Parental psychological control and the role of basic psychological needs: Are families with a child with atypical development at greater risk?

Journal title MALTRATTAMENTO E ABUSO ALL’INFANZIA
Author/s Eliana De Salvo, Caterina Laganà, Maria Cristina Gugliandolo
Publishing Year 2024 Issue 2024/3
Language English Pages 20 P. 77-96 File size 198 KB
DOI 10.3280/MAL2024-003004
DOI is like a bar code for intellectual property: to have more infomation click here

Below, you can see the article first page

If you want to buy this article in PDF format, you can do it, following the instructions to buy download credits

Article preview

FrancoAngeli is member of Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA), a not-for-profit association which run the CrossRef service enabling links to and from online scholarly content.

The parent-child relationship can often be punctuated by moments of friction and discom-fort. Being a parent can be an arduous task, parenting strategies adopted are in fact critical for children’s development, sometimes becoming risk factors for unhealthy children’s out-comes. Self-determination theory has postulated the existence of three basic psychological needs whose satisfaction can be a guarantee of well-being and also seems to be associated with the adoption of more functional parenting strategies. The present study, which targets a sample of mothers with typically developing children and mothers with atypically develop-ing children, aims to investigate the use of psychological control and the relation with the basic psychological needs satisfaction. Results are discussed in light of their implications for improving services for families with typical and atypical development.

Keywords: Family, Psychological control, Self-determination Theory, Needs satisfaction

