Effect of parental rearing styles on adolescent ego identity: the mediating role of involutionary attitudes

Yan Ding; Changan Sun; Bo Dong

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1292718

Effect of parental rearing styles on adolescent ego identity: the mediating role of involutionary attitudes

Front Psychol. 2024 Jan 31:14:1292718. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1292718. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Yan Ding^{1

2}, Changan Sun¹, Bo Dong¹

Affiliations

¹ School of Education, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, Suzhou, China.
² Qianhuang Experimental Senior High School, Changzhou, China.

Abstract

Previous studies have found that negative parental rearing styles can negatively predict the acquisition of ego identity, while it has not been discussed whether the overcompetitive attitudes, a stable personality, will further hinder their ego identity development under the model of educational involutionary. The study used the Overcompetitive Attitude Scale, the Brief Parental Rearing Styles Questionnaire, and the Ego Identity Status Scale to investigate 550 young students in a school in Suzhou in order to explore the influence of parental rearing styles on adolescents' ego identity development and the role of involutional attitudes. The results showed that: (1) Adolescents' overcompetitive attitude was positively predicted by parental rejection and overprotection, while it was negatively predicted by parental emotional warmth. (2) Parental emotional warmth significantly predicted adolescents' ego identity status more favorably than parental rejection, overprotection, and overcompetitive attitude. (3) Overcompetitive attitude plays a partial intermediary role between parental rearing style and ego identity.

Keywords: adolescent; ego identity; involution; overcompetitive attitude; parental rearing styles.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32100841 and 32100842), the MOE Project of Humanities and Social Sciences Grant (20YJC190002), the Project of Social Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (20YJC008), Jiangsu University Philosophy and Social Science Research Project (2019SJA1267), and the Qing Lan Project of Jiangsu Universities.