title: Family Financial Stress and Adolescent Sexual Risk-Taking: The Role of Self-Regulation.
abstract: The ability to control one's emotions, thoughts, and behaviors is known as self-regulation. Family stress and low adolescent self-regulation have been linked with increased engagement in risky sexual behaviors, which peak in late adolescence and early adulthood. The purpose of this study was to assess whether adolescent self-regulation, measured by parent and adolescent self-report and respiratory sinus arrhythmia, mediates or moderates the relationship between family financial stress and risky sexual behaviors. We assessed these relationships in a 4-year longitudinal sample of 450 adolescents (52 % female; 70 % white) and their parents using structural equation modeling. Results indicated that high family financial stress predicts engagement in risky sexual behaviors as mediated, but not moderated, by adolescent self-regulation. The results suggest that adolescent self-regulatory capacities are a mechanism through which proximal external forces influence adolescent risk-taking. Promoting adolescent self-regulation, especially in the face of external stressors, may be an important method to reduce risk-taking behaviors as adolescents transition to adulthood.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Science, Brigham Young University, 4103 LSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA. ali_crandall@byu.edu.
authors.forename: AliceAnn
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Crandall
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Science, Brigham Young University, 4103 LSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA.
authors.forename: Brianna M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Magnusson
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Science, Brigham Young University, 4103 LSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA.
authors.forename: M Lelinneth B
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Novilla
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Science, Brigham Young University, 4103 LSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA.
authors.forename: Lynneth Kirsten B
authors.initials: LK
authors.lastname: Novilla
authors.affiliation: Department of Religious Education, Brigham Young University, 270 N JSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA.
authors.forename: W Justin
authors.initials: WJ
authors.lastname: Dyer
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D005190:Family / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007182:Income; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D012309:Risk-Taking; D000068356:Self-Control; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D013315:Stress, Psychological
keywords: Adolescence; Family stress; Respiratory sinus arrhythmia; Self-regulation; Sexual risk-taking; Structural equation modeling