Cypriot Journal of Educational

Sciences 5 (2010) 152-166

www.world-education-center.org/index.php/cjes

The personality traits of parents and parents’ reports of adolescents’

problems

Firdevs Savi a *, Rengin Akboy

b

a Assistant Professor at Faculty of Education Mehmet Akif Ersoy University, Turkey

b Professor at Faculty of Education, Dokuz Eylül University, Turkey

Received July 21, 2009; revised March 02, 2010; accepted July 19, 2010

Abstract The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between personality traits of parents and parents’ reports of adolescent problems. The samples consisted of 389 adolescences whose ages range from 12–15 years old and their parents. Instruments are used Child Behaviour Check List/4–16 and Eysenck Personality Questionnaire in order to analyze the data, correlation analysis were employed. Independent t-test, MANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were utilized in analyzing the data collected. As a result of this study, it has been determined that behavioural problems of adolescents reported by their parents significantly vary depending on the gender of such adolescents as well as their parents’ education level. It was found out that there is positive relationship between mothers’ and fathers’ psychoticism and neuroticism levels and parents’ reports of adolescents’ problems. Based on this fact, it has been determined that adolescents were reported to exhibit more behavioural problems as the psychoticism and neuroticism levels of the parents go higher. According to this result, while examining adolescent behavioural problems, one must take into account the personality traits of parents as densely used resources of information and also the adolescent inclination for problematic behaviour and how different information resources might be utilized. Keywords: Behaviour problems; adolescents; personality traits; parenting. ©2010 Academic World Education & Research Center. All rights reserved.

1. INTRODUCTION

Various information resources such as families, teachers and the adolescents themselves must be frequently referred to in assessing emotional and behavioural problems of adolescence. Reliability of such informational resources appear before us as an important problem in objectively evaluating problems of the adolescence. For instance, it is emphasized in the assessment based on the reports of families that family psychopathology has a role, nd that higher stress level were found in many of the families who turn their children to the experts with behavioural complaints (Griest, Forehand, *Firdevs Savi. Tel: +90 248 2346000/1435; Fax: +90 248 2344505 E-mail address: fsavi@mehmetakif.edu.tr

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Wells & McMahon, 1980; Hammen, Rudolph, Weisz, Rao & Burge, 1999), and that psychological signs of the family directly and indirectly are reflected in adolescent behaviour. Furthermore, parental depression and psychopathology influence ratings of child behavioural problems by parents of children with behaviour problems (Brody & Forehand, 1986; Forehand, Lautenschlager, Faust & Graziano, 1986).

An often debated contemporary question is how to interpret higher levels of problematic childhood behaviour reported by mothers and fathers who themselves display psychopathological symptoms. Do the reports of these mothers reflect actual existing behaviour problems in children, or does maternal psychopathology influence the perception of their child’s behaviour problems? Related to such questions, Richters (1992) described these two different interpretations as the accuracy model and the distortion model. According to the accuracy model there are numerous high-risk studies demonstrating the link between maternal psychopathology and emotional or behavioural disturbances in children (Beidel & Turner, 1997; Downey & Coyne, 1990; Goodman & Brumley, 1990). The distortion model suggested that maternal psychopathology leads to a general over-reporting of symptoms in their children. In either model, both the accuracy and distortion hypothesis is asserted reporting more problematic behaviour in children by parents with psychiatric symptoms (Richters, 1992). Some studies report mixed results, which suggest that both models may apply: maternal psychopathology may be associated with increased behaviour problems among children, and mothers with psychopathological symptoms may over-report the incidence and/or severity of such problems (Najman et al., 2000).

While there is extensive literature on how parenting affects childrens’ behaviour (Maccoby, 1992), most of these studies are focused on certain personality traits of the parent (Bosquet & Egeland, 2000), on parental psychopathology (Goodman & Gotlib, 1999) and addressed the parenting of mothers (Kochanska, Clark & Goldman, 1997) while ignoring the possible impact of fathers’ personality characteristics. Very little research has been conducted about the fathers’ behaviour problem children in terms of how those fathers perceive their own personal coherency problems and how they affect their children’s behaviours.

