Chapter 1 16 Indeed, the concept of reciprocity between parents and adolescents has been integrated into many (but not all) parenting theories, from early (Bell, 1968; Patterson, 1982) to contemporary theories (Granic et al., 2008; Lougheed & Keskin, 2021; Sameroff, 2010). Hence, scholars generally agree that parenting, especially parenting adolescents, can best be operationalized as a two-way street (Kuczynski & Parkin, 2007; Soenens & Vansteenkiste, 2020). Rather than being passive recipients of their parents’ behavior, adolescents exhibit agency and actively choose their responses. For example, adolescents have the agency to decide whether to comply with their parents’ demands (Darling et al., 2007) or to disclose personal information (Smetana, 2008). Additionally, how adolescents function, such as how they behave or feel, is likely to elicit certain parenting behaviors. For instance, externalizing problems may elicit more controlling and rejecting behavior from parents in an attempt to reduce their adolescent’s problem behavior, which may further reinforce the adolescent’s externalizing problems (Patterson & Fisher, 2002). Similarly, adolescents who experience negative emotions or depressive symptoms may elicit a supportive parental reaction or even face parental rejection (Rudolph, 2009). Thus, according to the widely acknowledged theoretical principle of reciprocity, the dynamic processes within families flow not only from parenting to adolescent functioning (i.e., parent-driven influence) but also from adolescent functioning to parenting (i.e., adolescent-driven influence), as depicted in Figure 2 below. 1.5 Timescales: Processes between parenting and adolescent functioning unfold over time at varying timescales As previously described (see 1.3), parenting adolescents is understood as a highly dynamic phenomenon. Parenting practices vary over time and across different situations. For instance, parents need to adjust their behavior to the changing needs of their developing adolescent (Darling & Steinberg, 1993). Additionally, parents’ own psychological functioning (e.g., experience of stress) fluctuates over time, for example because of workrelated experiences, impacting how they behave towards their adolescent (Belsky, 1984). As such, on one day, a parent may behave warmer or more demanding toward their adolescent than on the previous day due to internal or external influences. These over-time fluctuations in parenting practices (or in overarching dimensions) are thought to impact the functioning of adolescents, and vice versa. All earlier described theories on human development and parenting (see 1.1 to 1.4) indeed propose that the dynamic processes between parenting and adolescent functioning unfold over time. For example, psychologically controlling parenting is thought to hamper adolescents’
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