Do You Want Advice or Comfort?: Detecting and Predicting Adolescent Reception of Parental Support

Abstract

Adolescent reception refers to adolescents’ attention to and evaluation of parental support. Although reception is a key component of support effectiveness, it is largely overlooked in past literature on parental support in the context of peer stressors. The present study utilizes a novel multi-method, multi-informant design to (a) detect, describe, and evaluate associations between different indicators of adolescent reception, and (b) test matches and mismatches between the types and levels of support (i.e., guidance and protection) parents provide and the types and levels of support adolescents desire as predictors of adolescent reception. Participants were 85 adolescents (Mage = 13.80 years, 52% females, 76% European American/White, 18% African American/Black, 3% multiracial, 2% Asian, 1% other) and one parent per adolescent. Parents’ provision of and adolescents’ desire for guidance and protection during two parent-adolescent discussions about a social evaluation challenge and an ongoing peer problem were assessed using observer ratings. Adolescent reception of support was assessed using observer ratings, adolescents’ self-reports, and parents’ reports. Results showed expected associations between indicators of adolescent reception, providing some support for validity of the measures and construct, as well as task-based differences. Higher-quality parental guidance was associated with higher observed reception in both parent-adolescent discussion tasks as well as higher self-reported reception in the ongoing peer problem discussion. Higher-quality parental protection was associated with higher observed reception in the ongoing peer problem discussion. Consistent with the matching hypothesis, positive associations between parental guidance and reception were more commonly detected at higher levels of desired guidance. This study demonstrates the value of different measures and perspectives of adolescents’ reception and provides preliminary evidence that adolescents’ desire for guidance enhances their reception of parental guidance.