1.1. The Concept of Personality

Phares (1991) asserts that “Personality is the pattern of characteristic thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that distinguishes one person from another and that persists over time and situation. Ryckman (1982) claims that it is the sum of biologically based and learnt behaviour which forms the person's unique responses to environmental stimuli. The personality structure is fairly stable and predictable throughout different situations and time. There are personality traits of different depth and significance. The changes which reflect events and feelings during the lifespan only affect the surface and not the core character. Profound changes in personality are usually consequences of major life changes or deliberate effort (Costa & McCrae, 1992).

1.2. Personality Theories

Throughout history varying views have been expressed for the basic nature of human beings. Personality, as a concept, has been described and measured by a range of theories and models. Some theories seek to explain the dynamics of personality as a whole. In explaining personality and

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psychopathology, the most important innovation brought forth by Freud and the psychoanalytical theory is the concept of unconscious psychological phase. It likens the psychological structure to an iceberg in which the small portion standing above the water surface represents the conscience zone, and the larger portion standing beneath the water surface represents unconscious zone. Disorderly behaviours are actually the signs of a person’s poor attempts to evade his/her inner conflicts. The only difference between normal and abnormal behaviours is in degree (Geçtan, 1989).

Humanistic approach pays importance to learning in fallacy to determine abnormal behaviours and their defense mechanisms. It accepts that such factors create walls blocking personal development. Such defense processes create an inconsistency between reality and what the individual experiences and thus results in maladaptive behaviours. Analytical psychology and Jung tried to resolve the processes in the depths of human psychology and pointed out that human behaviours, aside from their history, are conditioned by the individual and racial goals and ideals. According to Freud, life is nothing but a chain of instinctive actions being repeated until the interruption caused by the death. However, Jung believes that an individual constantly tries to renew him/herself and thus he/she is in self-creating development. Freud claims that personality originates from one’s childhood whereas Jung pays more importance to the racial roots of personality (Gençtan, 1989).

Jung described two most important tendencies, namely introversion and extraversion of personality. The extravert attitude directs a person to the external and objective world whereas the introvert attitude directs him/her to inner and subjective world. These two opposite attitudes exist together within the personality structure. Usually one of these attitudes is dominant and conscious while the other is repressed and unconscious. If ego exhibits a predominantly extravert attitude in its relationship with the world, unconscious personality exhibits introvert attitudes. Jung claimed that an individual must keep both of these attitudes in balance so that he/she might pursue an effective life. According to Jung, personality problems arise out of imbalance between introversion and extraversion (Cüceloğlu, 1991; Humphreys & Revelle, 1984; Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985).

Eysenck significantly contributed to modern learning theories and as a result of factor analysis he proved that there exist three independent personality dimensions, namely neuroticism, extroversion-introversion and psychoticism (Cüceloğlu, 1991). These dimensions are independent of intelligence and have consistently emerged as second order or super factors from large-scale factor analytic studies. The construct of psychoticism was described in detail and has subsequently been revised to describe and support the idea that high scorers have a greater probability and risk of psychotic illness (Eysenck, 1995). They are best described as solitary, not caring for people, troublesome, having difficulty in social interactions, cruel and inhumane, lacking feelings and empathy, and altogether insensitive. Alternatively, those high on psychoticism scores responded inappropriately to interpersonal cues, and tended to engage in disruptive and anti-social behaviours. Others have reported that high psychoticism youth socialize with those who might best be described as reckless or rebellious rather than conforming or studious (Mak et al., 2003).

