Poster #53 - Relationship Between Consulting and Adolescents' Prosocial Behavior: Are Empathic Concern and Friend Help-Giving Goals Mediators?

• In Event: Poster Session 02

Abstract

There is growing evidence that parental consulting, or advice-giving, with regard to peer relationships is related to adolescents’ social behavior (Gerardy, et al. 2015; Gregson et al. 2017; Low & Mounts, 2022; Poulin et al. 2012;Valentiner & Mounts, 2017). Missing from the literature is a consideration of mechanisms that account for these relationships (Ladd & Kochenderfer-Ladd, 2019). The current investigation uses a serial mediation model to examine whether empathic concern and help-giving goals toward friends function as mechanisms in the association between parental consulting and adolescents’ prosocial behavior with friends and with strangers. The serial mediation model presented in Figure 1 was the focus of this investigation.

Sixty-four diverse adolescent-mother dyads (adolescent Mage = 12.38; 35.9% boys) completed questionnaires and participated in video-recorded conversations about hypothetical friend relationships. Current analyses include only adolescent reports. Approximately 31.3% were African-American, 3.1% were Asian American, 12.5% were Latino, and 53.1% were White. The majority of the adolescents lived with both parents (59.4%), 25.0% lived with a single parent, 14.1% lived in stepfamilies, and the remaining lived in other arrangements. Educational levels of mothers ranged from some grade school to professional or graduate degree with income ranging from less than $20,000 per year to greater than $100,000 per year.

Consulting was assessed using a 10-item scale (alpha = .87; Mounts, 2004). Empathic concern was assessed using a 9-item scale (alpha = .86; Davis, 1983). Help-giving goals towards friends were assessed using a series of six hypothetical situations in which a friend was in a difficult situation. Adolescents were asked to report the likelihood that they would have six different goals related to their friend (i.e. help feel better (alpha = .92), express caring (alpha = .93), problem-solving (alpha = .79), respect privacy (alpha = .91), avoid the problem (alpha = .85), or blame friend (alpha = .91); Rose & Asher, 2004). Nine items were used to assess prosocial behavior toward strangers (alpha = .82) and 9 items were used to assess prosocial behavior toward friends (alpha = .89; Padilla-Walker et al., 2013).

Hayes’ (2018) PROCESS Model 6 was used to examine the serial mediation model. All models included consulting as the independent variable, empathic concern as the first mediator, one of the six help-giving goals as the second mediator, and one of two outcome variables (prosocial behavior with friends, prosocial behavior with strangers). All analyses included sex and age of adolescent as covariates.

Results (see Table and Figure) suggested that the relationship between consulting and prosocial behavior was mediated by empathic concern and two of the friend help-giving goals (help feel better and express caring). There was evidence that the relationship between consulting and prosocial behavior towards friends was mediated by empathic concern and the help feel better goal. The relationships between consulting and prosocial behavior with friends and prosocial behavior with strangers were mediated serially by empathic concern and the express caring goal. The relationship between consulting and prosocial behavior toward friends and strangers was also mediated by empathic concern. Results are suggestive of a need for longitudinal investigations of the mediated model.

Authors

• Cassidy Knoerzer, Northern Illinois University
  Presenting Author

• Nina S. Mounts, Northern Illinois University