Aspects of Antisocial Behavior in Relation to Emotion Understanding and Parenting Style in Slovak and South African Early Adolescents
Abstrakt
The study is aimed at investigating understanding of emotions in relation to aspects of antisocial behavior and substance use with respect to parenting styles. Subjects were 397 early adolescents from two countries (Slovakia and South Africa).
We examined, if similarities or differences exist in comparison of both samples. Variables were measured by the Situational Test of Emotional Understanding (STEU) and selected parts from the Social and Health Assessment (SAHA) questionnaire (namely the Antisocial behavior, Prosocial behavior, Beliefs legitimizing aggression, Parenting, School attachment, and Academic motivation scales).
The obtained results only partly support expected significant associations between higher level of emotion understanding and lower level of involvement in antisocial behavior. On the contrary the linkage between lower level of understanding of emotions and higher rate of negative forms of behavior was manifested.
These relations were only evident with Slovak adolescents, but not with their South African counterparts. Findings also revealed the importance of parenting styles in different areas of early adolescent?s behavior.
Parental involvement and warmth diminished the expressed involvement in antisocial behavior as well as substance use and increased prosocial beliefs.