Psychological Maladjustment Mediates the Relation Between Remembrances of Parental Rejection in Childhood and Adults’ Fear of Intimacy: A Multicultural Study

Abstract

This study assesses interpersonal acceptance-rejection theory’s (IPARTheory’s) prediction that adults’ (both men’s and women’s) remembrances of parental (both maternal and paternal) rejection in childhood are likely to be associated with adults’ fear of intimacy, as mediated by adults’ psychological maladjustment and relationship anxiety. The study also assesses the prediction that these associations will not vary significantly by gender, ethnicity, language, culture, or other such defining conditions. To test these predictions a sample of 3,483 young adults in 13 nations responded to the mother and father versions of the Adult Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire (short forms), Adult Personality Assessment Questionnaire (short form), the Interpersonal Relationship Anxiety Questionnaire, the Fear of Intimacy Scale, and the Revised Personal Information Form. Results of multigroup analyses showed that adults’ remembrances of both maternal and paternal rejection in childhood independently predicted men’s and women’s fear of intimacy in all 13 countries. However, remembered maternal rejection was a significantly stronger predictor of adults’ fear of intimacy than was remembered paternal rejection. Results also confirmed the prediction in all 13 countries and across both genders that both maternal and paternal rejection independently predicted adults’ psychological maladjustment and relationship anxiety, which in turn predicted fear of intimacy. In addition, psychological maladjustment partially mediated the relation between remembrances of maternal and paternal rejection, and adults’ fear of intimacy in all 13 countries and both genders.

Psychological maladjustment mediates the relation between recollections of parental rejection in childhood and adults’ fear of intimacy in Italy

“…However, few studies have investigated in a systematic way the association between adults’ recollections of parental care in childhood and adults’ current FOI. A recent IPARTheory-related study using data from 13 countries, including Italy, demonstrated that independently of the culture and gender, adults’ recollections of parental rejection during childhood are related to adults’ current FOI, and that overall psychological maladjustment of the form known to be associated worldwide with the experience of parental rejection mediates the relation between adults’ recollections of parental rejection in childhood and FOI in adulthood (Rohner et al, 2019). This form of maladjustment is termed the acceptance–rejection syndrome (ARS) in IPARTheory (Rohner, 2004).…”

Italian Validation of the Touch Avoidance Measure and the Touch Avoidance Questionnaire

“…Assessing and measuring touch avoidance could also be helpful in psychotherapeutic settings (Perrella, 2017;Rohner et al, 2019). Clinicians often meet people struggling with romantic relationships, sexuality, or assertiveness.…”

An Exploratory Study of Adult Baby-Diaper Lovers’ Characteristics in an Italian Online Sample

“…One of these difficulties concerns the creation of intimate relationships, based on sharing and the communication of thoughts and intimate feelings [25,28,44]. These persons would like intimacy; however, the tendency to consistently interpret events with distorted mental representations, resulting from rejection and the fear of other rejections, could reflect an underlying fear of intimacy, thus obstructing the creation of a meaningful relationship [25,26,45,46]. The lack of a steady relationship for about 77% of the sample could be a reminder of this fear of intimacy and of the need to defend themselves from other rejects.…”

“…In particular, we hypothesized that ABDL interests are positively associated with the degree of experienced rejection from both parental figures. In this perspective, ABDL phenomena could be considered one of the possible consequences of perceived parental rejection during childhood [24][25][26].…”