Neuroticism is described as affect and emotional control. Low levels of neuroticism indicate emotional stability whereas high levels of neuroticism increase the likelihood of experiencing negative emotions (Howard & Howard, 1995). The term neuroticism does not necessarily refer to any psychiatric defect. A more proper term could be negative affectivity or nervousness (McCrae & John, 1992). Neurotics more frequently become unstable, worried, temperamental and sad; nevertheless resistant persons on the other hand need strong stimuli to be provoked (Howard & Howard, 1995).

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There is the relationship between parental personality and parenting behaviours. For example, supportive and nurturing parenting is positively associated with extraversion and openness (Metsapelto & Pulkkinen, 2003), agreeableness (Belsky, Crnic & Woodworth, 1995) and conscientiousness (Clark, Kochanska & Ready, 2000), and inversely related to neuroticism (Metsapelto & Pulkkinen, 2003). In contrast, negative, controlling parenting is positively associated with neuroticism and inversely related to agreeableness (Belsky et al., 1995; Losoya, Callor, Rowe & Goldsmith, 1997). According to Belsky and Barends (2002) psychological attributes of parents also influence the way parents manage their children. Parents prone to negative emotional states, such as depression, irritability and/or anger, tend to behave in less sensitive, less responsive and/or harsher ways than other parents.

Deviations between the reports given by children and their families regarding the problems of the children might reflect, even partially, perceptions of their parents for the reasons behind their children´s problems. Perceptions of parents about their children’s behaviours might be those children’s characteristics, such as gender, age, personality mood states (Bugental & Happaney, 2004; De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005). Caregiver depression and stress were related to greater discrepancies between caregiver and adolescent reports of problems (Youngstrom, Loeber & Stouthamer-Loeber, 2000) that asserted that maternal depression predicted greater discrepancies between adolescent and maternal reports of problems; mothers with increased levels of depression tended to report more problems for the adolescents than adolescents reported for themselves.

This study integrated the relationship between personality traits of both mothers and fathers and parents’ reports of adolescents’ problems, (1) the relationship between personality traits of mothers and their reports of adolescents’ problems, (2) the relationship between personality traits of fathers and their reports of adolescents’ problems are among the goals of this study.

2. METHOD

2.1. Participants

The participants consisted of 389 (229 female and 160 male) randomly selected adolescents and parents whose ages range from 12-15. Of the adolescents in the study 21.85% (n=85) were age 12, 26.22 % (n=102) age 13, 23.36% (n=87) age of 14 and 29.56% (n=160) age 15. Other parental socio-demographical characteristics of the mothers, 46.01% (n=179) have elementary education, 20.56% (n=80) have secondary education, 21.85% (n=85) have high school education and 11.56% of them (n=45) have university education. Of the fathers in the study, 33.67 % (n=131) have elementary education, 23.65% (n=92) have secondary education, 26.22% (n=102) have high school education and 16.45% (n=64) have university education.

2.2. Instruments

Child Behaviour Checklist (CBCL/4-16). The scale was developed by Achenbach (1992) and was the first of what has become a multi-axial, empirically-based set of measures for assessing children from parents. It was adapted to Turkish by Erol et al. (1997), which measures consist of 112 statements about how the respondents have thought or felt about themselves within the past 6-month period, employing

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a 3-point scale (0-2). The CBCL and instruments include measurement of the following two dimensions: externalizing and internalizing, and eight constructs, withdrawn, somatic complaints, anxious/depressed, social problems, thought problems, attention problems, delinquent problems, and aggressive behaviour. Externalizing problems includes delinquent problems and aggressive behaviour; internalizing problems include social withdrawl, somatic complaints, anxiety/depression, and problems that don’t fit into either group, social problems, thought problems, attention problems. The scale is set to be .84 for the Turkish test-repeating test reliability, and total problem; the scale’s internal consistency, Cronbach alpha coefficient is found to be .82 for introversion, .81 for extraversion, and .88 for the total problem.

Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ): The scale was developed by Eysenck and Eysenck (1975). In the adaptation of the EPQ to Turkish (Bayar, 1983), the scale can be applied to participants at the of 16 or older. Inventory consists of 100 questions. Eysenck and Eysenck suggested that all of the personal traits could be reduced to three dimensions; P (Psychoticism), N (Neuroticism) and E (Extraversion). Scale’s test-retest reliability coefficients were said to range from .78 to .84. Concerning inner consistency of the test and Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, it was determined .70, for total scale, and introversion .82, extraversion .81.

2.3. Data Analysis

In order to identify the range of adolescents’ ages, gender, and parents’ educational level, the data were analyzed t test, MANOVA. Also, in order to investigate the relationship between parents’ personality traits and their perception of adolescents’ problems were analyzed by means of correlation analysis.

3. FINDINGS

The findings of reports mothers’ concerning adolescents’ behaviour problem from the point of gender are located in Table 1.

As can be seen in Table 1, when we analyse whether there is a change in perceptions of mother concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems; in diffidence (t2=3.70, p<.05), anxiety-depression (t=9.20, p<.05) and internalised behaviour problems (t2=4.56, p<.05) the difference was found to be meaningful and it was identified that the average of girls was greater than that of boys.

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Table 1 Result of analysis of reports mothers’ concerning adolescents’ behaviour problem from the point of gender.

Behaviour problems Gender n M SD t- Value

Social Withdrawn Somatic Complaints Anxiety-depression Social Problems Thought Problems Attention Problems Destructive Behaviours Aggression Sexual Problems Internalised Behaviour Problems Externalised Behaviour Problems Total Behaviour Problems

Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy

229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160

4.02 3.27 5.32 5.06 8.22 6.24 3.12 3.42 2.67 2.38 4.65 4.36 2.06 2.31 8.26 8.34 .69 .74

17.57 14.58 10.32 10.65 39.04 36.16

3.54 4.01

4.95 5.61 6.62 5.73 3.18 3.53 2.45 2.77 3.71 4.03 3.57 4.17 7.49 8.45 1.49 1.98

13.29 13.73 10.30 11.76 30.14 34.25

3.70*

.237

9.20*

.732

1.17

.505

.396

.010

.080

4.56*

.085

.760

p<.01** p<.05* n=389

Finding of reports fathers’ concerning adolescents’ behaviour problem from the point of gender are located in Table 2.

As can be seen in Table 2, when we analyse whether there is a change in perceptions of father concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems; in diffidence (t2=8.55, p<.05), anxiety-depression (t2=6.71, p<.01), thought problems (t2=3.94, p<.05) and internalised behaviour problems (t2=4.91, p<.05) the difference was found to be meaningful in relation to gender and it was identified that average points of girls was more than that of boys.

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Table 2 Result of analysis of reports fathers concerning adolescents’ behaviour problems from the point of gender

Behaviour problems Gender n M SS t- Value

Social Withdrawn Somatic Complaints Anxiety-depression Social Problems Thought Problems Attention Problems Destructive Behaviours Aggression Internalised Behaviour Problems Externalised Behaviour Problems Total Behaviour Problems

Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy Girl Boy

229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160 229 160

4.16 3.10 6.08 5.41 8.19 6.48 3.26 3.50 2.85 2.33 4.34 4.04 2.83 2.78

18.44 15.00 11.98 10.55 41.97 36.36

3.45 3.56 6.17 6.70 6.32 6.47 3.35 3.44 2.35 2.72 3.54 3.80 4.48 4.60

14.45 15.85 12.54 12.67 35.04 38.03

8.55*

1.04

6.71**

.487

3.94*

.640

.012

4.91*

1.22

2.24

p<.01** p<.05* n=389

Findings of reports of mothers’ concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems from the point of education levels are located in Table 3.

As can be seen in Table 3, the difference was found meaningful among reports of mothers concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems from the point of education levels, social withdrawn, anxiety-depression and internalised behaviour problems. Mothers who graduated from primary school reported more anxiety-depression and internalised behavioural problems than those graduated from secondary school, high school and university.

