The role of self-esteem in the relationship between parental support and monitoring and adolescents’ social initiative among adolescents in mainland China

ABSTRACT

Previous literature demonstrates that parental support and parental monitoring play an essential role in adolescents’ social competence and their self-esteem. In addition, the relationship between self-esteem and adolescents’ social initiative has been examined. However, little is known about the underlying mechanism of the associations among parental support, parental monitoring, and social initiative. The purpose of this research project was to examine the role of self-esteem in the relationship between parental connection and adolescents’ social initiative among adolescents in mainland China. Self-report data were acquired for this research project from the 589 adolescents who attended secondary schools in Hangzhou and participated in the Cross-National Study of Adolescence. Results of structural equation modelling indicated that adolescents’ self-esteem mediated the association between paternal, not maternal, connection and adolescents’ social initiative. There was no direct effect between maternal connection to adolescents’ social initiative. Limitations and suggestions for future research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Adolescence
• parental connection
• parental monitoring
• parental support
• self-esteem
• social initiative

Introduction

Self-esteem plays an important role in adolescent development. Youth with poor self-esteem are more likely to have negative consequences in their life, such as worse physical health and higher incarceration rates (Trzesniewski et al., 2006). Several studies have examined the relationship between self-esteem and adolescent social initiative and social initiative within the family context to learn how to get higher levels of self-esteem among adolescents. Adolescents’ social initiative is a particular form of youth social competence, which is an important ability to initially connect to the social world (Barber & Erickson, 2001). Although social competence generally occurs outside of the family (Barber & Erickson, 2001), parent-child relationships have the most influence on youth social initiative, because parent-child relationships are typically the earliest interpersonal connection that adolescents have in life. Adolescents with negative family functioning are more likely to have lower levels of social competence. Moreover, different parental styles are associated with social initiative, and even the quality of the parent-child relationship may impact adolescents’ social behaviours (Zhou et al., 2021). Self-esteem has been examined as the mediator effect in the relationship between social attachment and social competence as the individual characteristic variable (Barber & Erickson, 2001). Barber and Erickson (2001) showed that self-esteem is associated with social initiative among adolescents.

In addition to youth social initiative, the family also plays a critical role in youth self-esteem by helping them learn how to react to outsiders, have multiple kinds of relationships, shape various personalities, and develop age-appropriate levels of commitment (Van der Graaff et al., 2012). According to multiple studies, positive parental behaviours are correlated with adolescents’ self-esteem. Researchers indicated that there is a small to moderate positive relationship between certain parenting behaviours/styles and self-esteem (Pinquart & Gerke, 2019). Parenting styles can be combinations of various parenting behaviours. Among these behaviours, parental support was found to be positively related to adolescent self-esteem emotionally (Lim et al., 2015), while one study found parental knowledge (e.g. a proxy for parental monitoring) to be the only factor that directly predicts self-esteem (Peterson et al., 2004). Thus, parental reaction and behaviour are essential, precise, purposeful actions that parents use to socialize and direct their offspring. In this study, we investigate social initiative, parental behaviours, and self-esteem together in the same model. We examine the effects of parental connection (i.e. support and monitoring/knowledge) on adolescents’ social initiative, and self-esteem as the mediator between parental behaviours and social initiative. More specifically, we hypothesize that self-esteem will mediate the effects between parental connection and adolescents’ social initiative. Also, the relationship between self-esteem and social initiative was less studied by researchers in the past. In this research project, we also examine the relationship between adolescents’ self-esteem and social initiative, specifically within a Chinese context. Moreover, based on the literature review, we further hypothesize that there is a positive relationship between self-esteem and social initiative.

