Parental Rearing,Attachment,and Social Anxiety in Chinese Adolescents

Abstract

This cross-sectional study investigated associations between perceived parental rearing, attachment, and social anxiety. 510 Chinese middle school students, aged 12 to 20 years, completed a set of questionnaires including “Egna Minnen Beträffande Uppfostran” for Children (EMBU-C), Inventory for Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA) and Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents (SAS-A). The results showed that intercorrelations between adolescents’ rated attachment to parents were stronger than betweenparental and peer attachment. Girls scored higher on attachment to mother and peer than boys. Lack of parental rejection and presence of emotional warmth were strongly related to parental attachment. The rated level of total anxiety was not related to gender or age, but it was lower than what has earlier been reported from China. Perceived rejection from fathers and mothers’ as well as attachment to peer and mother acted as predictors; together they explained 19% of the variance in social anxiety.

Keywords

parenting peers anxiety

Adolescence is a time of emotional maturation during which children normally expand their supportive contacts beyond the family. The developmental path indicates that the child’s dependence is transferred from parents to peers, as they increase their socioemotional competence, explore new intimate relationships, and develop an adult identity (Allen, 2008). However, this positive development can be impeded by individual difficulties, such as anxiety (Degnan, Almas, & Fox, 2010). In current conceptualizations, anxiety disorders during childhood are seen as a combination of biological and environmental factors, where children’s socioemotional functioning is strongly shaped by their relationship context (Brown & Whiteside, 2008). Culture is a contextual factor that has been suggested to have a great influence upon the parent–child relationship in both Western and non-Western societies (Song, Thompson, & Ferrer, 2009). Still, the number of published studies focusing on associations between parental rearing and school-aged children’s well-being in non-Western societies is limited compared with the number of studies presenting data from Western societies. Specifically, investigations performed in rapidly developing non-Western countries are sparse.

The evidence of links between family environment and children’s socioemotional functioning comes from two main research lines; the first being studies on parenting and the second on child behavior. Baumrind (1966) discussed parenting styles and identified three distinct patterns of parental behavior: authoritative parenting (with high expectations and responsiveness), authoritarian parenting (high expectations and low responsiveness) and permissive parenting (low expectations and high responsiveness). The attachment theory, as formulated by Bowlby (1969), describes how the psychobiological needs for protection and emotional security are expressed in the child’s behavior. It has been demonstrated that the caregivers’ provision of a secure base to which the child can return in times of trouble predicts the child’s later ability to use his or her behavioral capacity to explore and form intimate relationships (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978). Even though parents remain central in their children’s lives throughout childhood, the attachment theory postulates that the parent–child relationship develops from a behavioral to a mental level, where the cognitive and affective inner working model (IWM) of the parent’s availability shapes the school-aged child’s state of mind regarding attachment (Main, Kaplan, & Cassidy, 1985). In this view, attachment is essential not only on a behavioral level during early childhood but also as a mental construct across the lifespan, making attachment theory a useful frame for studying emotional well-being in the transition during adolescence from childhood to adulthood. There is now convincing research indicating that secure attachment during adolescence is associated with the presence of a parent who is sensitive to the adolescent’s internal state of mind (Allen, 2008). Whereas affectionate, accepting and caring parental behavior have been seen as protective factors, low parental acceptance, rejection, a high level of control and overprotection have been seen as risk factors for developing attachment insecurity (Vasey & Dadds, 2001). Cassidy, Kirsch, Scolton, and Parke (1996) showed that having a secure relationship with parents during adolescence was associated with having secure representations of peers, which, in turn, was related to the enhancement of quality of peer experiences.

Theories of anxiety development have suggested that parental control, acceptance, and modeling of anxious behavior (Wood, McLeod, Sigman, Hwang, & Chu, 2003) as well as overprotection, rejection, and lack of warmth and emotional support are associated with school-aged children’s manifestations of anxiety (Bögels & Phares, 2008; Degnan et al., 2010). Muris, Meesters, Merckelbach, and Husenbeck (2000) reported that both parental rearing and attachment contributed to the severity of children’s anxiety-related symptoms. However, the identified family factors could, as discussed by Bögels and Brechman-Toussiaint (2006), also be related to child psychopathology in general and not specifically to anxiety problems. The above mentioned researchers have warned that, although childhood anxiety is a widespread problem in many societies, the etiology and sequelae of the problem still remain complex and elusive. Although traditional models have sought to explain the development of childhood anxiety in terms of single main effects (of parental control or child temperament), a more modern approach emphasizes the role of environmental and relational context in the development and maintenance of childhood anxiety from preschool age to adolescence. On the basis of these assumptions, more research on family life in different cultural contexts is needed.

