3-055 - Does the Adolescence of Today Require An Updating of Traditional Parenting Theories?

Session Type: Roundtable

Integrative Statement

In 2016, the Society for Research on Adolescence funded a faculty working group to re-evaluate traditional theories of parenting in light of modern conceptualizations of adolescence. In the proposed roundtable, members of the SRA working group will facilitate a discussion that addresses the questions we first asked ourselves when we began this work (led by panelist Melissa Lippold). These include (a) what are the novel challenges or contexts of adolescence today, (b) how are these novel challenges and contexts likely to impact adolescent adjustment, and (c) what implications for effective parenting in turn come from these novel challenges and contexts. After a general discussion of these issues, we will narrow our roundtable discussion to a single novel challenge and context; namely, the necessity for American youth in particular to navigate an increasingly diverse world. Roundtable presenters will discuss how parenting dimensions relate to adolescent adjustment across a set of diverse countries (Jennifer Lansford) and how American parents socialize their children around issues of class (Deborah Jones) and race/ethnicity (Gabriela Livas Stein). Our goal in this roundtable is to expand the discussions held by the working group thus far to SRA at large, to share ideas and conclusions (when available) from the working group with attendees, and to consider a broader future research agenda for our science.

Sub Unit

• Family Processes

Moderator

• Andrea Hussong, University of North Carolina

Panelists

• Deborah J Jones, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• Jennifer E. Lansford, Duke University

• Velma McBride Murry, Vanderbilt University

• Gabriela Stein, University of North Carolina at Greensboro