Literature review

Family context and social initiative

Barber and Erickson stated that social competence facilitates adolescent interpersonal relationships. Social competence can help adolescents engage in social activities with either group relationships or interpersonal relationships (Barber & Erickson, 2001). Social initiative, one form of social competence, is defined as social engagement, leadership, establishing boundaries, expressing one’s demands, sociability, and the capacity to discern other people’s emotions (Hillaker et al., 2008; Huber et al., 2018). Social initiative also has been found to be directly related to discrimination. The higher the levels of social initiative are, the lower perceived discrimination against Chinese left-behind adolescents, and thus social initiative helps prevent the development of mental illnesses, such as depression (Zhao et al., 2020). Socially competent adolescents are more likely to be self-determined and achievement oriented, while largely influenced by the ecological social environment (family, school, community, and peer) of adolescents (Barber & Erickson, 2001).

Positive parent-child interactions were reported to be able to buffer adolescents’ view of parent-child disputes (Azam & Hanif, 2011). Social initiative in youth and adolescents are influenced by supportive parent-child connections of high quality. Hillaker et al. (2008) found that supportive family relationships and positive family communication contribute to the development of social competencies and positive values, independence, and contribute to the quality of parent-child relationships. Adolescents’ perceptions of parenting processes (e.g. positive values, social competencies, positive family communication, and supportive family relationships) decline as they age, but the impact of parenting on adolescent outcomes does not decline. Throughout early adolescence, parental contributions to fundamental adolescent competence continue to be a significant factor to effective youth development.

The parent-adolescent relationship is one of the crucial antecedents of the development of adolescents’ social initiative (Barber & Erickson, 2001). Barber and Erickson (2001) conducted a longitudinal study with two cohorts (ages 14 to 16 and 11 to 13) to examine what social ecology factors impact adolescents’ interpersonal relationships (e.g. parent-adolescent, peer-relationships, adolescent-teacher relationships, etc.) and their social competence across time. Results indicated that the parent-adolescent relationship positively correlates with adolescent social initiative. Specifically, parental support was found to affect the social initiative of adolescents aged between 14 and 16 over time, which means that the more perceived supportive parental behaviours, the stronger social initiative that adolescents have. Compared to the older cohort, although the same finding showed that parental support had an impact on younger (11–13) adolescents’ social initiative in the sample, parental behaviour control (parental monitoring) also influences younger adolescents’ social initiative greatly. However, this finding did not appear in the older (14–16) cohort (Barber & Erickson, 2001).

Parental connection (parental support, parental knowledge/monitoring), and self-esteem

Rosenberg (1965) defines self-esteem as how people evaluate themselves, and how they view the value of themselves. Based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs model (Ormrod, 2018), it is more likely that adolescents achieve personal accomplishments, such as academic achievement, and social competence when their psychological needs are met. Once the children’s psychological needs are satisfied, the belief in their ability to achieve, as well as learning strategies, may be developed positively along with autonomous motivation (Pomerantz et al., 2005). Jiang et al. (2011) found that self-esteem has indirect effects on autonomous motivation and the perception of parental support on academic performance for Latino American adolescents, but the same result does not appear in the sample of Asian adolescents. This impact could be explained by the cultural environment. Steinberg et al. (1992) argued that individual self-esteem is not focused on as much within Chinese culture.

Research has shown that although the main connection of adolescents shifts from their parents to their peers, parental support and parental knowledge (i.e. proxy for monitoring) still play an important role in adolescent development (Chapman et al., 2013). In research conducted by Lim, You, and Ha (2013), parental support scores and adolescent self-esteem were positively correlated with each other in their Korean sample. Happiness and satisfaction in life also showed an increase in levels when there was an increase in parental support scores. Furthermore, they did one more step to measure maternal and paternal emotional support. Results showed a significant positive effect of these supports on adolescent self-esteem. The data indicated that parental emotional support would help adolescents to achieve greater self-esteem. With a higher level of self-esteem, adolescents are more likely to create emotional bonds and personal relationships than others. Although in this study, Lim and colleagues suggested that females are more likely to show the possibilities of creating bonds and relationships. Gender was not actually an influential factor that affected overall self-esteem within this Korean sample.

