An Evaluation of Adolescent Patterns of Sexual Self-Disclosure to Parents and Friends

Abstract

A study was conducted to examine adolescent's sexual self-disclosure to their parents and friends. The sample consisted of 169 senior high school students. The results revealed that adolescents engage in more sexual disclosure with their friends than with their parents. In addition, significantly greater sexual disclosure was reported between adolescents and same-sex, rather than opposite-sex, parent and friend. The only exception to this finding was that no significant differences were reported in male and female sexual self-disclosure to a best female friend. Additional regression analyses revealed that adolescent sexual disclosure to parents was strongly associated with adolescent perceptions of the openess and adaptiveness of the family context. By contrast, sexual disclosure to friends was strongly related to the adolescent's emotional individuation from the family. The discussion focuses on sexual socialization during adolescence.

Maternal and Peer Regulation of Adolescent Emotion: Associations with Depressive Symptoms

“…Emotion socialization also varies by the interaction of parent (mother versus father) and adolescent sex. For example, fathers are more likely than mothers to respond punitively to their son's anger, and daughters are more likely to make emotional disclosures to either parent than males Papini et al 1990). In addition, parental emotion socialization likely differs between dyadic interactions (mother-adolescent, father-adolescent) and whole-family interactions (Fosco and Grych 2013), in which mothers and fathers may influence each others' reactions to adolescent emotions.…”

Parental influence on career development: An integrative framework for adolescent career counseling

“…In other words, more than any other source, parents were the ones most likely to interact with adolescents regarding their career development (Sebald, 1989). Although much has been espoused about the decline in parentadolescent relations, teenage children still seek counsel and look to their parents for guidance regarding matters of importance (Papini, Farmer, Clark, & Micka, 1990;Rutter,1980). Adolescents' career aspirations have also been shown to be influenced by an interaction of individual variables such as ability and attitude toward school, as well as family environment variables such as parent aspirations and adolescent perception of parental encouragement (Majoribanks, 1986).…”

Clarifying co‐rumination: Associations with internalizing symptoms and romantic involvement among adolescent girls

“…Given the developmental salience of romantic experiences in early adolescence and the importance of peer influence on the formation of early romantic relationships (Brown, 1999;Connolly & Goldberg, 1999), it seems likely that co-ruminating teens would often discuss problems associated with romantic desires, experiences, and failures. Casually dating teens self-disclose to their friends more often than non-daters (Kuttler & La Greca, 2004), and adolescents may often turn first to their close friends for advice about romance and sexuality (Papini, Farmer, Clark, & Micka, 1990;Simon, Eder, & Evans, 1992). Thus, it seems reasonable that adolescents with more romantic experience would co-ruminate more.…”