The cultural frame within which parents raise their children in Asian societies has been suggested to differ from that in the West. Traditionally, family life in East Asia has been described as being influenced by Confucianism characterized by its focus on interdependence, emotional harmony, and filial piety (Song et al., 2009). Most Asian cultures are portrayed as collectivistic, with control of one’s emotions, deference to the group, and parental authority being key concepts, in contrast to Western cultures, where independence, self-expression, and the uniqueness of individuals are highly valued. In the Chinese culture, the high level of parental control exerted and the “guan” form of being authoritarian are assumed to represent the parental desire for the children to become successful (Stewart, Bond, Kennard, Ho, & Zaman, 2002). On the other hand, no culture remains unchanged across time, and it has been suggested that China’s national policy of one child per family introduced as a response to the nation’s large population growth in the last two decades has led to profound changes in family context and child-rearing arrangements (van IJzendoorn & Sagi-Schwartz, 2008). This makes the topic of family functioning in China of intense interest. Recent Chinese attachment research based on self-reports has indicated that secure childhood attachment promotes self-evaluation (Song et al., 2009), peer popularity (Wu & Zou, 1995), and peer acceptance (Chen, Chen, Li, & Wang, 2009), whereas it reduces children’s aggressive behavior (Li, 2007). In one study, the level of subjective well-being was found to be higher among securely attached adolescents than among those who were insecurely attached (Yang, Wang, Li, Teng, & Ren, 2010). Parents’ negative rearing behavior, as for example over protection, rejection, punishment or improper discipline, has also been shown to be related to childhood anxiety (Wang, Su, Wang, Liu, Shong, & Ren, 2000). Zhou, Xu, Ingles, Hidalgo, and La Greca (2008) found no evidence for gender differences in self-reported social anxiety in China, but they found that older adolescents rated their social anxiety as higher and interpreted the higher level in their findings as being related to the increasing prevalence of dating the opposite sex during middle adolescence.

Of specific relevance for clinical work with adolescents are reported differences in socioemotional functioning between boys and girls in the West (Sroufe, Egeland, Carlson, & Collins, 2005) as well as in Asia (Nishikawa, Sundbom, & Hägglöf, 2010; Song, 2009). Western reports have indicated that girls describe themselves as having more emotional relationships that can be described as close with their parents and peers than do boys (Hay & Ashman, 2003). Kenny and Gallagher (2002) found that girls reported higher levels of empathy than boys and that the girls’ empathy development relied less on parental attachment and more on non-family related factors like sociocultural norms and peer influences. However, girls have been demonstrated to report more social anxiety than boys and their close friendships have been revealed to be more strongly associated with their level of social anxiety, illustrating the complexity of socioemotional functioning during adolescence (La Greca & Lopez, 1998). Gullone and Robinson (2005) reported that, regardless of gender, older adolescents had less secure attachment to parents than younger adolescents but more secure attachment to their peers. Roelofs, Meesters, ter Huurne, Bamelis, and Muris (2006) confirmed that perceptions of parental rearing are important, but they also discussed separate pathways where the father and the mother are assumed to have a unique impact on the behavior of boys or girls respectively. Fathers have been described to encourage adolescent independence more than mothers who are more supportive of the ability to relate well emotionally (Bögels & Phares, 2008; Kenny & Gallagher, 2002).

