Adolescents' Perception of Parental Involvement in Schooling

Abstract

This study examines the types of parental involvement activities that adolescents are willing to support. It also investigates the extent to which adolescents' support is related to their gender and autonomy. The results showed that even though adolescents welcome most of the parental involvement activities, the support is generally stronger among girls than among boys and that parental physical attendance in school activities is not wished. Data also revealed a positive relationship between adolescents' openness to parental involvement activities and their level of work-orientation and identity. Gender effects are discussed in light of the hypothesis of girls' earlier maturation combined with greater receptiveness to social influence. Further, higher boys' work-orientation and girls' identity scores predict the likelihood of their support of a greater number of parental involvement activities. These results point out to the importance of taking into account adolescents' views of parental involvement activities when designing family-school partnerships programs.