Problem-solving rigidity of children on perceptual tasks as a function of parental authoritarianism.
The effect of parental authoritarianism on the rigid problem-solving behavior of 25 10- to 12-year-old children was examined. Children were tested on three perceptually ambiguous tasks in an experimentally induced ego-involving situation. Authoritarianism in one parent was associated with authoritarianism in the other. Children's greater difficulty on all three tasks was associated with higher parental authoritarianism; opposite sex correlations betweens sons' and mothers' and between daughters' and fathers' scores are stronger than same sex correlations. Children were consistent across all three tasks on rigid problem-solving behavior. It is suggested that rigid problem-solving behavior may mediate the transmission of authoritarianism from parent to child.
D001007:Anxiety / Q000209:etiology; D001318:Authoritarianism; D002648:Child; D003858:Dependency, Psychological; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009903:Optical Illusions; D010290:Parents; D011340:Problem Solving; D012737:Sex Factors; D014796:Visual Perception; D014888:Wechsler Scales