title: Parent-child discrepancies in the assessment of children's and adolescents' happiness.
abstract: In this study, we assessed parent-child agreement in the perception of children's general happiness or well-being in typically developing children (10- and 11-year-olds, n = 172) and adolescents (15- and 16-year-olds, n = 185). Despite parent and child reporters providing internally consistent responses in the General Happiness single-item scale and the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire-Short Form, their perceptions about children's and adolescents' general happiness did not correlate. Parents of 10- and 11-year-olds significantly overestimated children's happiness, supporting previous literature on the parents' positivity bias effect. However, parents of 15- and 16-year-olds showed the reverse pattern by underestimating adolescents' happiness. Furthermore, parents' self-reported happiness or well-being (reported 6 months later) significantly correlated with their estimations of children's and adolescents' happiness. Therefore, these results suggest a potential parents' "egocentric bias" when estimating their children's happiness. These findings are discussed in terms of their theoretical and applied implications for research into child-parent relationships.
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, Plymouth University, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK. Electronic address: belen.lopez-perez@plymouth.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Belén
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: López-Pérez
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, Plymouth University, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK.
authors.forename: Ellie L
authors.initials: EL
authors.lastname: Wilson
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006240:Happiness; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010290:Parents; D010465:Perception; D057566:Self Report; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
keywords: Child-report; Egocentric bias; Emotions assessment; Happiness; Parent-report; Positivity bias