Adolescents' Avoidance Tendencies and Physiological Reactions to Discussions about Their Parents' Relationship: Implications for Postdivorce and Nondivorced Families
Adolescents' Avoidance Tendencies and Physiological Reactions to Discussions about Their Parents' Relationship: Implications for Postdivorce and Nondivorced Families
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DOI：
10.1080/03637750802342308
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发表时间：
2008-01-01
影响因子：
2.5
通讯作者：
Hamrick, K.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Afifi, T. D.;Afifi, W. A.;Hamrick, K.
当父母和青少年之间的对话中引入父母关系的话题时，离异家庭的青少年可能特别容易因为需要保护（他们自己，他们的父母和他们的关系）而感到被困在父母之间，这应该使他们焦虑（即自我报告的焦虑）和生理唤起（即皮肤电导水平或SCL的变化）。当青少年感到兴奋时，我们认为他们应该尽量避免谈论父母与父母的关系。本研究收集了112对父母-青少年的自我报告、观察数据以及生理数据。结果显示，离婚预示着青少年被抓住的感觉，这影响了他们对保护的需求。这种保护需求反过来预测了青少年自我报告的焦虑和SCL的变化。与假设不同的是，SCL与青少年的回避倾向无关。然而，自我报告的焦虑与青少年自我报告的话题回避有关。讨论了这些结果的含义，以及一种新的观察编码方案。
A model was constructed to test the argument that when the topic of the parents' relationship is introduced in conversations between parents and adolescents, adolescents from divorced families may be especially likely to feel caught between their parents due to a need for protection (of themselves, their parent, and their relationship), which should make them anxious (i.e., self-reported anxiety) and physiologically aroused (i.e., changes in skin conductance levels or SCL). When adolescents feel aroused, we argued that they should attempt to avoid talking about their parents' relationship with their parent. Self-report and observational data, as well as physiological data, were collected from 112 parent-adolescents dyads. The results revealed that divorce predicted adolescents' feelings of being caught, which influenced their need for protection. This need for protection, in turn, predicted adolescents' self-reported anxiety and changes in SCL. Unlike what was hypothesized, SCL was not associated with adolescents' avoidance tendencies. Nevertheless, self-reported anxiety was associated with adolescents' self-reported topic avoidance. The implications of these results, and a new observational coding scheme for avoidance, are discussed.