Introduction: Satisfaction of adolescents' basic psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness contributes to their well-being. Socialization igures (e.g., parents) can assist adolescents in getting these needs met. In addition, adolescents can engage in need crafting, thereby proactively managing their behavior towards improved need satisfaction. This research aimed to develop a need crafting measure and to examine the role of need crafting in adolescents' need-based experiences and mental health. Method: A cross-sectional study in 233 Flemish students (Study 1; M age = 16.6, 58.4% female) addressed the psychometric properties of a need crafting measure and its associations with relevant constructs. Using a three-wave longitudinal study in 436 Flemish students (Study 2; M age = 16.33, 66,0% female), we investigated the role of need crafting in adolescents' mental health and the intervening role of need-based experiences. Results:In Study 1, a CFA yielded evidence for the psychometric quality of the need crafting measure. Need crafting was related in meaningful ways with different validation constructs and with adolescents' need-based experiences. Study 2 showed that need crafting was related to adolescents' mental health, both at the level of inter-individual differences and at the level of intra-individual change. Need-based experiences accounted partly for the mental health beneits associated with need crafting, with the effects remaining signiicant after controlling for perceived maternal need-support. Conclusion:The indings provide initial evidence for the importance of adolescents' need crafting in mental health. Future research needs to further examine factors that determine adolescents' ability to manage their own psychological needs.

This study aimed to gain more insight in the sources of daily parenting among mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Specifically, we examined associations between daily variations in child behavior, mothers' psychological needs, and mothers' controlling and autonomy-supportive parenting. Moreover, the study examined the potential mediating role of daily vitality and stress within these associations. In total 41 mothers (M = 41.84 years) of children with ASD (M = 10.92 years, range 7-15) participated in a 7-day diary study. Multilevel structural equation modeling revealed that both daily child behavior (i.e., externalizing problems and prosocial behavior) and mothers' psychological needs relate to day-to-day variation in parenting behavior. Daily stress and vitality played an intervening role in most of these associations.

Based on self-determination theory, this diary study examined associations between adolescents' daily need crafting and daily fluctuations in their need-based and affective experiences. We also examined the role of daily perceived autonomysupportive parenting in adolescents' daily need-crafting. Adolescents (N = 159; M age = 15.56; 62% female) filled out a diary for seven consecutive days. Multilevel path analyses indicated that need crafting varied on a day-to-day basis, with daily need crafting relating positively to daily positive affect and negatively to negative affect. The benefits of daily need crafting were accounted for by higher daily need satisfaction and lower need frustration. Further, on days adolescents perceived more parental autonomy support, they reported more need satisfaction and less need frustration, an effect that was partially due to higher need crafting that day. Overall, the results suggest that need crafting represents a critical pro-active skill, with resulting benefits for adolescents' daily need-based experiences and well-being.

The COVID-19 pandemic represents a threat not only to individuals’ physical health but also to their mental health. Self-Determination Theory assumes that the satisfaction of basic psychological needs for autonomy, relatedness and competence promotes psychological well-being during destabilizing times. Yet, the pandemic seriously hampered individuals’ opportunities to satisfy their needs. The current study provides a preliminary test of the effectiveness of a 7-session online program, LifeCraft, that promotes individuals’ proactive attempts to uplift their need-based experiences (i.e., need crafting). Next to the effects on individuals’ need crafting skills, we examined program-effects on adults’ need-based experiences and mental health and we explored the role of participants’ program engagement. An experimental study among 725 Belgian adults [ M age = 51.67 ( range = 26 – 85); 68.55% female] was conducted, with an experimental condition of 252 and a control condition of 473 participants. At the level of the entire sample, there was limited evidence for the effectiveness of the program. There were only small immediate program-effects on need crafting and well-being. After taking into account the role of program engagement, findings showed that the program was more beneficial for participants who actively participated, with these participants reporting immediate and stable increases in need crafting, need satisfaction and well-being and decreases in need frustration. Further, changes in need crafting fully mediated changes in need-based experiences and well-being. To conclude, the findings provide initial evidence for the effectiveness of LifeCraft during the COVID-19 pandemic, with active participation being a prerequisite for the program to be effective.

To explain why there is substantial heterogeneity in the degree to which adolescents suffer from psychologically controlling parenting, it is important to take into account adolescents' active contribution to the socialization processes and to their coping with controlling parenting in particular. This study aimed to examine whether adolescents' coping with controlling parenting (i.e., oppositional defiance, compulsive compliance, negotiation, and accommodation) moderated associations between psychologically controlling parenting, adolescents' experiences of psychological need frustration, and their internalizing and externalizing problems. A total of 161 adolescents (M age = 15.56 years; SD age = 1.14; 61.5% female) and either their mother or their father participated in 7-day diary study. As expected, accommodation played an adaptive role, thereby buffering within-person (daily) associations between psychologically controlling parenting, adolescents' need frustration, and subsequent problems. Unexpectedly, compulsive compliance played a similar adaptive role. Overall, the moderating effects of coping were rather limited, suggesting that adolescents' coping can alter the daily negative consequences associated with psychologically controlling parenting only to a certain extent. Psychologically Controlling ParentingPsychologically controlling parenting involves manipulative, pressuring, and sometimes subtle parental behaviors that interfere with the child's psychological and emotional experiences, such as guilt induction, shaming, and conditional regard (Barber, 1996). Because of the intrusive character of psychological control, it is assumed to be detrimental for adolescents' functioning (Barber & Harmon, 2002). Research has shown convincingly that psychologically controlling parenting is related to higher levels of adolescent problem behavior (see Pinquart, 2016, 2017 for meta-analyses). Adolescents who report higher levels of parental psychological control display more internalizing problems, such as depressive symptoms (Gargurevich & Soenens, 2016) and anxiety (McLeod et al., 2007), and more externalizing problems, such as aggression (Cui et al., 2014) and delinquent behavior (Liga et al., 2017).Recent studies have shown that psychologically controlling parenting is not entirely a stable parental children, thereby inducing feelings of inadequacy (competence frustration). Adolescents may also experience feelings of insecurity and alienation in the parent-adolescent relationship (relatedness frustration) because their parents' love and attention is conditional on the degree to which they attain their parents' standards (Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2010). Consistent with this reasoning, research has shown that frustration of adolescents' needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness plays an intervening role in associations between psychologically controlling parenting and adolescents' maladjustment, both in terms of internalizing problems and externalizing problems (Mabbe et al., 2016). On a daily level, diary st...