Content area
Full Text
J Child Fam Stud (2009) 18:396411 DOI 10.1007/s10826-008-9244-8
ORIGINAL PAPER
College Students Affective Distress: The Role of Expectation
Discrepancies and Communication
Allison Kanter Agliata Kimberly Renk
Published online: 28 November 2008 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2008
Abstract The discrepancy between college students performance and parents expectations may be related to college students affective distress. Further, the role that parentcollege student communication reciprocity may play in the context of these discrepancies has not been examined. As a result, this study examined parentcollege student expectation discrepancies and communication reciprocity as predictors of college students affective distress (i.e., anger, depression, and anxiety). Results of this study suggest that college studentparent expectation discrepancies, communication reciprocity, and college students affective distress(i.e., anger, depression, and anxiety) are interrelated significantly. Further, results from the hierarchical regressions conducted for this study suggest that college students perception of their communication reciprocity with their parents may be a more important predictor of college students depression and anxiety in the context of the expectation discrepancies examined in this study. These ndings underscore the importance of teaching communication skills to college students and their parents as a means of diminishing the deleterious effects of perceiving one another inaccurately.
Keywords Parent College student Expectation
discrepancies Communication reciprocity Anger
Depression Anxiety
Introduction
Transitioning to college is a crucial block in gaining independence for many late adolescents. Youniss and Smollar (1985) state, however, that, even as college students gain independence, they view their parents as authority gures who can set rules and expectations for their behavior. Even though college students individuate from their parents, they still have a strong attachment to them, respect them, work for their approval, and try to meet their expectations (Greenberg et al. 1983). Weidmans (1989) undergraduate socialization model is the rst to recognize the impact of parental socialization on university adjustment. This model suggests that parentcollege student relationships inuence many aspects of college students lives and are related to college students social and academic success. In fact, research supports the supposition that mothers and fathers parenting of their college students is related to college students functioning in many domains (e.g., academic success, Silva et al. 20072008; emotional adjustment, McKinney and Renk 2008; Renk et al. 2006).
The importance of the parentcollege student relationship often is...