Social Provisions in Adolescents’ Relationships With Parents, Best Friends, and Teachers: Validation of the Network of Relationships Inventory–Social Provisions Version

Family Communication Quality and Adolescent Psychological Well-Being: The Mediating Role of Emotional Security

Adolescence is a developmental period in which family relationships may be associated with psychological well-being. This cross-sectional study examined whether Emotional Security (ES) statistically mediates the association between Family Communication Quality (FCQ) and Adolescent Psychological Well-Being (PWB). Participants were 250 adolescents aged 15–19 years recruited through purposive sampling from public senior high schools (SMA Negeri) in Pekanbaru, Riau, Indonesia, in April 2026. The instrument comprised 21 self-report items, with seven items representing each construct. Validator feedback was used to refine the instrument, and the final 21-item version was declared valid and ready for field administration. Data were analyzed using PLS-SEM in SmartPLS 4. FCQ was positively associated with ES (β = .481, t = 9.928, p < .001) and PWB (β = .249, t = 3.952, p < .001), while ES was positively associated with PWB (β = .293, t = 4.831, p < .001). The specific indirect association through ES was also statistically supported (β = .141, t = 4.093, p < .001), while the direct association remained significant, indicating complementary mediation. ES accounted for approximately 36.2% of the total FCQ–PWB association. Positive blindfolding Q² values for ES (.146) and PWB (.138) indicated in-sample predictive relevance and were not interpreted as out-of-sample performance. SRMR = .045 and NFI = .929 were treated as supplementary fit indices. The findings indicate that higher-quality family communication is associated with adolescent psychological well-being both directly and through emotional security. Given the cross-sectional, purposive, same-source self-report design, the results do not establish causality and should be generalized cautiously.

A Structural Equation Model of Family-of-Origin Experiences, Relationship Beliefs, Communication Patterns, and Couple Satisfaction

The present study aimed to examine a structural equation model investigating the direct and indirect relationships among family-of-origin experiences, relationship beliefs, communication patterns, and couple satisfaction among adults in the United States. This cross-sectional correlational study was conducted among 618 adults (309 couples) residing in the United States who were involved in committed romantic relationships. Participants were recruited through community organizations, counseling centers, social media platforms, and online survey panels. Data were collected using the Family-of-Origin Scale (FOS), Relationship Belief Inventory (RBI), Communication Patterns Questionnaire–Short Form (CPQ-SF), and Couple Satisfaction Index (CSI-32). Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation analyses, confirmatory factor analysis, and structural equation modeling were performed using SPSS 29 and AMOS 29. Model fit was evaluated using χ²/df, CFI, TLI, GFI, AGFI, RMSEA, and SRMR indices. Bootstrapping with 5,000 resamples was employed to assess indirect effects and mediation pathways. Correlation analyses revealed significant associations among all study variables. Family-of-origin experiences were negatively associated with dysfunctional relationship beliefs and positively associated with communication patterns and couple satisfaction (p < .001). The measurement model demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties, with all factor loadings, composite reliability coefficients, and average variance extracted values exceeding recommended thresholds. The structural model exhibited excellent fit to the data (χ²/df = 2.31, CFI = .962, TLI = .956, GFI = .932, AGFI = .914, RMSEA = .046, SRMR = .041). Family-of-origin experiences significantly predicted relationship beliefs (β = -.53, p < .001), communication patterns (β = .39, p < .001), and couple satisfaction (β = .28, p < .001). Relationship beliefs significantly predicted communication patterns (β = -.34, p < .001) and couple satisfaction (β = -.29, p < .001). Communication patterns emerged as the strongest direct predictor of couple satisfaction (β = .52, p < .001). Significant indirect effects confirmed that relationship beliefs and communication patterns partially mediated the relationship between family-of-origin experiences and couple satisfaction. The model explained 28% of the variance in relationship beliefs, 49% of the variance in communication patterns, and 67% of the variance in couple satisfaction. The findings support a developmental-relational model in which family-of-origin experiences influence adult couple satisfaction both directly and indirectly through relationship beliefs and communication patterns. Communication patterns emerged as the most influential determinant of couple satisfaction, highlighting their central role in relationship functioning. The results suggest that interventions targeting maladaptive relationship beliefs and communication processes may help mitigate the negative effects of adverse family experiences and enhance relationship quality among couples.

The power of friendships in adolescents' daily lives: Bi-directional within-person associations between friendship interaction quality and affect.

