Journal of Adolescent Research

Relational components of three attributes often regarded as individual variables (conflict, autonomy, and self-regulation) were examined in two studies. In Study 1, mothers and their 10-through 12-, 13-through 15-, or 16-through 17-year-old offspring reported expected times of transition to 47 adultlike behaviors (behavioral autonomy) and rated the importance of delaying each transition. Discrepancies from mothers' expectancies were found to be greatest for 13-through 15-year-olds. In Study 2, characteristics and correlates of conflict across different types of relationships were assessed. Sixth-grade and eighth-grade Hispanic American adolescents reported significant differentiation among relationships with mothers, fathers, andfriends infrequency of conflict, conflict resolution strategies and sequelae, and correlates of adolescents'psychosocial competence. Variations suggest that multiple relationships may be involved in the development of autonomy and self-regulation during childhood and adolescence.

Data from over 1,500 American adolescents-collected in two separate projects, both longitudinal-were used to examine the interrelations among three dimensions of adolescent religiosity and the degree to which those mediated the effects of parental behavior on adolescent deviant outcomes. The findings lend support to this special issue theme that various dimensions of parent/child interaction have independent effects on adolescent characteristics (religiosity and deviance). Generally, the three religiosity dimensions functioned as intervening variables between parental behaviors and deviance, with adolescents' expectations of future religious activity reducing subsequent deviance more than either public or private adolescent religiosity. The patterns of findings imply that out ofparent/child relationships and theirpublic andprivate religious activity, adolescents construct a view of what will be theirfuture patterns of religious activity. They then tend to participate or not in deviant behavior consonant with their future religious orientation.

This study tested a neighborhood-level approach to what often is treated as a purely familial or within-household phenomenon-the infonmal social control of children. The data analyzed were drawn from a new, multilevel assessment of 80 neighborhoods in Chicago. The results showed that, first, informal social control can be measured reliably at the neighborhood level. Second, three dimensions of neighborhood structure-concentrated poverty, ethnicity/immigration, and residential stability-were found to explain significant amounts of variation in child social control. Third, informal social control mediated 50% of the effect of residential stability on rates of adolescent delinquency. Even afteradjustingforprior levels of crime in the neighborhood, informal social control emerged as a significant inhibitor of adolescent delinquency. The collective social control of children is an important construct that should be added to theoretical accounts and research projects that stress social regulation in families.

Reports of activities from 3,119 high school seniors werefactoranalyzed into dimensions that signified integration into school-based, adult-endorsed norms or engagement in peerfun activities that excluded adults. Individuals were given scores on each dimension and then grouped into orientations toward school-adult norms, butnotpeerfun (School), toward fun but not school-adult norms (Party), toward both (All-around), or toward neither (Disengaged). School and All-around seniors were distinguishably high in community service, religion, andpolitics. Party seniors used marijuana more than did School seniors, but not All-around, seniors. Results indicated important variations in seniors' integration (connection) into the part ofpeer culture that coincides with adult normative society. It appears that connection may be typically associated with regulation but also may be superseded by agency-autonomy, as was manifested in the All-around group.

How is adolescent functioning related to experiences of connection, regulation, and supportfor autonomy at home, in school, and with peers? Using datafrom the Maryland Adolescent Growth in Context (MAGIC) study (an ongoing longitudinal study of 1,387 African Amenrican and European American adolescents and theirfamilies), it was found that: (a)family demographic characteristics helped predict only academicperformance; (b) although positive experiences on one indicator predicted positive experiences on the other two, each of the three types of experience explained a unique amount of variance in adolescentfunctioning (e.g., regulation related most strongly to externalizing behaviors; in contrast, supportfor autonomy related to all aspects offunctioning); (c) although adolescents with positive interactions in one context were likely to have positive interactions in the other contexts, characteristics of each context explained unique amounts of variance infifuctioning (e.g., experiences with siblings emerged as uniquely important predictors of mental health).

This study investigated the relation to school grades, feelings of depression, and antisocial behavior of youth perceptions of three central dimensions of socialization (connection with significantothers, regulation of behavior, andpsychological autonomy) as they are experienced infour social contexts: family, school, neighborhood, ndpeers. Analyses of a random sample of 900 fifth and eighth-grade youth included both descriptive accounts of youth experience in these contexts and testedfor various models predicting independent and interactive effects among contexts on youth functioning. Findings showed that connection, regulation, and autonomy were meaningful dimensions of socialization experience in the four contexts, thatfamily and peers were primary socialization domains, and that discrete aspects of youth functioning were related to specific contexts. There was some evidence that deficits in experience in one context can be compensatedfor by experience in other contexts.