Parental Control as a Stimulus for Youth Control: Mediating the Parental Knowledge–Child Delinquency Relationship With Cognitive Impulsivity

Abstract

Parental knowledge was investigated as a foil to reactive criminal thinking, as represented in the current study by cognitive impulsivity. Cognitive impulsivity and neutralization were tested as mediators of the parental knowledge–child delinquency relationship in 1,734 early adolescents (811 boys, 923 girls) from the Gang Resistance and Education Training (GREAT) study. A path analysis of the first three waves of GREAT data revealed that Wave 2 cognitive impulsivity but not Wave 2 neutralization techniques negatively mediated the link between Wave 1 parental knowledge and Wave 3 child delinquency. These results were replicated in variables measured at Waves 2 through 4. Parental control, in the form of parental knowledge and monitoring, may therefore prevent delinquency by countering cognitive impulsivity.

Cognitive Impulsivity as a Mediator of the Parental Knowledge-Childhood Aggression Relationship

“…The purpose of the current investigation was to extend the results of the Walters (2020a) investigation to aggression perpetration in an effort to determine whether a process similar to the one found for parental knowledge, reactive criminal thinking, and delinquency generalized to the relationship between parental knowledge, cognitive impulsivity, and aggression perpetration. Most of the control variables from the previous Walters (2020a) probe were included in the current investigation (age, sex, race, family structure, and parent education).…”

“…The purpose of the current investigation was to extend the results of the Walters (2020a) investigation to aggression perpetration in an effort to determine whether a process similar to the one found for parental knowledge, reactive criminal thinking, and delinquency generalized to the relationship between parental knowledge, cognitive impulsivity, and aggression perpetration. Most of the control variables from the previous Walters (2020a) probe were included in the current investigation (age, sex, race, family structure, and parent education). One difference was that there was no measure of unsupervised routine activities, which was included as a control variable in the Walters (2020a) study based on its well-established association with parental knowledge and delinquency (Walters, 2018), in the data base for this study.…”

“…Research indicates that parental control, of which parental knowledge is a facet, predicts future delinquency (Hoeve et al, 2009) and childhood aggression (Lösel & Bender, 2014). Walters (2020a) proposed that reactive criminal thinking/cognitive impulsivity mediated the relationship between parental knowledge and delinquency and uncovered support for this supposition in a study of early adolescent male and female schoolchildren. The reason why cognitive impulsivity was proposed as a link between parental knowledge and delinquency is that parental control, knowledge, and monitoring can be considered constraints on a child's natural tendency to act impulsivity and seek immediate gratification, which, if left unchecked, can give rise to delinquency.…”

“…Most of the control variables from the previous Walters (2020a) probe were included in the current investigation (age, sex, race, family structure, and parent education). One difference was that there was no measure of unsupervised routine activities, which was included as a control variable in the Walters (2020a) study based on its well-established association with parental knowledge and delinquency (Walters, 2018), in the data base for this study. As such, the unsupervised routine activities variable was replaced by aggression victimization, a well-known correlate of parental knowledge and aggression perpetration (Stavrinides, Nikiforou, & Georgiou, 2015).…”

“…As such, the unsupervised routine activities variable was replaced by aggression victimization, a well-known correlate of parental knowledge and aggression perpetration (Stavrinides, Nikiforou, & Georgiou, 2015). Following from the results of the previous Walters (2020a) investigation, it was hypothesized that cognitive impulsivity, the developmental antecedent to reactive criminal thinking, would mediate the parental knowledge-childhood aggression relationship after age, sex, race, family structure, parent education, and aggression victimization were controlled, but that cognitive insensitivity, the developmental antecedent to proactive criminal thinking, would not.…”