Research has consistently shown that parenting and parent-adolescent relationships are important means of socialization and have an impact on adolescent development in various domains (Baumrind, 1991; Laursen & Collins, 2009). From the various socialization practices that parents use during their children’s adolescence, it is parental control which has gained particular attention in recent years. Parental control has been described as the set of parenting practices that aim to shape adolescent behavior in order to get the desired outcome (from everyday behavior such as tidying up their bedroom and doing homework to avoiding risk or problem behavior and the development of self-regulation) (Keijsers & Laird, 2014; Kiesner et al., 2010). Parental control has many forms from those which tend to be maladaptive, such as harsh control or psychological control, to more adaptive forms such as behavioral control or monitoring (Grolnick & Pomerantz, 2009). Previous studies have shown that the adequate use of parental control as perceived by adolescents has many positive behavioral outcomes such as lower rates of substance use, lower levels of delinquency and better engagement at school (Gentile et al., 2014; Lipperman-Kreda et al., 2017). However, there has been far less research done on the psychological outcomes of perceived parental control and this is therefore the aim of the present study.

There are several variables which may account for the associations between perceived parental control and adolescent outcomes. One of the most significant is the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship (Laursen & Collins, 2009). The way in which parents try to structure their adolescents’ lives through parental control contributes to the overall emotional climate in the family and the quality of parent-adolescent relationship. This in turn affects adolescents’ development (Laursen & Collins, 2009; McKinney & Renk, 2011a). The aim of this study is to explore the associations between perceived parental control, the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship and the psychological adjustment of early adolescents.

Parental Control and Adolescent Adjustment

The use of parental control is seen as the central dimension of parenting (Baumrind, 1991; Steinberg, 2001). The character of certain practices of control and the way in which parents assert control is an important factor in adolescent development (Bacikova-Sleskova et al., 2021; Grolnick & Pomerantz, 2009). Previous research has made an important distinction between two types of parental control; behavioral control and psychological control. These differ in both their manifestation and consequences.

Behavioral control (often referred to as monitoring) is characterized by parental supervision, providing rules about acceptable and unacceptable behavior and the monitoring of adolescent behavior (Barber et al., 1994; Grolnick & Pomerantz, 2009; Keijsers & Laird, 2014; Kiesner et al., 2010). Overall, both parent-reported and adolescent-reported behavioral control has been associated with many positive short-term and long-term outcomes including lower levels of problem behavior, substance use and risk sexual behavior as well as fewer problem friends, less problematic internet use and better achievement at school (Carroll et al., 2016; Gentile et al., 2014; Lipperman-Kreda et al., 2017).

Most previous studies have primarily focused on the effect of behavioral control on avoiding negative behavior. However, there has been a recent developmental trend among adolescents showing a decrease in externalizing behaviors and an increase in various forms of internalizing behaviors (Bor et al., 2014; De Looze et al., 2015). Therefore, there is a growing need to study parental control in the context of positive outcomes such as well-being, self-esteem and life satisfaction. From the few previously published studies, it can be assumed that perceived behavioral control is associated with worse psychological adjustment (Kakihara et al., 2010; van Lissa et al., 2019). On the other hand, one study among early adolescents has shown that when behavioral control is introduced with high levels of parental knowledge, it is associated with positive outcomes one year later (Bacikova-Sleskova et al., 2021). Similarly, Kakihara et al. (2010) have reported that the negative effects of parental control on psychological adjustment are primarily present in older adolescents. It can be assumed that the age of adolescents plays an important role when considering the effect of parental behavioral control on positive outcomes.

In contrast to behavioral control, psychological control is characterized by the parental manipulation of adolescents’ emotions, feelings and thoughts. This is done using various behaviors such as guilt induction, conditional love or love withdrawal, anxiety induction or showing disrespect (Barber, 1996; Janssens et al., 2017; Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2010). Parents who use psychological control are not responsive to the emotional and psychological needs of their children (Barber et al., 2005). Psychological control has been shown to be ineffective in reducing unwanted behavior in many different samples (Janssens et al., 2017; Kincaid et al., 2011). Moreover, it negatively affects adolescents’ psychological adjustment such as self-esteem, psychological well-being, depression symptoms and anxiety (Cui et al., 2014; Mabbe et al., 2016; Costa et al., 2015). The results are similar for both parent-reported as well as adolescent-reported psychological control.

