Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

8-2004

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Human Ecology

Major Professor

Julia A. Malia

Committee Members

Priscilla W. Blanton, Diane A. Klein, Gary W. Peterson

Abstract

There is a lack of studies addressing aspects of parent/adolescent relationships in the Sub-Sahara African region. It has been assumed, due to closely knight Sub-Sahara African family and kin networks, adolescents’ respect for elders, and ancestor reverence, that adolescents in that culture may function differently compared to those reared in European/American societies; they instead may be more similar to adolescents in the collectivistic societies of Asia. The purpose of this study is to examine perceptions of youth in Kenya regarding their parents’ parenting behaviors and adolescents’ development of self-esteem. The study is part of a larger cross-national project examining parent-adolescent relationships and adolescents’ social competence that has been conducted at specific sites within several countries. The analysis in the present study used self-report data that were acquired from 630 Kenyan adolescents. Participants, both females and males, were recruited using a convenience strategy from four high schools in three administrative provinces in Kenya that were targeted in order to minimize differences across ethnic and cultural groups. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed parental guidance (i.e., providing support and reasoning) from both parents to be a positive predictor of adolescents’ self-esteem, whereas parental punitiveness (especially mothers’) was found to be a negative predictor. Although parental monitoring and autonomy granting had been identified as likely viable constructs to include in this study, they failed to be significant predictors of adolescents’ self-esteem for our sample. Despite the fact that the results of this study show a similar pattern for both parental guidance (support and reasoning) and punitiveness as that demonstrated among both European/American and Asian societies, possible explanations for the Kenyan results may differ from those of both European/American and Asian societies. The results of this study point to unique differences in how Kenyan adolescents’ perceptions of their parents’ behaviors relate to the adolescents’ self-esteem. This study highlights the need for initiating culture-specific studies in Sub-Sahara Africa in order to find clues to existing parenting styles and behaviors and their influence on adolescents’ self-esteem in the region.

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