Parenting Internalization and Correlations Between Parenting, Sentiments, and Self-satisfaction Variables in Adolescence and Adulthood

The transition from adolescence to adulthood is currently attracting increased attention in developmental psychology. According to Vygotsky, Bronfenbrenner, Erikson and Bruner’s developmental theories, increasing autonomy and self-concept development imply that relationships between young adults and parents change according to the internalization of this relationship and the development of new traits. Thus, different changes can be expected in the links between parental attitudes or style and such selfsatisfaction variables as self-esteem and subjective well-being on the one hand, and such sentiments as love and jealousy, on the other. Sentiments are differentiated from situationally determined emotions and represent more prolonged relationships. A two-group comparison design was used to examine these changes. Data were acquired from Russian- speaking Latvians in two age groups: ages 16-19 and 26-29. Six Likert-like scales were used to acquire data: a 30-item Parental Authority Questionnaire (PAQ), a 37-item Child Rearing Practices Report (CRPR), a 10-item Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem scale (RSES), Sternberg’s revised 45-item Love Scale, a 25-item Self-Report Jealousy Scale (SRJS), and a 39-item Berne Questionnaire of Subjective Well-Being (BSW). The hypothesis predicts that the links between parenting variables and self-esteem and subjective well-being on the one hand, and with love and jealousy on the other, will change during the transition from adolescence to adulthood. Results partially confirm the predictions.

Some theoreticians are convinced that only a theory that went through empirical intersubjective verification and quantitative analysis can be identified as scientific [39, 40]. This conviction seems to be fundamental for the modern understanding of science that emerged in the 17th century [57, 44]. Can such a general idea as internalisation proposed in different versions by Janet, Mead, Freud, and Vygotsky be verified empirically? There are sufficient data on simple subjectoriented external actions, sensory standards, and emotion transformed later into forms of internal regulation [55, 59, 28]. Is the internalisation of complicated social opinions and appraisals the same as that of simpler subject-oriented actions or emotion? Can we verify the transfer of external social interaction into internal self regulation?

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