In another study conducted by Qurban et al. (2019), they pointed out that there was no direct relationship between adolescent self-esteem and sports participation among Chinese students. Indeed, while considering parental support as a mediator in this relationship, higher self-esteem and motivation may work towards a higher level of sports participation. As a result, it is possible that parental support or parents’ behaviours indirectly affect adolescent self-esteem in the model in China. Gender differences were also examined in this study. However, Hunter et al. (2015) did not find the effect of maternal and paternal support mediating adolescent self-esteem in the U.S. sample. One possible explanation could be that they included additional factors such as parental control so that the relationship between self-esteem and parental support got impacted. The results might also be affected by cultural differences.

Not only parental support but also parental monitoring (i.e. proxy for monitoring) is a big factor in influencing self-esteem. Peterson et al. (2004) found that maternal knowledge was the only factor that directly predicted self-esteem among their sample of Chinese adolescents. Parental support indirectly predicted self-esteem, with autonomy mediating the relationship. In a study conducted by Shen (2011), she also found that parental control (including both autonomy-granting and monitoring) predicted adolescents’ school outcomes mediated by self-esteem. In a cross-cultural study conducted by Lee and Randolph (2015), they found that American adolescents were more likely to decrease the number of aggressive behaviours with an increasing amount of parental monitoring, while this effect was not observed in the Korean sample. On the other hand, in both cultures, parental monitoring was mediated by self-esteem and substance use in the relationship with aggressive behaviours. In other words, increased parental monitoring would result in higher self-esteem levels, which in turn decreased the number of aggressive behaviours.

These findings from different cultures give us possible reasons to combine parental support and parental knowledge (i.e. proxy for monitoring) together. We use the term parental connection to represent this variable which assess parenting behaviours, characteristic of parental support and parental knowledge of adolescent behaviours (including whereabouts of adolescent when they are not at home), representative of firm behavioural control. That is, we measure the extent to which adolescents perceive each parent as providing support and firm behavioural control via their parental knowledge of adolescents.

Social initiative and self-esteem

As mentioned before, social initiative is a specific form of adolescents’ social competence. Many studies have been conducted to investigate the influence of parenting behaviours on adolescents’ self-esteem and their social competence, but fewer studies have paid attention to examining the effect of self-esteem and adolescents’ social initiative specifically. A study byAgnieszka et al. (2021) examined the relationship between social competence, self-esteem, and the attendance of physical activity with 106 Polish adolescents. The result of the correlational analysis revealed that adolescents’ social competence is significantly related to self-esteem and the frequency of attending physical activities. Barber and Erickson (2001) found that self-esteem can be the antecedent of adolescents’ social initiative within U.S. samples. There is a positive association between self-esteem and U.S. adolescents’ social initiative. Also, self-esteem can predict adolescents’ social initiative later in life. However, to the best of our knowledge, no studies have examined the relationship between self-esteem and social initiative among Asian adolescents. It is not clear whether self-esteem is positively significantly associated with social initiative among Chinese adolescents. Therefore, we further examine the relationship between self-esteem and social initiative among Asian adolescents. We hypothesize that self-esteem will positively correlate with social initiative, and self-esteem will positively predict Asian adolescents’ social initiative.

Parental behaviors, self-esteem, and social initiative

In summary, the relationships between self-esteem and parental support in the Asian family context have been explicitly investigated, which are significantly and positively correlated with each other. In addition, among U.S. adolescents, social initiative is positively predicted by the positive parent-adolescent relationship and self-esteem separately. Therefore, we build on the previous works by examining the role of self-esteem in the relationship between parental connection and adolescent social initiative among Asian families. We hypothesize that self-esteem will mediate the effect between parental connection and adolescents’ social initiative. Specifically, we expect self-esteem will fully or partially mediate the relationship between parental connection and Chinese adolescent social initiative. Hunter et al. (2015) did not find the mediating effect of self-esteem between social initiative and parental support, which means that parental support directly affects adolescent social initiative. In the study by Hunter and colleagues, however, they examined more than one parental behaviour (e.g. psychological and behavioural control) rather than just parental support, and looked at the independent variables with not only adolescent social initiative but also their depression and antisocial behaviours with U.S. samples.

