Poster #158 - What Comes First? Testing Bidirectional Associations of Warmth, Solicitation, and Disclosure Among Mexican-origin Females

• In Event: 3-053 - Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Section - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Integrative Statement

Influential work on parental monitoring points to the salience of parental solicitation and adolescent disclosure for parental knowledge of youth’s whereabouts (Statin & Kerr, 2000). This work highlights the importance of uncovering factors that promote self-disclosure from youth and solicitation of information from parents. Parent-child relationship quality fosters youth disclosure and parental solicitation of youth’s whereabouts (Stattin & Kerr, 2000; Tilton-Weaver, 2014) and monitoring can promote a positive parent-child relationship (Dishion & McMahon, 1998). Cross-sectional work with Latino samples has investigated parent-adolescent relationship quality and cultural-related variables in association with youth disclosure and/or parental solicitation (Blockin, Crouter, Updegraff, & McHale, 2011; Villalobos & Smetana, 2012). This research shows that more parental acceptance and higher parental acculturation is associated with more youth disclosure and parental solicitation (Blockin et al., 2011). Further, adolescents with stronger Latino values disclosed and trusted more in their mothers (Villalobos & Smetana, 2012). The current study extends past work by examining bidirectional associations between females’ reports of parental warmth, parental solicitation, and youth disclosure across two waves. Baseline levels of adolescent familism and Spanish language orientation were included.

Data were drawn from a subsample of 175 Mexican-origin female adolescents who participated in a 3-wave longitudinal study and responded to questions related to their mother and father figures separately (97% of birth mothers and 80% of birth fathers were considered parental figures at Wave 2). Wave 3 occurred either 6 months or 1 year after wave 2. Solicitation and disclosure were assessed at waves 2 and 3. At wave 2, adolescents were ages 14-19 (M= 16.25, SD=1.58). Overall, adolescents reported higher levels of warmth and solicitation from, and disclosure to, mothers compared to fathers (see Table 1 for correlations and means). Structural equation modeling, which controlled for adolescent age, revealed that both mother- (CFI=1.00, TLI= .99; RMSEA=.03; chi square (13) = 15.4, p=.29) and father- (CFI=.99, TLI= .97; RMSEA= .05; chi square (13) = 17.8, p=.17) models had a good fit to the data. The mother-model revealed that familism at wave 1 predicted maternal warmth (ß= .40; S.E. =.08; p=.01) and adolescent disclosure (ß= .31; S.E. =.14; p=.03) at wave 2. Warmth at wave 2 predicted solicitation (ß= .38; S.E. =.10; p=.001) and adolescent disclosure (ß= .32; S.E. =.10; p=.001) at wave 3. The father-model revealed that familism at wave 1 predicted paternal warmth (ß= .48; S.E. =.17; p=.01) at wave 3. Warmth at wave 2 predicted solicitation (ß= .41; S.E. =.13; p=.01) and adolescent disclosure (ß= .29; S.E. =.11; p=.01) at wave 3.

Overall, females with stronger familism values at baseline reported higher levels of maternal and paternal warmth at subsequent waves, supporting earlier work (Taylor, Larsen-Rife, Conger, & Widaman, 2012). Further, supporting past work (Tilton-Weaver, 2014), results revealed that past perceptions of warmth from mothers and fathers predicted more solicitation from parents and adolescent disclosure at a later wave. Altogether, this study did not reveal bidirectional associations; but it does highlight the importance of parental warmth in fostering adolescent disclosure and parental solicitation.

Authors

• Mayra Y Bamaca-Colbert, The Pennsylvania State University
  Presenting Author

• Griselda Martinez, Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Lorena Aceves, Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jasmin E Castillo, Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Dawn Paula Witherspoon, The Pennsylvania State University
  Non-Presenting Author