Parent-Adolescent Relationship and Adolescent Adjustment

The quality of the parent-adolescent relationship plays a key role in optimal adolescent development (Laursen & Collins, 2009; Steinberg, 2001). The relationship between parents and adolescents includes both positive and negative aspects. The positive aspects included in previous studies have been mutual warmth, support, affection, intimate disclosure, closeness and quality time spent together, while the negative aspects include conflicts, alienation or antagonism (Branje et al., 2010; Furman & Buhrmester, 1992; Laursen & Collins, 2009). It has been shown that high levels of positive aspects such as support and low levels of negative aspects such as conflicts have been associated with better mental health and well-being, higher self-esteem, fewer depressive symptoms, better academic achievement and fewer risky behaviors (Bacikova-Sleskova et al., 2011; Branje et al., 2010; Brouillard et al., 2018). The importance of considering both the positive and negative aspects of the parent-adolescent relationship in one model has been stressed as they may uniquely contribute to adolescent adjustment (Branje et al., 2010; Brouillard et al., 2018; Furman & Buhrmester, 1992). The present study makes a distinction between the positive and negative aspects of the relationship as perceived by adolescents.

Parental Control, Parent-adolescent Relationship and Adolescent Adjustment

There are a number of variables which may be responsible for the associations between perceived parental control and adolescent outcomes. The quality of the parent-adolescent is among one of the most important (Laursen & Collins, 2009). The way in which parents try to structure their adolescents’ lives through parental control contributes to the overall emotional climate in the family and influences the levels of mutual warmth, perceived support and frequency of conflicts (Bosmans et al., 2006; Laursen & Collins, 2009; McKinney & Renk, 2011a). Indeed, psychologically controlling parents that use guilt induction, public shaming or conditional love may provoke more conflicts with their adolescents. Moreover, research has shown that psychological control is associated with lower levels of parental warmth (Güngör & Bornstein, 2010). On the other hand, behavioral control is often interpreted as a sign of parental interest in their adolescents (Pomerantz & Eaton, 2000). This can lead to a better parent-child relationship and may subsequently increase adolescents’ own psychological adjustment (Milevsky et al., 2007). In line with this, Bosmans et al. (2006) found that a high-quality parent-adolescent relationship (represented by secure attachment) mediates the link between harsh maternal control and adolescent externalizing behaviors.

Self-determination theory (SDT) (Deci & Ryan, 2000) also offers further support for the association between parental control and the parent-adolescent relationship. According to SDT, parental control brings the desired outcomes if it is provided in such a way that it helps to satisfy all three basic psychological needs – the need for autonomy, competence and relatedness (Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2010; Deci & Ryan, 2000). Controlling parenting (i.e. psychological control) leads to the frustration of these psychological needs (Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2010). It can be assumed that the threat to the need for autonomy, competence and relatedness elicits more conflicts and less perceived warmth in the mutual relationship. On the other hand, parental behavioral control and monitoring may contribute to satisfying the need for relatedness (Hamza & Willoughby, 2011; Rodríguez-Meirinhos et al., 2020) which may help adolescents perceive the relationship with their parents as better.

Gender Differences

The question as to whether the socialization process in a family differs by gender has not yet been sufficiently addressed in developmental psychology. There is a substantial amount of research which has shown that parenting differs regarding the gender of both the parent and the child and that boys and girls might be differently affected by parenting (Gryczkowski et al., 2010). In adolescence, mothers are more involved in their child’s everyday life than fathers (Bornstein, 2015). They spend more time with their children, are more responsible for the daily care and discipline (McKinney & Renk, 2011a) and are more engaged in their children’s emotional life than fathers (Klimes‐Dougan et al., 2007). As a result, mothers use both adaptive and maladaptive forms of control more than fathers do (Shek, 2008). This is also consistent regarding the reports of both parents and adolescents (Mastrotheodoros et al., 2019). Moreover, adolescents perceive their mothers as more supportive than their fathers and tend to perceive the relationship with their mother as closer (van Lissa et al., 2019). While there seem to be differences in the intensity of parenting between mother and father, it is important that mothers and fathers use generally similar parenting strategies for optimal adolescent development (Simons & Conger, 2007; Tavassolie et al., 2016).

There have been several gender differences in parenting found regarding the gender of the child. However, this pattern is not as clear regarding parental gender. In particular, adolescent girls generally perceive greater parental behavioral control than boys (i.e. girls report more parental monitoring and more rules than boys) (Smetana & Daddis, 2002; van Lissa et al., 2019). However, the gender differences are not as clear regarding parental psychological control. In some studies, boys reported higher perceived psychological control than girls (Luebbe et al., 2014; Shek, 2008) while other studies did not find any gender differences (Cui et al., 2014; Mabbe et al., 2016).