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Table 3 MANOVA results of analysis of reports of mothers concerning adolescent behaviour problems from the point of education level

Behaviour Problems

Education Level of Mother (graduated)

n M SD F p

Social Withdrawn

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

8.48 7.77 7.14 7.50

2.92 3.33 3.10 4.39

3.50**

.016

Somatic Complaints

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

7.46 6.09 5.64 5.25

13.45 4.50 4.54 3.82

1.03

.379

Anxiety-depression

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

11.17 10.31 9.44 8.79

6.61 6.19 5.54 6.09

2.45*

.063

Social Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

7.10 7.23 6.13 6.72

3.51 3.62 3.84 3.66

.64

.589

Thought Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

4.03 3.97 3.56 3.34

1.98 2.06 2.11 2.02

1.99

.114

Destructive Behaviours

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

6.34 5.72 5.52 5.70

3.63 3.85 3.52 4.12

1.15

.326

Destructive Behaviours

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

2.21 1.95 2.34 1.88

2.45 1.93 2.85 1.91

.54

.651

Aggressive Behaviour

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

7.52 7.02 7.58 7.34

5.41 5.80 5.48 4.64

.17

.913

Internalizing Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

27.12 24.19 22.22 21.54

17.85 11.17 11.22 10.85

2.98*

.031

Externalizing Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

9.74 8.98 9.93 9.22

7.04 6.74 7.14 5.47

.32

.811

Total Problems Primary School Secondary School High School University

179 80 85 45

57.11 52.59 50.72 49.20

28.48 23.38 23.50 21.34

.84

.138

** p<0.01, *p<0.05 n=389

Findings of reports of fathers’ concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems from the point of education levels are located in Table 4.

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Table 4 MANOVA results of analysis of reports fathers’ concerning adolescents’ behaviour problems from the point of education level

Behaviour Problems

Education Level of Father (graduated)

n __ X

ss F p

Social

Withdrawn

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

8.19 8.60 7.93 6.86

2.96 3.08 3.71 3.30

3.58*

.014

Somatic Complaints

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

6.99 7.34 6.64 4.66

10.73 14.41 4.64 3.30

1.011

.388

Anxiety-depression

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

10.12 10.64 9..23 8.27

6.82 5.56 6.59 5.87

2.89*

.035

Social Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

7.11 7.66 7.02 6.06

3.64 3.75 3.79 3.24

2.27

.079

Thought Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

3.84 4.17 3.88 3.22

2.19 1.84 2.20 1.79

2.60

.052

Destructive Behaviours

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

6.00 6.44 6.37 4.89

3.72 3.71 4.11 3.17

2.44

.064

Destructive Behaviours

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

2.14 2.48 2.14 1.98

2.60 2.57 2.47 1.85

.586

.625

Aggressive Behaviour

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

7.23 7.65 8.09 7.16

5.48 5.87 5.61 5.00

.556

.644

Internalizing Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

25.84 26.59 25.81 19.79

16.03 18.15 11.96 10.24

2.99*

.031

Externalizing Problems

Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

9.38 10.13 10.23 9.15

7.23 7.45 7.12 5.88

.501

.682

Total Problems Primary School Secondary School High School University

131 92 102 64

54.91 57.61 56.33 45.86

27.69 28.98 24.74 20.16

2.72*

.044

** p<0.01, *p<0.05 N=389

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As can be seen in Table 4, the difference was found meaningful among reports of fathers concerning adolescents’ behavioural problems from the point of education levels, social withdrawn, anxiety-depression and internalised behaviour problems and total problems. Fathers who graduated from secondary school reported more social withdrawn, anxiety-depression and internalised behaviour problems and total problems than those graduated from primary school, high school and university.

The correlation between personality traits of mothers and their reports of adolescent problems are located in Table 5.

