Citation

Markey CN, Ericksen AJ, Markey PM, Tinsley BJ. Adolesc. Fam. Health 2001; 2(2): ePub.

Affiliation

Healthy Families Project, University of California, Riverside (ccastro@citrus.ucr.edu)

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, Instutute for Youth Development)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This study examined the predictive value of parental monitoring and preadolescents’ personality traits in determining preadolescents’ participation in health-promoting and health-compromising behaviors. Onehundred and thirty (130) preadolescents and their mothers completed measures assessing preadolescents’ personality traits, perceptions of parental monitoring, and preadolescents’ participation in healthy and risky behaviors. Findings from this study suggest that preadolescents’reports of parental monitoring predict their tendency to engage in healthy and risky behaviors. Mothers’ and preadolescents’ reports of youths’ personality traits explain unique variance in preadolescents’ participation in risky behaviors, but not in their health-promoting behaviors. An association between preadolescents’ self-reports of personality and their experience of parental monitoring was found. Familial influences may best explain preadolescents’ adoption of healthy behaviors. However, as children reach adolescence, individual differences appear to be important predictors of risky behaviors. Additional research is needed to better understand the interaction between these two predictors, and their differential and combined ability to predict youths’ health-related behaviors over time.