Parent-child relationship quality and adolescent health: Testing the differential susceptibility and diathesis-stress hypotheses in African American youths.

Nila Shakiba, Mengyu Miranda Gao, Elisabeth Conradt, Sarah Terrell, Barry M Lester

Child development 2022 Jan

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This study tested two competing models of differential susceptibility and diathesis-stress in a prospective longitudinal study of African American youths (N = 935). It examined whether individual variations in the functioning of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis at age 11 interact with middle childhood parent-child relationship quality to predict mental and physical health problems in adolescence (ages 11-15 years old). Adolescent boys with lower levels of cortisol reactivity to laboratory challenges had the highest levels of internalizing problems if they experienced a high conflictual relationship with their parents. Equally low-reactive boys, however, reported the lowest number of physical illnesses if their relationship with their parents was characterized by high levels of intimacy and support. © 2021 The Authors. Child Development © 2021 Society for Research in Child Development.

Citation

Nila Shakiba, Mengyu Miranda Gao, Elisabeth Conradt, Sarah Terrell, Barry M Lester. Parent-child relationship quality and adolescent health: Testing the differential susceptibility and diathesis-stress hypotheses in African American youths. Child development. 2022 Jan;93(1):269-287