When doing cross-cultural research, the cultural validation of the chosen instruments for collecting data is of vital importance (Nishikawa, et al., 2010; Quoss & Zhao, 1995). Most self-report questionnaires designed to measure perceptions of parental behavior as well as attachment have been developed and validated in the West, but there are a few instruments; Egna Minnen Beträffande Uppfostran (EMBU; Perris, Jacobsson, Lindström, Von Knorring, & Perris, 1980), Inventory for Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA; Armsden & Greenberg, 1987) and Social Anxiety Scale (La Greca & Lopez, 1998) that have been validated and found applicable in non-Western cultures (Ma, Wang, & Wang, 1999; Song et al., 2009; Zhou, et al., 2008). Given that the People’s Republic of China is the country with one of the world’s largest population groups, more research is warranted to explore how Chinese adolescents reflect on their relationship context and social functioning. Most cross-sectional research on this topic is based on retrospective data, where respondents have been asked to report on their recollected memory of parental rearing and childhood attachment. No recent studies have, to our knowledge, investigated how both current perceptions of parental rearing and attachment are linked with anxiety problems during adolescence, a research question that should be of interest in modern China, with its radical changes in family patterns in the last 40 years. As to now, there is little information on how these changes are affecting the well-being of the present generation of adolescents.

The first aim of this study was to explore the concurrent associations between perceptions of parental rearing and self-assessed current attachment to one’s father, mother, and a selected peer in a sample of Chinese adolescents. The second aim was to study age and gender differences in perceptions of parental rearing, attachment, and social anxiety. The third aim was to examine if perceptions of parental rearing and attachment to parents and peers were able to predict social anxiety in the sample under investigation.

Method

Participants

The sample was composed of 510 students (240 boys and 270 girls) attending a Chinese middle school in Beijing, the People’s Republic of China. The chosen school was situated in a middle class area in the southern part of Beijing. The age of the students in the sample ranged from 12 to 20 years with 283 students being in junior middle school from grades 7 to 9 (132 boys and 151 girls, age in years M = 14.05, SD = .98) and 227 students in senior middle school from grades 10 to 12 (108 boys and 119 girls, age [years] M = 17.14, SD = .93). The sample was divided into two age groups for the statistical analyses, the junior middle school group (JMS) and the senior middle school group (SMS). All students were ethnic Chinese, with 75% of the families originating from the Beijing area, 8% from the nearby regions and 17% from other parts of China. Of the students, 80% of the boys and 82% of the girls were the only child in their family.

Measures

Egna Minnen Beträffande Uppfostran for Children (EMBU-C)

EMBU-C (the Swedish acronym for “my memories of upbringing”) developed by Castro, Toro, Van der Ende, and Arrindell (1993), and modified by Grüner, Muris, and Merckelbach (1999) was used in this study. EMBU-C was derived from the original Swedish EMBU (Egna Minnen Beträffande Uppfostran; Perris et al., 1980), an 81-item inventory for assessing adults’ recollections of their parents’ rearing behavior. The EMBU-C consists of 40 items intended to assess children’s and adolescents’ current perceptions of their parents’ rearing behavior. For each EMBU-C item, the assessment first focuses on father’s rearing behavior and then on mother’s rearing behavior, using a 4-point Likert-type scale to rate the frequency of the particular behavior (1 = no, never to; 4 = yes, most of the time). The instrument yields four subscales where the sum-score reflects the parent’s degree of overprotection in 10 items (e.g., “When you get home, you have to tell your parents what you have been doing”), rejection in 10 items (e.g., “If anything happens at home, you get blamed for it”), emotional warmth in 10 items (e.g., “When you are unhappy, your parents console you and cheer you up”) and anxious rearing in 10 items (e.g., “Your parents worry about what you are doing after school”). The internal consistency has been reported to be satisfactory for the original English EMBU-C version (α coefficient = .81; Castro et al., 1993) as well as for the Japanese EMBU-C version (α coefficients = .76 to .88; Nishikawa et al., 2010). For this study, the EMBU-C was translated into Chinese by the second author using the Chinese EMBU (Ma et al., 1999) as a model. As many of the EMBU-C items are identical with those in the EMBU, but simplified and adapted to be understood by a younger age-group, a back translation was not considered necessary. The Chinese EMBU-C was finalized after pilot testing, and consecutive discussions of specific items were held with two native Chinese English teachers until consensus was reached. The EMBU-C four factor model, suggested by Castro et al. (1993) and proven to be valid in an Asian context already (Nishikawa et al., 2010), was chosen after having tested the psychometric properties of the Chinese EMBU-C. A principal components factor analysis with Oblimin rotation was carried out on the 40 items, where fathers and mothers separately explained 41% and 46% of the variance respectively, which corresponds to the original of 37% for fathers and 35% for mothers (Muris, Meesters, & van Brakel, 2003). Almost all items loaded substantially on intended four factors. The α coefficients for internal consistency for the Chinese EMBU-C scales varied between .74 and .89.

The Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA)

Attachment quality was assessed with the IPPA, an instrument developed to measure the adolescent’s “internal working model” (IWM) of his or her experience of attachment with the mother, father, and a selected peer (Armsden & Greenberg, 1987). The parental scale of the IPPA includes 25 items: 9 tapping mutual trust (e.g., “My parents respect my feelings”), 8 focusing on quality of communication (e.g., “My parents can tell when I’m upset over something”), and 8 items the degree of alienation (e.g., “I don’t get much attention at home”). For the IPPA peer scale, the respondent is asked to keep a selected peer in mind when answering the questions. The peer scale is presumed to assess a related but distinct attachment domain; it, too, includes 25 items, 9 tapping mutual trust, 9 the quality of communication, and 7 the alienation from the selected peer. Respondents are supposed to complete the IPPA questionnaire by indicating how often each statement is true for them on a 5-point Likert-type scale. Response categories are (1 = Never or Almost Never to; 5 = Always or Almost Always). The IPPA has been translated into Chinese and validated by Song (2004) who reported the internal consistency to be satisfactory (α coefficient = .87), as was the retest reliability over a 3-week period (r = .86). The Chinese IPPA was used in this research and as recommended, the overall score for the three IPPA scales was used. A high IPPA score indicates a positive quality of attachment that is, high level of trust, good communication, and a low level of alienation feelings to father, mother, or peer, respectively. In our sample, the IPPA internal consistency was considered to be satisfactory with α coefficients varying between .92 and .93 for the scale scores.

Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents (SAS-A)

The SAS-A was developed to assess subjective experiences of social anxiety in adolescents (La Greca & Lopez, 1998). The scale is composed of 18 descriptive self-statements and 4 filler items reflecting activity preferences or social preferences. Each item is rated on a 5-point scale indicating how often the statement fits with the participant’s experience (1 = not at all to; 5 = all the time). Three subscales have been identified. The first subscale, fear of negative evaluation (FNE), includes eight items and reflects fears, concerns, or worries in relation to negative evaluations from peers (e.g., “I worry about what other kids think of me”). The second subscale, social avoidance and stress (SAD-New), contains 6 items and reflects social avoidance and distress with new social situations or unfamiliar peers (e.g., “I get nervous when I meet new kids”). The third subscale, social avoidance and stress (SAD-General), includes four items and reflects generalized or pervasive social distress, discomfort, and inhibition (e.g., “I feel shy even with kids I know well”). In this research, a Chinese version of SAS-A, translated and validated by Zhou and coworkers (2008), was used. In their investigation, the internal consistency varied from an α coefficient of .61 to one of .85 and the range for the test-retest reliability over a 2-week interval was from r = .61 to r = .84. For the SAS-A sum score that was used in the present regression analysis, the α coefficient was .92, and for the subscales, the α coefficients varied between .73 and .89.

Procedure

The headmaster of the school selected for the investigation was contacted by the second author, the project was presented to him, and with his permission the class teachers were approached. As student data were collected anonymously in class rooms on one single occasion and under the responsibility of the school headmaster, parental consent was not applied for. The procedures followed the ethical rules of the Swedish Psychology Association. The questionnaires were handed out to the teachers who distributed and collected them in the classrooms. The students were informed through the school broadcasting system that their participation was absolutely voluntary, the instructions were read aloud and it was stressed that there were no names on the questionnaires and the individual answers were anonymous. Later, the second author went to each classroom to answer questions and to check that the respondents were answering the questionnaires independently. The filling in of the questionnaires required approximately 30 min and the order of the instruments included was established at random for each classroom. No students declined to contribute. However, 7% of the questionnaires had to be rejected because of incomplete answers.