With regard to the effect of maternal or paternal control on adolescents’ outcomes, the results have suggested that an adequate level of behavioral control used by the mother has a stronger effect on the desired outcome than the control used by the father. On the other hand, maladaptive forms of paternal control (e.g. psychological control, harsh control, behavioral overcontrol) have a stronger negative effect on adolescents than maladaptive maternal control (Keijsers et al., 2010; Soenens et al., 2006). However, there has been relatively little work done on the effects of parental control in specific parent-adolescent gender dyads.

The associations between perceived parental control, parent-adolescent relationships and adolescent psychological adjustment may vary according to both the adolescent and parental gender. Several studies have shown stronger effects of parenting in same sex parent-adolescent dyads (Crouter et al., 1995; Murray et al., 2014; van Lissa et al., 2019). This may be partially explained by the social cognitive theory perspective (Bussey & Bandura, 1999) where there is a stronger tendency to imitate the behavior of the same-sex parent. Moreover, adolescents spend more time with parents of the same sex (Crouter et al., 1995) and have closer relationships with them (Laursen & Collins, 2009). It has also been found that parents of the same sex are more responsive to their child (Furman & Buhrmester, 1992). Therefore, in the present study it was expected that the links between parenting, the parent-adolescent relationship and adolescent outcomes would be stronger for the dyads of the same sex.

The Present Study

The current study aimed to explore the gender-specific links between parental behavioral and psychological control as perceived by adolescents and adolescents’ psychological adjustment. Further, it aimed to study whether these associations were also indirect through the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship. It was expected that in a sample of early adolescents, perceived behavioral control would be positively and perceived psychological control would be negatively associated with adolescents’ psychological adjustment. Moreover, it was expected that this relationship would be both direct and indirect through the parent-adolescent relationship. It was further expected that the relationships would be gender specific with the strongest associations for dyads of the same sex.

This study aimed to add to the existing knowledge of this topic on several points. Firstly, previous research has shown the importance of considering the gender of both the adolescents and parents when studying the effects of parenting (Branje et al., 2010; Van Lissa et al., 2019). However, this has not always been done in parenting studies. Thus, the present study has taken the gender of both the parents and adolescents into account in order to get a more nuanced insight into parenting. Secondly, the level of parental control as well some aspects of the parent-adolescent relationship change during the course of adolescence with the largest change occurring in the first years (De Goede et al., 2009). Therefore, studying parenting in mixed aged samples may provide inaccurate results. In order to overcome this, the present study focuses on an age homogenous group of seventh grade early adolescents. Thirdly, the use of parental control, the way in which adolescents interpret parental control and the effects of control seem to be culturally specific (Chen et al., 2016; Güngör & Bornstein, 2010; Marbell & Grolnick, 2013). In countries where collectivistic values are dominant, parents use more controlling behavior towards their children than parents in individualistic countries (Dwairy & Achoui, 2010). Moreover, adolescents in collectivistic countries tend to interpret their parents control more positively, i.e. as more legitimate and less intrusive (Chao & Aque, 2009; Chen et al., 2016) and thus may benefit from parental control not only in reducing unwanted behavior but also in promoting psychological adjustment and positive development (Cao et al., 2016; Marbell & Grolnick, 2013). One study found that parental psychological control characterized by guilt induction was perceived more negatively by Belgian than Chinese adolescents (Chen et al., 2016). Another example can be found in research by Chao and Aque (2009) who found that Afro-American adolescents perceive highly controlling behavior as showing parental love and interest. Similarly in Ghana, less controlling parental behavior was perceived as neglectful with a lack of parental interest (Marbell & Grolnick, 2013). Although Slovakia is a European country that does not differ considerably from other European countries regarding its culture and primary values, it still scores quite low on the individualism scale in comparison to western countries (Bašnáková et al., 2016). Moreover, there is a strong Catholic background which endorses the importance of family and obedience. A further specific of Slovak parenting is the time spent with children as a result of the social system and lower financial resources in Slovak families. Mothers usually take maternity leave for up to 3 years and also later parents rarely use nannies or babysitters. This may lead to closer bonding with parents, the mother in particular, as well as greater acceptance of parents as authority figures. Therefore, it might be supposed that adolescents in Slovakia tend to perceive parental authority as legitimate and not intrusive to their needs. It is believed that these cultural aspects together with the age of early adolescents account for the differences in the present results from those which have previously been published. However, it should be noted, that there is large within-country variance in the level of individualism/collectivism (Lansford et al., 2021) and the level of individualism for each particular parent might be an interesting factor to take into account in future research.

Gender Specifics

One of the aims of the present study was to identify the gender-specific links between parental control, the parent-adolescent relationship and psychological adjustment.

