Parents' data were evaluated in three studies of families with a delinquent adolescent. Families were provided with different forms of a positive versus negative interactional (attributional) context. Study 1 demonstrated that the negative context elicited significantly more negative behaviors than did the positive context when parents interacted with each other and with their delinquent adolescent. Study 2 demonstrated that the dispositional attributions of parents were influenced by the manipulation of set, with a dissatisfied set producing negative blaming attributions and a satisfied set producing nonblaming, positive attributions. Study 3 demonstrated that parents' negative sets regarding their adolescent's negative behaviors, once established and discussed by the family for 5 min, were unresponsive to a subsequent positive reattribution regarding those behaviors. Taken together, the data provide some support for reattribution techniques such as relabeling. Yet, the data question the ease with which such techniques can be successful and challenge proponents of such techniques to develop methodologically sound empirical demonstrations of their effectiveness.

The study examined attributions and defensive communication behaviors in high-or low-level conflict families of a delinquent adolescent. Family members'attributions and communication behaviors were examined in two contrasting priming conditions in which families focused on either dissatisfying or satisfying family events. The results replicated past parent-child attribution studies in that family members from low-conflict families made fewer dispositional (blaming) attributions about other family members' dissatisfying versus satisfying behaviors, whereas family members from high-conflict families made equivalent amounts of dispositional attributions about others' dissatisfying versus satisfying behaviors. As expected, family members from high-conflict families behaved significantly more defensively than did those from low-conflict families. Attributions and subsequent defensive behaviors did not covary.

Twenty‐two two‐parent families with a referred adolescent were seen by 11 male and 11 female trainees in family therapy. Mothers, fathers, adolescents, and therapists were rated for verbal expression in affective, behavioral, and cognitive! attributional modes during the first session. Results clearly point to role and content difference in modes of expression. Of particular importance are differences by role which occured as a function of therapist gender. These differences suggest that therapist gender has an impact on family therapists' and family members' verbalizations in first sessions of family therapy.

This investigation studied the relationship between mothers (S = 32) who perceive their child as exhibiting behavior problems, their reported daily experience of social support contacts, and the observed rate of prosocial mother-child interactions. Notable, and of clinical relevance, was the finding that mothers who perceived their children as acting out were observed to experience significantly fewer prosocial mother-child interactions on days that these mothers reported low levels of social support contact. Implications toward primary prevention and treatment are discussed.

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