Parental monitoring and adolescent information management: What do we know and what are the gaps?

Session Type: Conversation Roundtable

Abstract

Moderator: Judith Smetana
Participants: Skyler Hawk, Loes Keijsers, Sheila Marshall

The decades-old assumption that parental monitoring is critical for keeping adolescents out of trouble was upended by Kerr and Stattin’s (2000; Stattin & Kerr, 2000) now-classic studies demonstrating that parental monitoring and control typically had been (mis)measured by assessing what parents know, not what they actually do, and that adolescents’ voluntary disclosure, rather than parenting, predicts parental knowledge and in turn, reductions in problem behavior. These findings have led to a sustained and robust body of research that shifted the emphasis from parents’ monitoring of adolescents’ activities to adolescents’ agency in revealing or concealing information about their routine activities. Research has investigated the correlates and consequences of disclosure and secrecy for adolescent adjustment and parent-adolescent relationships in varying contexts, the strategies that teens use to manage information with parents, and the conditions in which parenting matters. This roundtable brings together scholars who have been major contributors to this research to discuss key findings and advances in conceptualization of research on parental monitoring and adolescent information management and to identify the unanswered questions, contradictory findings, and methodological challenges that remain to be addressed. The contributors include international researchers and scholars who study diverse samples and employ different methods. Panelists will discuss, among themselves and with the audience, questions pertaining to progress and prospects for research in this area. The aim of this roundtable discussion is to stimulate new research and identify critical directions that will help move the field forward.

Sub Unit

• Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Moderator

• Judi Smetana, University of Rochester

Panelists

• Skyler T. Hawk, Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK)

• Loes Keijsers, Erasmus University Rotterdam

• Sheila Kathleen Marshall, University of British Columbia (UBC)