For the boys, the direct and indirect associations seemed to function similarly for both maternal and paternal processes (with the exception of the negative association of paternal psychological control with the positive PAR that was not confirmed in the maternal model). For both mothers and fathers, perceived control was only indirectly associated with boys’ psychological adjustment through the perceived quality of the parent-adolescent relationship. This finding suggests that parental control may be linked to boys’ adjustment only because it improves (behavioral control) or worsens (psychological control) the quality of the parent-boy relationship which in turn increases or decreases boys’ self-esteem and life satisfaction. Although boys generally report a lower quality of the parent-adolescent relationship than girls both in the current as well as previous studies (Branje et al., 2012; van Lissa et al., 2019), it seems to play a particularly important role in their psychological adjustment.

For the girls, the associations differed for the maternal and paternal processes. The link between parental control and psychological adjustment was direct for paternal control and both direct and indirect for maternal control. The most visible indication of this was the direct association in the father-girl dyad. In previous research, a similar result was found among emerging adults when both paternal and maternal parenting styles were directly linked to emotional adjustment only among the girls (McKinney et al., 2011b). While the PAR was associated with both psychological and behavioral control in the father-daughter dyad in the current study, this did not lead to further psychological adjustment. Therefore, the opposite association might occur in this dyad. It can be assumed that in a good father-daughter relationship, fathers control their daughters more as well as their control being better interpreted and thus leading to better psychological adjustment. Adversely, the use of psychological control in poorer relationships may be stronger which is directly associated with worse psychological adjustment. Research has shown that fathers spend more time with their sons than with their daughters (Raley & Bianchi, 2006). Moreover, boys report more easy-going communication with their fathers than girls (Levin & Currie, 2010). This may help to build the positive relationship between father and son through which the effects of paternal control are manifested. On the other hand, girls might need more direct signs of their fathers’ care and interest (i.e. behavioral control) to increase their psychological adjustment.

Branje et al. (2010) found that the quality of the mother-adolescent relationship is associated with depressive symptoms for both boys and girls. Yet, it was only important for boys in the father-adolescent dyad. Similarly, Gryczkowski et al. (2010) reported fathers’ involvement to be related to the externalizing problems of boys but not girls. This supports the idea that fathers are particularly important in boy’s adjustment.

With regards to the maternal model, maternal control was associated with adjustment only indirectly through the quality of the mother-adolescent relationship (with one exception being the link between psychological control and adjustment for girls) while more direct associations were found among fathers. However, another study found the opposite to be the case (McKinney & Renk, 2011a). Their study found that fathers’ parenting was linked to outcomes more indirectly through conflict while mothers parenting was more direct. In a recent study, Van Lissa et al. (2019) looked at the role of parental support, behavioral control and psychological control in emotion regulation among adolescents and found several gender-specific associations. They found that support played a role in emotion regulation in the mother-daughter dyad but not in the mother-son dyad while perceived behavioral control was important in the father-son dyad. However, unlike the current study, it was associated negatively which also shows the possibility of age and culturally specific results.

Limitations

There are several limitations in the present study which have to be acknowledged. Firstly, because the study is not longitudinal, it does not allow us to make causal conclusions. Secondly, this study focused on parental control and parent-adolescent relationships as perceived by adolescents therefore only data from adolescents have collected. This may have introduced single informant bias which can produce artifactual covariance between the predictor and criterion variable (Podsakoff et al., 2003). This has to be taken into account when interpreting the results. On the other hand, parents tend to provide more socially desirable answers on their parenting in order to meet social and their own expectations about being a good parent, mainly in terms of underreporting negative parenting (Bornstein et al., 2015; Korelitz & Garber, 2016). Thus, parental reports on their parenting might also be biased. Indeed, research has shown that adolescents reports on parenting are stronger predictors of adolescent outcomes than parental reports (Abar et al., 2015; Maurizi et al., 2012). Therefore, adolescents reports on their parents’ parenting quality must be considered a valid and important source of information.

Secondly, the respondents in this study are early adolescents. Previous research has shown that the pubertal changes that are associated with early adolescence may directly destabilize the parent-adolescent relationship and may be the cause for temporal worsening of the relationship (Laursen & Collins, 2009). As there is a high probability that some of the respondents have already undergone pubertal changes while others have not, this information would be of interest in interpreting the results.

The present study adds to the knowledge on the gender-specific links between parental control, the parent-adolescent relationship and psychological adjustment. It was found that perceived behavioral control was positively and psychological control negatively associated with psychological adjustment for both maternal and paternal control for the boys and girls. Maternal control was associated with adolescents’ adjustment only indirectly through the quality of the mother-adolescent relationship while more direct associations were found among fathers. This was particularly the case for the father-girl dyad. The current results contradict previous findings on several points although this could be attributed to the age of the early adolescents as well as to cultural specifics of the sample.