Moreover, the function of self-esteem in adolescents’ social initiative, especially in Asian contexts, is unclear. We also examine whether self-esteem is positively and significantly associated with social initiative among Asian adolescents, and thus we further hypothesize that self-esteem will positively correlate and predict Chinese adolescents’ social initiative.

Methods

Participants

Existing data from the Cross National Study of Adolescence (CNSA), which is a large cross sectional study that collected data from 11 different countries during the period of mid 1990’s and 2000’s, was used in this study. Only the Chinese sample in CNSA was utilized based on the purpose of the study.

The Chinese data was recruited from Hangzhou, China, a southern urban city in China, and the sample consisted of 589 adolescents (female = 336, male = 224, and 29 who did not report gender). All the participants ranged from seventh to twelfth grade, and the age was from 12–19, with a mean age of 15.76 years old.

Procedures

Chinese adolescent participants were recruited through middle and high schools in Hangzhou. Parents were informed about the study and adolescents participated with parental consent. All the different schools in China had participation rates above 90%. Students completed the survey in their classrooms, and no incentive was given. While probability sampling was not used in this study, the sample of participants was diverse in terms of sociodemographic characteristics (age, gender, and household demographic variables).

Since it was a cross-cultural study and we did not use local instruments, we needed to make sure the items in each scale were logical and made sense with the mandarin language and Chinese culture. The back translation technique (Riordan & Vandenberg, 1994; Rose, 1985) was used to reduce nonequivalent measurements. For example, the survey questions were translated into Chinese by independent bilingual translators. The reliability checking was conducted by the independent bilingual translators when back-translated into English, and the inconsistencies between the Chinese and English versions were also examined by other individual bilingual translators. The following scales were used in our study during data collection.

Measurements

Parenting

This study combined parental knowledge (i.e. a proxy for monitoring) and parental support as ‘parental connection’, which were measured by the Parent Behavior Measure (PBM, Peterson et al., 1985), which was a self-report instrument consisting of 4 items for parental support and 6 items for parental knowledge of the subscale of PBM to determine the degree of support they felt (e.g. This parent has made me feel that he or she would be there if I needed him or her; This parent knows where I am after school.), which used a Likert-type scale with a range from ‘Strongly Agree’ (4 points) to ‘Strongly Disagree’ (1 point) to measure participants responses. The instrument’s reliability and validity had been assessed and found to be trustworthy in other Chinese samples (e.g. Supple et al., 2004), which enhanced the confidence in the study’s findings. The Cronbach’s alpha for these scales was .75 and .74 for maternal and paternal scales separately.

Global self-esteem

To assess Chinese adolescents’ self-esteem, we used the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1979) which utilized a four-point Likert scale ranging from ‘strongly agree’ (4 points) to ‘strongly disagree’ (1 point). We utilized only the five positive valanced items based on previous research which suggested that self-derogation (using negative valanced items) is a conceptually distinct dimension from the positive items that were being measured (Bush, 2000, 2003; Owens, 1993, 1994). Therefore, only the remaining five positive items were used in the analysis, as they demonstrated adequate reliability. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was .69 for this scale.

Social initiative

Social initiative was measured with the 13 items from the Monitoring the Future Study (Bachman et al., 1993). This group of questions measured young people’s attempts to interact socially with peers and adults outside of the home and in group settings (e.g. I talk to teachers and staff about things other than class.). This set of questions consistently used a 5-item Likert-type scale, with 1 indicating never/almost never true and 5 indicating very often/always true. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was .78 for this scale.