Results

SPSS version 16.0 was used for the data analyses. The two age-groups, the JMS and the SMS groups, were studied separately. In addition, the group was divided according to gender. Pearson product moment–correlations were used to investigate relationships within and between measures for the two age-groups and for boys and girls, respectively. Two-way between-groups ANOVAs were conducted to explore the impact of age-group and gender on the ratings of parental rearing, parent and peer attachment, and social anxiety, respectively. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis was conducted to explore the predictive power of parental rearing and attachment in relation to social anxiety for the two age-groups when age and gender was controlled for.

The first aim of the study was to explore associations within measures: between perceptions of fathers and mothers’ rearing behavior as well as between attachment to the adolescent’s father, mother, and the selected peer. The calculated associations within measures are presented in Tables 1, 2 and 3.

Table 1.

Pearson Product–Moment Correlation Coefficients Within the EMBU-C Scores.

	EMBU-C—Mother
Measure	Junior middle school (N = 283)	Senior middle school (N = 227)	Boys (N = 240)	Girls (N = 270)
EMBU-C—Father
Overprotection	.83**	.78**	.79**	.83**
Rejection	.79**	.87**	.84**	.78**
Emotional warmth	.75**	.84**	.80**	.76**
Anxious rearing	.82**	.81**	.80**	.84**

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment. **p < .0.01

Table 2.

Pearson Product–Moment Correlation Coefficients Within the IPPA Scores.

	IPPA—Mother
Measure	Junior middle school (N = 283)	Senior middle school (N = 227)	Boys (N = 240)	Girls (N = 270)
IPPA—Father	.66**	.83**	.80**	.67**

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment. **p < .0.01

Table 3.

Pearson Product–Moment Correlation Coefficients Within the IPPA Scores

	IPPA—Peer
Measure	Junior middle school (N = 283)	Senior middle school (N = 227)	Boys (N = 240)	Girls (N = 270)
IPPA—Father	.36**	.25**	.36**	.26**
IPPA—Mother	.23**	.25**	.29**	.16**

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment. **p < .0.01

The results suggested that mothers and fathers’ EMBU-C mean scale scores were strongly and significantly interrelated for both age-groups, as well as when the group was split according to gender. The correspondence between the attachment to father and the attachment to mother, as assessed with IPPA, was strong for both age-groups and for boys and girls, respectively. However, the associations between attachment to mother and attachment to peer as well as between attachment to father and attachment to peer were weaker but still significant for both the age-groups as well as for the boys and the girls separately.

The relationships between the adolescents’ perceptions of parental rearing and attachment to parents and peer were analyzed with Pearson product–moment correlations and the results are presented in Table 4.

Table 4.

Pearson Product–Moment Correlation Coefficients Between the EMBU-C Scores and the IPPA Scores by Age-Groups and Sex.

	Junior middle school				Senior middle school				Junior middle school		Senior middle school
	IPPA—Father		IPPA—Mother		IPPA—Father		IPPA—Mother		IPPA—Peer		IPPA—Peer
Measure	Boys(N = 132)	Girls(N = 151)	Boys(N = 132)	Girls(N = 151)	Boys(N = 108)	Girls(N = 119)	Boys(N = 108)	Girls(N = 119)	Boys(N = 132)	Girls(N = 151)	Boys(N = 108)	Girls(N = 119)
EMBU-C—Father
Overprotection	.06	−.08			−.07	−.04			.17	.11	−.04	−.17
Rejection	−.31**	−.35**			−.30**	−.37**			.09	−.09	−.02	−.25**
Emotional warmth	.76**	.74**			.64**	.82**			.19*	.33**	.33**	.13
Anxious rearing	.33**	.21*			.12	.22*			.25**	.19*	.22**	−.03
EMBU-C—Mother
Overprotection			−.03	−.02			−.12	−.15	.21*	.16	.10	−.09
Rejection			−.28**	−.22**			−.32**	−.35**	−.17*	.00	.03	−.20*
Emotional warmth			.65**	.75**			.65**	.79**	.16	.21**	.29**	.19*
Anxious rearing			.21*	.30**			.09	.10	.28**	.16	.32**	−.00

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment.

Significant at the .05 level, two-tailed. **Significant at the .01 level, two-tailed.

The results indicated that perceived rejection by father was negatively related to attachment to father for boys and girls in both age-groups as well as for girls’ attachment to peer in the SMS group. Father’s emotional warmth was strongly and positively related to attachment to father as well as to attachment to peer, except for girls in the SMS group where no significant association was found. Furthermore, father’s anxious rearing was positively related to attachment to father for girls in both age groups but only for boys in the JMS group.

