Research suggests that adolescent health requires both reducing problem behavior and promoting the development of social competence. There is strong support for the influence of parenting practices on both aggressive and competent behavior. However, there has been little research to date focused on parental messages, or the verbal communication parents provide to their children, about aggressive and effective nonviolent responses to conflict. The present study used hierarchical regression to examine parental messages supporting fighting and parental messages supporting effective nonviolent responses to problem situations in relation to adolescent aggressive and effective nonviolent behavior. These relations were expected to be moderated by adolescent gender. Additionally, the unique influence of parental messages was explored, relative to the effects of parental behavioral modeling of antisocial and prosocial acts. Messages supporting fighting and messages supporting nonviolent responses were analyzed as distinct constructs in the current study, and were expected to produce different patterns of influence on each adolescent behavior. Discrepancies based on respondent (parent or adolescent) were also anticipated. Participants included a predominantly African American sample of 105 adolescents and a parent or caregiver, who were assessed as part of a larger project evaluating the effects of a neighborhood intervention. As hypothesized, youth reports of parental messages supporting nonviolent responses were significantly related to lower levels of youth aggression, even when controlling for parental modeling. Youth reports of parental messages supporting nonviolent responses also predicted higher levels of effective nonviolent behavior, but these effects could be better accounted for by parental modeling. Contrary to expectation, parental messages supporting fighting did not significantly predict adolescent aggression or effective nonviolent behavior, and only minimal support was found for the moderating influence of gender. As anticipated, youths’ perceptions of parental messages were better predictors of their behavior than were parents’ reports. Overall, the current study’s findings have important implications for violence prevention efforts, and call for continued research.

The purpose of the current studies was to identify messages that Latino parents communicate to their offspring about the use of legal and illegal drugs and to determine associations between parental messages and substance use outcomes. Previous research has identified parent-child communication as protective against tobacco, alcohol, and other drug use. However, most of these studies have failed to examine the specific messages communicated and those that have focused almost exclusively on non-Hispanic Caucasians. Study 1 identified messages that Latino parents communicate to their offspring regarding legal and illegal drugs through two focus groups with Latino college students (N = 7; ages 18-25). Many parental messages expressed in the focus groups were consistent with previous research. However, two distinct messages emerged from the focus groups: abstaining from substance use for religious reasons and because it would be disrespectful to parents. Results of qualitative analyses were combined with previous research identifying parental messages about substance use to create a 75-item questionnaire assessing the degree to which parents conveyed identified message types. Following the first study, an additional sample of Latino emerging adults (N = 222) was recruited from Virginia Commonwealth University, other Virginia colleges, and organizations with primarily Latino members in order to examine the psychometric properties of the newly developed questionnaire and to assess the associations between parental messages and substance use outcomes in Study 2. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) produced six components: Rewards & Punishments, Religious Beliefs, Never Addressed, Respecting Parents, Focus on Yourself, Negative Consequences of Use. These resulting components then were examined in association with substance use outcomes while also controlling for participants’ age, sex, religious commitment, familism, and acculturation. Results suggest that parental messages about substance use are differentially associated with substance use outcomes, with some messages appearing to be protective and other messages associated with increased risk. Further, select parental messages were strongly associated with the substance use patterns of Latino emerging adults while some messages were not related or marginally related to substance use. Specifically, messages focused on the negative consequences of use were most protective, while messages stressing rewards and punishments and respecting parents were associated with increased risk. These data indicate that attention to the specific messages parents communicate to their offspring regarding substance use, and not merely the frequency or openness of communication, is important. Implications, next steps for future research, and limitations of the current study are discussed.