Data analysis

In the study, we used the SPSS Amos Structural Equation Model (SEM) to explore the relationship between parental connection, social initiative, and self-esteem. Maximum likelihood was used to estimate a value for missing data in the analysis. The reliability of each scale was tested at first and they all had a moderate or higher (0.69–0.78) level of Cronbach alpha values. Since social initiative affects people on the group level and interpersonal level, we used the summary/scale variables to combine items representing group-level social initiative and interpersonal-level social initiative separately. In addition, the parenting behaviours of mothers (Figure 2) and fathers (Figure 1) were analysed individually. The mediation model was then created in SPSS Amos. Factor loadings and modification indices were assessed for each item in both models. The correlations between each survey item and their corresponding latent variable were measured. Both direct and indirect effects were assessed and labelled. We hypothesized that parental connection, social initiative, and self-esteem levels will be positively correlated with each other, with self-esteem mediating the relationship between parental connection and social initiative.

Figure 1. Model of zero-order correlation between paternal connection and social Initiative.

Figure of the model of zero-order correlation between paternal connection and social initiative was created in AMOS. Own Work.

Results

Figure 2. Model of zero-order correlation between maternal connection and social Initiative.

Figure of the model of zero-order correlation between maternal connection and social initiative was created in AMOS. Own Work.

Mediation model

Figure 3. Mediation model among paternal connection, self-esteem, and social initiative.

* p<.05 two tailed.

Figure of the mediation model among paternal connection, self-esteem, and social initiative was created in AMOS. Own Work.

As Table 1 shows, there is a significant positive correlation between paternal connection and adolescent’s social initiative (r = .17, p < .05). However, the table indicates that there is no correlation between maternal connection and adolescent’s social initiative (r = .12, p > .05). Additionally, there is also a significant positive correlation between self-esteem and social initiative (r = .38, p < .05) in the paternal model. In contrast, the results illustrate that there is a possible mediated relationship between paternal connection, adolescent’s social initiative and self-esteem. The correlation between paternal connection and social initiative (Table 2) has great fit index: CMIN/df = 2.691, IFI = .943, CFI = .942., RMSEA = .05.

Table 1. Zero-correlation for paternal and maternal connection of social initiative.

Variables	β	S.E.	C.R.
Paternal Connection → Social	.17*	.08	2.04
Maternal Connection → Social	.12	.08	1.48

β = standardized beta.

*p < .05 two tailed.

Table 2. Model fit indices of multiple-group models.

Models	CMIN/df	RMSEA	IFI	CFI
Model 1: Paternal Connection and Social Initiative (no mediator)	2.691	.05	.943	.942
Model 2: Paternal Connection and Social Initiative (mediator: Self-Esteem)	2.620	.05	.909	.907

RMSEA = the root mean square error of approximation, CFI = the comparative fit index

Mediation analysis was performed to assess the mediating role of self-esteem in the relationship between paternal connection and social initiative. The results (see Figure 3) indicated a significant indirect effect of paternal connection on social initiative (β = .075, p < .001). The total effect of paternal connection on social initiative was also significant (β = .127, p < .05). Results showed that self-esteem partially mediates the relationships between parental connection and social initiative. Thus, the hypothesis is supported.

Factor loadings and modification indices were assessed for each item in the mediation analysis to test the measurement model. The model-fit measures were used to assess the model’s overall goodness of fit. The mediation model between paternal connection and social initiative (Table 2) has good fit index: CMIN/df = 2.620, IFI = .909, CFI = .907., RMSEA = .05.

Discussion

The purpose of this research was to test the association among parental connection, self-esteem, and social initiative among Chinese adolescents, focusing on the mediation effect of Self-esteem. Specifically, whether adolescent self-esteem mediates the association between parental connection and social initiative of Chinese adolescents. The data from the Cross National Study of Adolescence (CNSA) was used to examine adolescent self-esteem as a mediator of the relationship between parental connection (parental support and knowledge) and adolescent outcome (social initiative) in a sample of adolescents from Mainland China. Since mothers and fathers have different functions and influence on adolescents, we were able to test the adolescent reports of maternal and paternal connection separately. We expected that self-esteem would mediate the relationship between parental connection and adolescence social initiative among adolescents in mainland China, and that self-esteem would positively correlate with adolescence social initiative. The hypotheses were examined with structural equation analysis using youth reports of parental connection, and self-reported self-esteem and social initiative.

