Role of parent-child relationships in mediating the effects of marital disruption.
OBJECTIVE
This study sought to explore the long-term effects of and relationships between parental divorce, interparental conflict, and parent-child relationships on interpersonal and generalized trust, empathy, dependency, and depressive affect among late adolescents.


METHODS
Self-administered questionnaire data were collected from a sample of 288 college students (including 60 children of divorce). Participants were asked to rate current and past levels of interparental conflict, the current affective quality of their parent-child relationships, and present adjustment.


RESULTS
Path analyses revealed that the effects of interparental conflict on psychological well-being were mediated by parent-child relationships. For women, however, parental divorce also was found to affect adjustment indirectly (via disrupted father-daughter relationships), although no such path emerged for men.


CONCLUSIONS
The findings are part of a growing literature documenting the role of parent-child relationships in mediating the effects of marital disruption. In addition to efforts to resolve marital conflict, clinicians may want to focus on enhancing mother-child, father-child relationships as a way to modify the damaging effects of conflictual marital relations on children and adolescents.
Black
A E
AE
Department of Psychology, University of Rochester, NY 14627.
Pedro-Carroll
J
J
D000293:Adolescent; D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D003863:Depression / Q000523:psychology; D004243:Divorce / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010553:Personality Development