Parenting Styles, Adolescents' Attributions, and Educational Outcomes in Nine Heterogeneous High Schools

Abstract

2,353 Ss attending 6 high schools in California and 3 high schools in Wisconsin during the 1987–88 and 1988–89 school years completed questionnaires measuring parenting styles, attributional tendencies, and educational outcomes. Adolescents who perceived their parents as being nonauthoritative were more likely than their peers to attribute achievement outcomes to external causes or to low ability. Furthermore, the higher the proportion of dysfunctional attributions made for academic successes and failures, the lower the levels of classroom engagement and homework 1 yr later. Although adolescents' attributional style provided a bridge between parenting style and 2 educational outcomes, it did not fully explain the impact of parenting on those outcomes. Additional analyses within gender and ethnic subgroups reinforced the overall pattern of findings observed within the entire sample. Tables of errors, regression coefficients, and variance are appended. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)