Friends play a critical role in adolescent development, yet relatively little is known about how friendship interactions in adolescents' daily lives relate to their affective experiences. This study examined bidirectional associations between friendship interaction quality (i.e., warmth and conflict) and momentary affect, as well as whether these associations were moderated by individual differences (i.e., depressive symptoms, habitual rumination, and gender). 247 adolescents (Mage = 12.94, SDage = 0.41, 108 females, 224 identified as Belgian) participated in an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) study involving five surveys per day over two consecutive weeks. Pre-registered Dynamic Structural Equation Modeling (DSEM) analyses revealed that higher momentary negative affect was associated with greater friendship conflict in the subsequent hours, whereas friendship warmth was associated with higher subsequent positive affect. These associations were not consistently moderated by depressive symptoms, habitual rumination, and gender. Exploratory analyses examining temporarily closer associations (i.e., affect and friendship interaction quality assessed at the same time) suggest that conflictual interactions with friends were associated with higher levels of negative affect and lower levels of positive affect, whereas, warm interactions with friends were associated with lower levels of negative affect and higher levels of positive affect. Overall, findings highlight short-term, micro-level associations between adolescents' friendship interaction quality and their affective experiences in daily life.

Parental Insecure Attachment Styles and Clinical Psychological Symptoms in Adolescent Children: The Mediating Role of Coparenting

Revisiting Maternal and Paternal Parenting Styles: Differentiating Latent Profiles and Associations With Psychosocial Outcomes of Chinese Adolescents in a National Sample of Parent-Child Dyads.

INTRODUCTION Parent-child interactions constitute a critical developmental context for the psychosocial adjustment of adolescents. This study aimed to differentiate parenting styles and examine their domain-specific effects on later adolescent outcomes, using a culturally sensitive, person-centered approach. METHODS This study employed latent profile analysis (LPA) on a national sample of 8333 Chinese parent-adolescent dyads (4564 mother-child and 3769 father-child dyads) from the China Education Panel Survey (CEPS). At baseline, adolescents were aged 12.93 years on average (SD = 0.82), and 51.5% of them were boys. Analyses were conducted separately for the full sample of parents, mothers, and fathers to identify distinct parenting profiles and their subsequent influence on adolescent academic difficulty, deviant peer affiliation, and depression. RESULTS A robust four-profile structure namely Authoritative, Managerial, Warm Harbor, and Disengaged was identified for the full and maternal samples. Crucially, a unique five-profile structure emerged for fathers, featuring an additional Emotionally Detached profile characterized by average discipline but extremely low warmth. Further analyses revealed that the Authoritative and Warm Harbor profiles were associated with more favorable outcomes across all domains, particularly in mother-child dyads. For father-child dyads, the Emotionally Detached profile was uniquely associated with higher academic difficulty, deviant peer affiliation, and depression. CONCLUSIONS These findings underscore the necessity of using gender-differentiated, person-centered approaches to understand culturally configured parenting and its consequences. Moving beyond uniform theoretical models, these results inform more targeted research and family support practices.

The mediating role of self-esteem in the association between perceived social support and youth mental health difficulties

This study examined whether self-esteem mediates the association between perceived social support and youth mental health difficulties in a heterogeneous sample of school-recruited youths and clinically referred inpatient and outpatient youths. The study included 312 children and adolescents (mean age = 14.36 years, SD = 2.19, range = 9–19; 37.5% boys, 62.5% girls). The primary analysis was a covariate-adjusted mediation model in the full sample, with perceived social support (MSPSS) as the predictor, self-esteem (RSE) as the mediator, and Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) Total Difficulties as the outcome. Hierarchical clustering based on SDQ, RSE, and MSPSS item profiles was conducted as a secondary, exploratory analysis. Higher perceived social support was associated with higher self-esteem (B = 0.26, 95% CI [0.20, 0.31], bootstrapped p  < 0.001), and higher self-esteem was associated with fewer mental health difficulties (B = −0.43, 95% CI [−0.50, −0.35], bootstrapped p  < 0.001) in the covariate-adjusted full-sample model. The indirect effect via self-esteem was statistically detectable (B = −0.11, 95% CI [−0.14, −0.08], bootstrapped p  < 0.001), indicating partial mediation. Exploratory cluster-specific analyses indicated that the indirect effect was significant in the lower-difficulties/higher-resources cluster (B = −0.05, 95% CI [−0.09, −0.02], bootstrapped p  = 0.003), but not in the higher-difficulties/lower-resources cluster (B = −0.01, 95% CI [−0.04, 0.00], bootstrapped p  = 0.077). Self-esteem appears to represent one pathway linking perceived social support to fewer mental health difficulties in youth. Cluster-specific findings should be interpreted as exploratory and suggest that the strength of this pathway may vary across psychosocial profiles.