Gender and life stress as moderators of the relation between social and parental support and child adjustment

The receipt of peer and familial support has been shown to predict fewer internalizing and externalizing problems and better adjustment among child populations (Stice, Ragan, & Randall, 2004). However, the benefits children receive from social support tend to vary across genders and in response to life stressors (Jackson & Warren, 2000). These results suggest that to understand the predictors of children's adjustment, one must consider children's perceptions of received support and how life stress may affect the relation between support and adjustment.;The present study sought to examine whether gender and life stress moderated the relation between parental and peer support and children's adjustment. Hypotheses were tested using a sample of 72 fourth, fifth, and sixth grade children who attended a university-affiliated elementary school, along with their parents. Multiple informants were used to measure children's perceptions of support, stressful life events, and symptoms of maladjustment. Multiple regression analyses were used to test all hypotheses.;Parental support significantly predicted children's self reports of overall maladjustment, externalizing behaviors, loneliness, and prosocial behaviors. Peer support significantly predicted children's self reports of loneliness, prosocial behaviors, externalizing and internalizing symptoms, overall maladjustment, and peer reports of overt aggression. Gender moderated the relation between low parental support and children's loneliness (p < .05), with boys more negatively affected than girls. The number of life events reported within the last 12 months moderated the relation between perceptions of peer support and children's loneliness (p < .05), with the strongest association seen among children with a high number of stressful life events. Stressful lifetime events and those events within the previous 12 months also moderated the relation between parental support and self-reports of overall adjustment, prosocial behaviors, and externalizing behaviors ( p < .05). Results suggest that children's perceptions of peer and parental support may increase overall adjustment, but continued research is needed to assess variations in adjustment across contexts, genders, and in relation to life stress. Information about the moderating effects of gender and stress will be useful in interventions designed to increase children's social support.