this second type of change in parental ideas by analyzing whether the beliefs of a group of parents from the same social and

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