  1. Aunola, K., Viljaranta, J., & Tolvanen, A. (2017). Does daily distress make parents prone to using psychologically controlling parenting?. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 41(3), 405-414. DOI: 10.1177/0165025416658555
  2. Barber, B. K. (1996). Parental psychological control: Revisiting a neglected construct. Child Development, 67(6), 3296-3319. DOI: 10.2307/1131780
  3. Bartholomew, K. J., Ntoumanis, N., Ryan, R. M., Bosch, J. A., & Thøgersen-Ntoumani, C. (2011). Self-determination theory and diminished functioning: The role of interpersonal control and psychological need thwarting. Personality and social psychology bulletin, 37(11), 1459-1473. DOI: 10.1177/0146167211413125
  4. Brassard, M. R., Hart, S. N., & Glaser, D. (2020). Psychological maltreatment: An international challenge to children’s safety and well-being. Child abuse & neglect, 110 (Pt 1), 104611.
  5. Chen, B., Vansteenkiste, M., Beyers, W., Boone, L., Deci, E. L., Van Der Kaap-Deeder, J., Duriez, B., Lens, W., Matos, L., Mouratidis, A., Ryan, R. M., Sheldon, K. M., Soenens, B., Van Petegem, S., & Verstuyf, J. (2015). Basic psychological need satisfaction, need frustration, and need strength across four cultures. Motivation and Emotion, 39(2), 216-236.
  6. Costa, S., Gugliandolo, M. C., Barberis, N., Cuzzocrea, F., & Liga, F. (2019). Antecedents and consequences of parental psychological control and autonomy support: The role of psychological basic needs. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 36(4), 1168-1189. DOI: 10.1177/0265407518756778
  7. Costa, S., Ingoglia, S., Inguglia, C., Liga, F., Lo Coco, A., & Larcan, R. (2018). Psychometric evaluation of the basic psychological need satisfaction and frustration scale (BPNSFS) in Italy. Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, 51(3), 193-206. DOI: 10.1080/07481756.2017.1347021
  8. Costa, S., Liga, F., Gugliandolo, M. C., Sireno, S., Larcan, R., & Cuzzocrea, F. (2020). Antecedents of parental psychological control: A narrative review grounded in Self-Determination Theory perspective. Maltrattamento e abuso all’infanzia, (2020/2). DOI: 10.3280/MAL2020-002003
  9. De Clercq, L. E., Prinzie, P., Swerts, C., Ortibus, E., & De Pauw, S. S. (2022a). “Tell me about your child, the relationship with your child and your parental experiences”: a qualitative study of spontaneous speech samples among parents raising a child with and without Autism Spectrum Disorder, cerebral palsy or down syndrome. Journal of Developmental and Physical Disabilities, 34(2), 295-329. DOI: 10.1007/S10882-021-09800-1
  10. De Clercq, L. E., Prinzie, P., Warreyn, P., Soenens, B., Dieleman, L. M., & De Pauw, S. S. (2022b). Expressed emotion in families of children with and without autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy and down syndrome: relations with parenting stress and parenting behaviors. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 52(4), 1789-1806.
  11. De Clercq, L., Van der Kaap-Deeder, J., Dieleman, L. M., Soenens, B., Prinzie, P., & De Pauw, S. S. (2019). Parenting and psychosocial development in youth with and without autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy, and Down syndrome: A cross-disability comparison. Advances in Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 3, 220-234.
  12. Desimpelaere, E. N., De Clercq, L. E., Soenens, B., Prinzie, P., & De Pauw, S. S. (2024). Parenting a child with Down syndrome: A qualitative study on parents’ experiences and behaviors from a self-determination theory perspective. Journal of Pediatric Nursing, 74, e14-e27.
  13. Dieleman, L. M., De Pauw, S. S., Soenens, B., Mabbe, E., Campbell, R., & Prinzie, P. (2018a). Relations between problem behaviors, perceived symptom severity and parenting in adolescents and emerging adults with ASD: The mediating role of parental psychological need frustration. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 73, 21-30.
  14. Dieleman, L. M., Moyson, T., De Pauw, S. S. W., Prinzie, P., & Soenens, B. (2018b). Parents’ Need-related Experiences and Behaviors When Raising a Child With Autism Spectrum Disorder. Journal of Pediatric Nursing: Nursing Care of Children and Families, 42, e26-e37,
  15. Dieleman, L. M., Soenens, B., Prinzie, P., De Clercq, L., & De Pauw, S. S. (2021). Parenting children with cerebral palsy: A longitudinal examination of the role of child and parent factors. Exceptional Children, 87(3), 369-390. DOI: 10.1177/001440292098646
  16. Dieleman, L. M., Soenens, B., Vansteenkiste, M., Prinzie, P., Laporte, N., & De Pauw, S. S. W. (2019). Daily Sources of Autonomy-Supportive and Controlling Parenting in Mothers of Children with ASD: The Role of Child Behavior and Mothers’ Psychological Needs. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 49(2), 509-526.
  17. Distefano, R., & Meuwissen, A. S. (2022). Parenting in context: A systematic review of the correlates of autonomy support. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 14(4).
  18. Eddy, J. M., Leve, L. D., & Fagot, B. I. (2001). Coercive family processes: A replication and extension of Patterson’s coercion model. Aggressive Behavior: Official Journal of the International Society for Research on Aggression, 7(1), 14-25.
  19. Gavazzi, S. M., & Lim, J. Y. (2023). Family systems theory. In Families with Adolescents: Bridging the Gaps Between Theory, Research, and Practice (pp. 35-45). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
  20. Grolnick, W. S. (2003). The Psychology of Parental Control: How Well-Meant Parenting Backfires. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.
  21. Grolnick, W. S., & Pomerantz, E. M. (2009). Issues and challenges in studying parental control: Toward a new conceptualization. Child Development Perspectives, 3(3), 165-170.
  22. Hodapp, R. M., Casale, E. G., & Sanderson, K. A. (2019). Parenting children with intellectual disabilities. In Handbook of parenting (pp. 565-596). Routledge.
  23. Ingoglia, S., Liga, F., Coco, A. L., & Inguglia, C. (2021). Informant discrepancies in perceived parental psychological control, adolescent autonomy, and relatedness psychological needs. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 77, 101333.
  24. Kuppens, S., & Ceulemans, E. (2019). Parenting styles: A closer look at a well-known concept. Journal of child and family studies, 28(1), 168-181.
  25. Mabbe, E., Soenens, B., Vansteenkiste, M., Van Der Kaap-Deeder, J., & Mouratidis, A. (2018). Day-to-day variation in autonomy-supportive and psychologically controlling parenting: The role of parents’ daily experiences of need satisfaction and need frustration. Parenting, 18(2), 86-109. DOI: 10.1080/15295192.2018.1444131
  26. Minuchin, S. (2018). Families and family therapy. Routledge.
  27. Myers, B. J., Mackintosh, V. H., & Goin-Kochel, R. P. (2009). “My greatest joy and my greatest heartache:” Parents’ own words on how having a child in the autism spectrum has affected their lives and their families’ lives. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 3(3), 670-684.
  28. Pinquart, M. (2017). Associations of parenting dimensions and styles with externalizing problems of children and adolescents: An updated meta-analysis. Developmental psychology, 53(5), 873-932,
  29. Pinquart, M. (2018). Parenting stress in caregivers of children with chronic physical condition-A meta-analysis. Stress and Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress, 34(2), 197-207,
  30. Pomerantz, E. M., & Wang, Q. (2009). The role of parental control in children’s development in Western and East Asian countries. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 18(5), 285-289.
  31. Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2008). From ego depletion to vitality: Theory and findings concerning the facilitation of energy available to the self. Social and Personality psychology compass, 2(2), 702-717.
  32. Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2017). Self-determination theory: Basic psychological needs in motivation, development, and wellness. Guilford.
  33. Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2024). Self-determination theory. In Encyclopedia of quality of life and well-being research (pp. 6229-6235). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
  34. Scharf, M., & Goldner, L. (2018). “If you really love me, you will do/be…”: Parental psychological control and its implications for children’s adjustment. Developmental Review, 49, 16-30.
  35. Smetana, J. G. (2017). Current research on parenting styles, dimensions, and beliefs. Current opinion in psychology, 15, 19-25.
  36. Soenens, B., & Vansteenkiste, M. (2010). A theoretical upgrade of the concept of parental psychological control: Proposing new insights on the basis of self-determination theory. Developmental review, 30(1), 74-99.
  37. Soenens, B., & Vansteenkiste, M. (2023). A lifespan perspective on the importance of the basic psychological needs for psychosocial development. In R. M. Ryan (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of self-determination theory (pp. 457-490). Oxford University Press.
  38. Soenens, B., Luyckx, K., Vansteenkiste, M., Duriez, B., & Goossens, L. (2008). Clarifying the link between parental psychological control and adolescents’ depressive symptoms: Reciprocal versus unidirectional models. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly (1982-), 411-444.
  39. Van Riper, M. (2007). Families of Children with Down Syndrome: Responding to “A Change in Plans” with Resilience. Journal of Pediatric Nursing, 22(2), 116-128.
  40. Zhu, X., & Shek, D. T. (2021). Parental control and adolescent delinquency based on parallel process latent growth curve modeling. International journal of environmental research and public health, 18(17), 8916.

Eliana De Salvo, Caterina Laganà, Maria Cristina Gugliandolo, Parental psychological control and the role of basic psychological needs: Are families with a child with atypical development at greater risk? in "MALTRATTAMENTO E ABUSO ALL’INFANZIA" 3/2024, pp 77-96, DOI: 10.3280/MAL2024-003004