Middle-Class African American Adolescents' and Parents' Conceptions of Parental Authority and Parenting Practices: A Longitudinal Investigation

Conceptions of parental authority and ratings of parental rules and decision making were examined longitudinally among 82 middle-class African American adolescents and their parents (82 mothers and 52 fathers), who were divided into two groups according to family income. Adolescents were, on average, 13.14 years of age at Time 1 and 15.05 years of age at Time 2. Nearly all adolescents and parents affirmed parents' legitimate authority to regulate (and children's obligation to comply with) rules regarding moral, conventional, prudential, friendship, and multifaceted issues, but they were more equivocal in their judgments regarding personal issues. With age, adolescents increasingly judged personal issues to be beyond the bounds of legitimate parental authority, but judgments differed by family income. Adolescents from upper income families rejected parents' legitimate authority to regulate personal issues more at Time 1 than did adolescents from middle income families, but no differences were found at Time 2. Authority to regulate adolescents' behavior did not extend to other adults or to schools, churches, and the law. With adolescents' increasing age, African American families became less restrictive in regulating prudential, friendship, multifaceted, and personal issues. Adolescents', mothers', and fathers' judgments demonstrated significant continuity over time, but few cross- or within-generation associations in judgments were found. Conceptions of legitimate parental authority at Time 1 were found to predict family rules at Time 2.