Based on the zero-order correlation results, there was a significant positive correlation between paternal connection and adolescents’ social initiative. This finding suggests that when adolescents perceive connection related behaviours from father, it is likely to be associated with higher levels of social initiative as an outcome in adolescents. This is consistent with previous research suggesting that father support and monitoring can play an important role in promoting positive outcomes in adolescent development. Compared to mothers, the more children reported being supported by their fathers, the more likely they were to display initiative in engaging outside the home in the U.S (Stolz et al., 2005).

In contrast, there was no significant correlation between maternal connection and adolescents’ social initiative. This finding means that there may not be a strong relationship between maternal connection and adolescent social initiative. However, it is important to note that this finding does not necessarily mean that mothers are not important sources of support for their children in other ways. Maternal monitoring has been shown more significantly related to youth antisocial behaviours, especially in predicting boys’ antisocial behaviours (Stolz et al., 2005).

There could be several reasons why there was no significant correlation found between maternal connection and social initiative. One possible explanation is that maternal connection may not be the only factor that influences an adolescent’s social initiative. Additionally, it is possible that the way in which maternal connection was measured in the study was not sensitive enough to capture the full extent of its impact on social initiative. For example, the study only assessed maternal connection through adolescent self-report measures, which may not accurately reflect the level of support provided by the mother in reality.

The results of the mediation model supported the hypothesis that self-esteem will be positively related to adolescents’ social initiative. This finding further supports the previous research that self-esteem can predict adolescents’ social initiative (Barber & Erickson, 2001; Koszałka-Silska et al., 2021), at least in relation to fathers. The most interesting finding is that adolescents’ self-esteem partially mediates the relationship between paternal connection and social initiative, which supported our hypothesis on the mechanism of self-esteem for paternal connection. This finding suggests that paternal connection indirectly influenced adolescents’ social initiative through facilitating self-esteem. Which means than father influence may have significant influence on adolescents’ behavioural outcomes through self-esteem. In general, however, findings similarly align with previous research examining the mediating role of self-esteem in the relationship between general parental behavioural control and psychological control and adolescents’ positive developmental outcomes, such as prosocial behaviours, academic achievement, and social initiative (Barber & Erickson, 2001; Cao et al., 2022; Hunter et al., 2015; Jiang et al., 2011; Shao et al., 2018).

Our study found that paternal behaviours indirectly influenced adolescents’ social initiative through self-esteem. This result in someways is inconsistent with a study by Hunter et al. (2015) where both mother and father supportive behaviours have direct effects on adolescents’ social initiative. Barber et al. (2005) also examined the relationship between parental support and adolescents’ social initiative with U.S. adolescents, the result shows that parental support is more directly linked to the American adolescents’ social initiative. The differences between our findings and previous research can be considered as the cultural factors. Chinese culture has been historically viewed as the representative of collectivism, and family-culture traditionally plays a crucial role in every family (Bush et al., 2002; Chen, 2019). The more children perceived that their parents know about them, the more supportive feelings and higher self-esteem they have (Bush et al., 2002), and they may have higher belonginess in the family. In fact, the act of Chinese parents guiding their children’s behaviour through the use of rules, regulations, and monitoring their activities is considered to be supportive of their needs, and thus beneficial to their psychological needs turning into perceived competence, relatedness, and result in positive social competence outcome (Cao et al., 2022).

Bush et al. (2002) found that Chinese parents foster self-esteem by monitoring their behaviours of their young children. According to the research, results showed that the use of autonomy-granting behaviours fostered Chinese adolescents’ self-esteem. When adolescents can have the access to their peer relationships, it is helpful for them to build up connections with others. In the Chinese culture, collectivism plays an important role in it. Conformity is the key idea in collectivism which brings harmony and connectedness. In Shen’s research (Shen, 2011), parental support was found to predict conformity in the Chinese sample, which decreases their self-esteem levels. However, parental monitoring (including autonomy-granting behaviours) gives adolescents’ autonomy to stay away from the sense of conformity. Thus, it is reasonable that in our model, parental monitoring predicts more of social initiative in the mediation model. Also, the parental support items in the survey were general questions about whether adolescents feel that their parents support them. It could be harder for respondents to answer these questions than those specific questions in parental monitoring sections.