Table 5 The correlations between personality traits mothers and their reports of adolescent problems

Neuroticism Psychoticism Extraversion

Social Withdrawn .152** .196** -.075

Somatic Complaints .225** .195** -.053

Anxiety/Depression .135** .288 -.027

Social Problems .216** .173** -.004

Thought Problems .131** .136** -.057

Attention Problems .113* .176** -.031

Delinquent Behaviour .285** .131** -.008

Aggressive Behaviour .141** .209** .029

Internalizing Problems .191** .264** -.052

Externalizing Problems .201** -.199** .022

Total Problems .223** .229** -.027 Correlation is significant at the 0.05 and 0.01 level.

As seen in Table 5, while there has been a significant correlation between mothers’ character traits of psychoticism and neuroticism and neurotic levels and their perception of social withdrawn, somatic complaints, anxiety/depression, social problems, thought problems, delinquent behaviour, aggressive behaviour, internalizing problems, externalizing problems, and total problems (p<.01) in adolescences; there found a positive significant relationship between mothers’ psychotic levels and their perception of attention problems in adolescences (p<0,05 ); no relationship between mothers’ psychoticism levels and their perception of anxiety-depression in adolescents was found. Moreover, no reasonable relationship between mothers’ extraversion levels and behaviour problems of adolescents were found.

The correlation between fathers’ personality traits and their reports of adolescents´ problems are located in Table 6.

As seen in Table 6, while there has been a significant correlation between fathers’ character traits of psychoticism and neuroticism levels and their perception of social withdrawal, somatic complaints, anxiety/depression, social problems, thought problems, delinquent behaviour, aggressive behaviour, internalizing problems, externalizing problems, and total problems (p<.01) in adolescents. No reasonable relationship between fathers’ extraversion levels and behaviour problems of adolescents have been reported.

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Table 6 The correlation between fathers’ personality traits and their reports of adolescent problems

Behaviour problems Neuroticism Psychoticism Extraversion

Social Withdrawn .219** .273** -.044

Somatic Complaints .237** .219** -.043

Anxiety/Depression .189** .227** -.038

Social Problems .257** .237** .009

Thought Problems .285** .231** .003

Attention Problems .214** .226** -.094

Delinquent Behaviour .387** .229** -.011

Aggressive Behaviour .268** .289** -.024

Internalizing Problems .230** .271** -.046

Externalizing Problems .332** .290** -.018

Total Problems .305** .300** -.032

* Correlation is significant between .05 and .01 levels.

4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The main objective of this study was to examine the relation between personality traits of parents and parents’ reports of adolescent problems. First of all, it was observed that mothers reported more

unsociable, anxious-depressive and internalizing behaviour problems in their daughters compared to sons; while similarly, fathers reported more unsociable, anxious-depressive, thought problems and internalized behaviour problems in their daughters compared to sons. It has been observed that when such acquired results are compared to literature, some similarities have been found (Horwitz, Leaf, Leventhal, Forsyth & Speechley, 1992; Offer & Schonert-Reichwl, 1992; Albayrak-Kaymak, 1994; Gaoni, Black & Baldwin, 1998; Stormont, 2002; Erol, Kılıç, Ulusoy, 1998; Hill, 2002; Prinzie, et. al., 2005).

Another finding of the research has been that mothers who are primary school graduates have reported more anxious-depressive and internalizing problems in adolescents; while elementary school graduate fathers have reported more anxious-depressive, internalizing problems as well as total behaviour problems in adolescents. Thus, one can conclude that educational levels of parents may affect the equality of sharing and the level of communication with the adolescent, which enables parents to develop a positive relationship with the adolescent. In another study, which shows similarities to such findings, it is stated that if the father does not have sufficient information on development and education of his child due to being poorly educated, this will affect the adolescent negatively (Başar, 1996). It is also claimed that as the education level of fathers increase, the possibility of showing affection towards their child also increases, while punishments decrease (Bilir & Güneysu, 1988). As an element to be evaluated in relation to mothers’ education, it has been emphasized that what determines the relationship between mother and child is whether it bases on attention, affection, and trust rather than whether she is a working mother or not. (Ekşi, 1999; Yeşilyaprak, 2003)

