The Effect of Marital Discord and Interparent Inconsistency in Parenting Practices on Juvenile Delinquency: An Empirical Study of China

• In Event: Urban - Rural Migration, Parenting, and Predictors of Delinquency among Chinese Youth

Abstract

In the days ahead, phycologists and sociologists emphasize the importance of parental consistency in children’s growth and development. According to family system theory, the family is an organized system, which is made up of interdependent subsystems, e.g. marital subsystem and parent–child subsystem. Given the fact that the subsystems are reciprocal and interdependent, behavior and emotions transfer directly from one subsystem (e.g. marital subsystem) to another subsystem (e.g. parent–child subsystem), and vice versa (Davies, Sturge-Apple,& Cummings, 2004). To date, researchers have increasingly suggested that marital discord has negative impacts on parenting, such as interparent inconsistency in parenting practices, which could result in poor parent-child relationship and child behavior problems. The phenomenon is so-called Spillover effect. The objective of the present study is to explore how marital discord interacts with interparent inconsistency, and how such interaction interplays with other common predictors of juvenile delinquency such as social bond and mental health through spillover mechanism among Chinese youths.

Authors

• Tzu-Hsuan Liu, University of Macau

• Spencer De Li, University of Macau