Limitation

Though the study contributed to the research on self-esteem as a mediator of parenting, there were also some noteworthy limitations. First, the data of our study are only from one city in mainland China, which is a limitation because adolescents in different cities or regions may have different experiences and behaviours. For example, adolescents in urban areas may have different lifestyles, attitudes, and social support networks than those in rural areas. Therefore, the results of this study may not be applicable to adolescents in other regions of China, as well as to adolescents in other Asian countries.

On the other hand, the model did not find a significant correlation between maternal connection and adolescent social initiative. This would imply that there may not be a strong relationship between maternal connection and adolescent social initiative. However, it is important to note that this finding does not necessarily mean that mothers are not an important source of support for their children in other ways. The study only focused on the relationship between maternal connection and adolescents’ social initiative without considering other potential factors that may have affected the results. Positive induction, where parents use reasoning and explanation to guide their children, can be an important aspect to consider when exploring maternal influence on social initiative. For instance, a mother who had positive experiences in school and a positive attitude towards social consequences might engage in positive induction by explaining to her child how certain behaviours can have a positive impact on others, thereby encouraging social initiative. By considering various factors, researchers can gain a more comprehensive understanding of how maternal influence shapes social initiative in children.

Then, the gender of the adolescents participating in the study may also be a factor. According to Stolz et al. (2005), they found that maternal monitoring has more significant influence on their sons in behavioural outcomes than daughters. We were not able to separate the gender of our sample because of sample size, and thus we do not know whether there will have potential correlation between maternal connection and social initiative on gender differences. Research suggests that there may be gender differences in the relationship between parental connection and adolescents’ social initiative, with maternal support potentially playing a more important role in promoting social initiative in adolescent girls. Additionally, in both cross-sectional and longitudinal studies, adolescent girls were more likely to perceive maternal parenting attributes as more positive than paternal parenting attributes (Dou et al., 2020). The association between maternal connection and adolescents’ social initiative may have been missed in the study since gender of adolescent differences were not taken into consideration.

Suggestions

Future research could replicate these results with a more varied sample of adolescents from different cultural, socioeconomic, and racial backgrounds. The relationships between parental connection, self-esteem, and social initiative may be more easily identified when this is done.

Using probability sampling could increase the likelihood that their study results are representative of the larger population. This can also help to improve the reliability and validity of the study. Since non-probability sampling was used in this study, the sample may not be an accurate representation of the larger population of adolescents in China.

Social initiative is personal ability, we do not know whether social initiative may be valued more in individualistic culture rather than collectivistic culture orientation, therefore, we suggest that future research could look at the role of social initiative within different cultural orientations (e.g. collectivism and individualism).

Additionally, positive induction and other related variables could be added to this model. Previous research (Bush et al., 2002) suggested that in Asian cultures such as Chinese samples, parental monitoring, positive induction, and other variables can work together to affect adolescents’ self-esteem. Factors such as positive induction measure additional components of parenting (e.g. using reasoning and explanation to connect their positive behaviours to positive consequences), rather than parental support alone. Thus, we thought it would be useful for future studies to include additional variables.

Last but not the least, including more samples from different time points can be beneficial. After several years, parental behaviours and knowledge about how to treat the adolescents can be very different from the past. Thus, data from different time points can result in various outcomes. A longitudinal study can be useful to assess these changes.

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Dr. William Boone and Dr. Darrel Davis for helpful comments on earlier drafts. We would like to thank them for their encouragement and guidance throughout the project.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The participants of this study did not give written consent for their data to be shared publicly, so due to the sensitive nature of the research supporting data is not available.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Miami University .