The Relationship Between Parents' Harsh Discipline And Adolescent Internalizing Problems: A Moderated Mediation Mode

The World Health Organization’s population survey of nearly 100 countries found that about one-third of teenagers have internalization problems such as anxiety and depression,The detection rates of depression and anxiety symptoms among adolescents in China were 32% and 31.8% respectively.Ecosystem theory points out that family plays a direct role in the development of teenagers,and the discipline behavior of parents in family factors is one of the important influencing factors of teenagers’ internalization.The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of parents’ strict discipline on Teenagers’ Internalization problems,and the mediating role of general self-concept between parents’ strict discipline behavior and teenagers’ Internalization problems.Adolescence is a sensitive period for the occurrence and development of individual internalization problems.During this period,teenagers are undergoing drastic changes in both body and psychology.The degree of individual development and strict discipline of parents may jointly affect teenagers’ Internalization problems.Therefore,this study introduces the important development factor of puberty phase to investigate whether the influence of parents’ strict discipline behavior on Teenagers’ Internalization problems will be different due to the time when teenagers enter puberty,and to test the regulatory role of the development factor of puberty phase.This study used the mother version of children’s behavior scale,parent-child conflict resolution strategy scale,Self-concept Questionnaire and adolescent development scale,737 junior middle school students and their mothers from two junior middle schools in Qingdao city were selected as subjects,The variables of adolescent internalization,parents’ strict discipline behavior,adolescent general self-concept and adolescent development were measured,SPSS 24.0 and process plug-in were used for statistical analysis,and the following main research results were obtained:(1)There is a significant positive correlation between parents’ strict discipline behavior and teenagers’ Internalization problem.The higher the degree of parents’ strict discipline behavior,the more serious the teenagers’ Internalization problem is.Parents’ corporal punishment and psychological aggression are significantly positively correlated with teenagers’ Internalization problems.(2)General self-concept plays an intermediary role between parents’ strict discipline and teenagers’ internalization.However,only parents’ psychological aggression can affect teenagers’ Internalization through teenagers’ general self-concept,and parents’ corporal punishment has no significant impact on Teenagers’ internalization.(3)Adolescence plays a moderating role in the mediating relationship between parental psychological aggression,general self-concept and adolescent internalization problems.Early maturity buffered the negative impact of parents’ psychological attack on Teenagers’ general self-concept,and late maturity buffered the impact of mothers’ psychological attack on Teenagers’ internalization.The above research conclusions provide an empirical basis for family education,home school co education and the construction of mental health curriculum for junior middle school students.The results of this study suggest that for the internalization of junior middle school students,we should pay attention to the cultivation of teenagers’ healthy self-concept in combination with their family rearing environment,and carry out targeted mental health education according to the different degree of teenagers’ physiological development.