The associations between the mother’s rearing behavior and attachment to mother and to peer indicated a similar pattern. Mother’s overprotection was positively related to attachment to peer for boys in the JMS group. Mother’s rejection was negatively related to attachment to mother for boys and girls in both age groups as well as to boys’ attachment to peer in the JMS group and girls’ attachment to peer in the SMS group. Mother’s emotional warmth was positively related to attachment to peer in all groups except for the boys in the JMS group, where no significant association was revealed. Mother’s anxious rearing was positively related to attachment to her for boys and girls in the JMS group as well as with attachment to peer for boys in both the JMS and the SMS groups.

The second aim was to study age and gender differences in the perceptions of parental rearing, attachment, and social anxiety. The results for the two-way between ANOVAs made for the EMBU-C, IPPA, and the SAS-A mean scores for JMS and SMS groups as well as for boys and girls independently are presented in Table 5.

Table 5.

Means and Standard Deviations for Scales by Age-Groups and Sexes.

	Junior middle school		Senior middle school				Boys		Girls
	(N = 283)		(N = 227)				(N = 240)		(N = 270)
Scales	M	SD	M	SD	F(1, 506)	η²	M	SD	M	SD	F(1, 506)	η²
EMBU-C—Father
Overprotection	2.19	0.58	1.99	0.55	16.95***	.03	2.15	0.52	2.06	0.57	3.56	.01
Rejection	1.89	0.57	1.73	0.49	12.09***	.02	1.90	0.60	1.74	0.48	11.69***	.02
Emotional warmth	2.69	0.70	2.67	0.65	0.14	.00	2.69	0.65	2.67	0.70	0.02	.00
Anxious rearing	2.60	0.62	2.44	0.55	7.76**	.02	2.52	0.60	2.53	0.60	0.00	.00
EMBU-C—Mother
Overprotection	2.30	0.60	2.14	0.58	10.04**	.02	2.30	0.56	2.18	0.60	5.44*	.01
Rejection	1.93	0.58	1.80	0.51	7.88**	.02	1.96	0.60	1.79	0.50	12.81***	.03
Emotional warmth	2.79	0.64	2.74	0.63	0.93	.00	2.72	0.61	2.82	0.65	3.08	.01
Anxious rearing	2.70	0.60	2.56	0.59	6.01*	.01	2.66	0.59	2.62	0.61	1.08	.00
IPPA—Father	9.16	1.41	9.33	1.28	1.80	.00	9.19	1.34	9.27	1.37	0.45	.00
IPPA—Mother	9.46	1.33	9.53	1.24	0.38	.00	9.33	1.30	9.63	1.27	6.64**	.01
IPPA—Peer	10.13	1.27	9.99	1.22	1.62	.00	9.86	1.25	10.25	1.23	12.42***	.02
SAS-A: total	7.28	2.26	7.08	1.91	1.02	.00	7.04	2.22	7.33	2.00	2.29	.01
SAS-A FNE	2.59	0.92	2.41	0.78	5.53*	.01	2.42	0.87	2.60	0.85	4.87*	.01
SAS-A SAD–new	2.54	0.86	2.58	0.77	0.36	.00	2.51	0.86	2.60	0.78	1.55	.00
SAS-A SAD–general	2.15	0.82	2.09	0.68	0.14	.00	2.11	0.78	2.13	0.74	0.67	.00

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = the inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment; SAS-A = Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents; FNE = fear of negative evaluation.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

The results indicated a significant interaction effect between age-group and gender on the adolescents’ perception of fathers’ anxious rearing, F(1, 506) = 4.36, p = .040, η² = .009, showing that the junior middle school girls perceived a significantly higher level of paternal anxious rearing than the others. None of the other mean scores for the scales exhibited an interaction between age and gender. There was a main effect for age on the mean scores for fathers’ as well as for mothers’ overprotection, rejection, and anxious rearing suggesting that the younger students perceived higher levels of these parental behaviors than the older ones. Furthermore, the boys rated their fathers’ as well as their mothers’ rejection as higher than the girls. In addition, the boys rated their mothers’ overprotection as higher than the girls. The girls rated attachment to mother as well as attachment to peer as higher than the boys. On the SAS-A, the younger students rated their FNE as higher. In addition, the girls rated their fear of negative evaluations as higher than the boys.