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Results indicated that there are positive relationships between mothers’ and fathers’ psychoticism and neuroticism levels and parents’ reports of adolescents’ problems. According to this, as psychoticism and neuroticism levels in parents’ personality increase, they reported more behaviour problems in adolescents. The results seemed to convey parallelism with Forehand, Wells, McMahon, Griest & Rogers, (1982) of results. A number of researchers have cautioned clinicians against overreliance on mothers' perceptions of their children's deviant behaviours and have suggested that mothers may inaccurately label their children as deviant due to their own personal adjustment problems, including depression, anxiety, and marital dissatisfaction. Belsky et. al., (1995) describe that, for mothers and fathers, neuroticism was consistently associated with less sensitive, less affective, and less stimulating parenting. Mothers high in negative emotionality and disagreeableness showed more negative effect. Kochanska et. al., (1997) found that mothers with low scores on emotional stability expressed more negative effect in interactions with their children. In addition, mothers’ high negative emotionality, linked to excessive self-focus, may impair responsive parenting (Dix, 1991). Parental depression and psychopathology have been found to influence ratings of child behaviour problems by parents of children with behaviour problems (Brody & Forehand, 1986; Forehand et al., 1986; Jensen, Traylor, Xenakis & Davis, 1998; Akçakın, 1983).

Another finding of this study was the positive correlation between fathers’ character traits and their reports of adolescents’ problems. Lahey, Conger, Atkeson & Treiber (1984) suggested that mothers who are depressed or distressed may have a lower tolerance-threshold for child misbehaviour, which may cause them to respond more negatively and to see their children as more deviant. On the other hand, these data seem to suggest that fathers may cope with stress and child problems differently than mothers. However, fathers may provide a different but not inaccurate picture of the problem child's behaviours (Webster-Stratton, 1988). Oliver, Guerin and Coffman (2009) determined that fewer direct links exist between fathers’ personality and adolescent outcomes compared to those found for mothers.

To the degree that direct effects are the result of modelling, time spent with each parent may be a salient factor. Steinberg and Silk (2002) indicated that adolescents spend more time and communicate more with their mothers than fathers. Paulson and Sputa (1996) said that adolescents, mothers, and fathers all agreed that mothers were more involved with and did more activities with their adolescents than fathers. Although some studies showed that numerous factors contribute to individual differences in parenting behaviour, parental personality has been assigned a major role by some theorists (Vondra, Sysko & Belsky, 2005) because it relates to both the way mothers and fathers execute the parental role as well as to the quality of their close relationships (Belsky & Barends, 2002).

However, there are several limitations of the study that should be noted. First, mother and fathers’ perception of adolescences’ behavioural problems were analysed from the point of their character traits and mothers-fathers’ other perceptiual factors were not included in the study. Moreover, there is a limitation due to lack of comparison between fathers and mother via clinical sample. Despite these limitations, the present study showed that parental personality, specifically psychotic and neurotic dimension, is predictive for perception of behaviour adolescence as well as maladaptive parenting practices.

Under the light of such findings, in accordance with understanding of modern education, there has been a need for protecting adolescent psychological welfare and supporting their healthy personal improvements. In this sense, parents’ capacity to solve their own psychological problems seems to be very important for adolescences to evolve suitable behaviours against their developing and changing character traits. Therefore, it will be hugely beneficial to supply psychological support to those parents and adolescences that are at risk of behaviour problems from the point of psychological condition via School-based preventive studies in the scope of Psychological Consulting and Guidance services.

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This article has been taken from Doctoral Dissertation “The Relationship Between From 12-15 Age Secondary School Students Behavioural Problems by Family Functionings and Parent’s Personality Features”. DEU. 2008; and also presented at İzmir 18. Conference Of Educational Sciences, İzmir, 3-5 October 2009.