Attitudes about Help-Seeking Mediate the Relation Between Parent Attachment and Academic Adjustment in First-Year College Students

Although numerous studies have documented an association between parent attachment and college student adjustment, less is known about the mechanisms that underlie this relation. Accordingly, this short-term longitudinal study examined first-year college students’ attitudes about academic help-seeking as one possible mechanism. As predicted, help-seeking attitudes mediated the relation between parent attachment and academic adjustment, even after controlling for gender and initial academic adjustment, with females holding more favorable attitudes about academic help-seeking. College personnel might explicitly encourage academic help-seeking in first-year students to maximize academic success and mitigate the effects of insecure attachment and gender-specific socialization.