The third aim was to explore the relationship between specific aspects of upbringing and social anxiety. We conducted a regression analysis, to test whether the scores from the EMBU-C and the IPPA scales were able to predict social anxiety, as assessed using the SAS-A total score, after controlling for the adolescents’ age-group and gender. The results from the hierarchical multiple regression analysis performed are presented in Table 6.

Table 6.

Summary of Hierarchical Regression With EMBU and IPPA Predicting Anxiety.

Block	R ²	δR²	ΔR²	F	β
Age-group and gender	0.7%	0.3%	0.7%	1.81	—
EMBU	15.0%	13.3%	14.3%	8.79***	—
Rejection, father					.21 (19, 8)*
Rejection, mother					.21 (22, 6)*
IPPA	18.6%	16.5%	3.6%	8.72***	—
Attachment, mother					−.22**
Attachment, peer					−.16***

Note: EMBU-C = my memories of upbringing for children; IPPA = Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Age-group and gender were entered into the model in Block 1 but explained only 0.7% of the variance in the reported social anxiety. After entering the EMBU-C scores in Block 2, the variance explained by the model reached 15.0%, F(13, 496) = 8.79, p = .000 and, finally, when the IPPA scale scores were entered in Block 3, the total variance explained by the model as a whole was 18.6%, F(13, 496) = 8.72, p = .000. In the final model, unique contributions were found for mothers’ rejection (β = .23, p = .020), for fathers’ rejection (β = .20, p = .047) as well as for attachment to peer (β = −.16, p = .000) and attachment to mother (β = −.22, p = .018).

Discussion

As the amount of data published on the well-being of Chinese adolescents is limited, we wanted to open up a discussion on this topic by exploring the associations between the data received both within and between the used measures. As expected, and in accordance with the literature from the West, the intercorrelations between adolescents’ rated attachment to mother and to father were stronger than the correlations between parental attachment and peer attachment, suggesting the existence of separate, but partially overlapping, internal constructs (Crowell, Fraley, & Shaver, 2008). In addition, the associations between rated parental rearing and attachment to parent were stronger than between rearing and attachment to peers. Allen (2008) as well as Hazan and Zeifman (1999) has suggested that family rearing patterns and attachment to parents reflect complementary facets of the family environment, but they also propose that peer attachment is a distinct, but nevertheless related, attachment construct. Our data from a non-Western society support the view that parental and peer relationships are perceived as different. We suggest that both play important roles in the adolescent’s transition to an adult identity and in the preparation for developing supportive relationships besides the parental relationships. When looking more in detail at the associations between perceived parental rearing and attachment, both parental rejection and emotional warmth were strongly related to the perceived attachment to father as well as to mother, anxious rearing was only related to the younger adolescents’ parental attachment but overprotection was not at all related to parental attachment. This might indicate that lack of rejection, perceived emotional warmth, and anxious rearing (prevalent for the younger adolescents) reflect a common construct or a main dimension of parental care, as was described by Muris and coworkers (2003) in their research on childhood anxiety and associated with attachment to parents.

In addition, our results correspond with earlier publications suggesting that adolescents’ perceptions of their parents’ rearing are related to their age, associated with their level of maturation and independence (Allen, 2008; Kobak & Duemmler, 1994). The older adolescents in our sample did not seem to feel as exposed to parental care as the younger ones, since they reported less overprotection, less rejection, and less anxious rearing both from their fathers and mothers. However, when we considered the sample as a whole, the boys reported more rejection both from fathers and mothers than the girls. Furthermore, the boys reported more maternal overprotection than the girls. Our results could indicate that the boys rated themselves as being more exposed to deficits in parental rearing than the girls, something that might reveal that male and female adolescents experience parental expectations differently (Giudice, 2009; Song et al., 2009). However, it is of importance to note that our results do not imply that the actual parental behavior differed, only that the adolescents’ perceptions did.

In Western cultures, it has often been stressed that adolescents struggle to form their identity and that, during this period of their lives, they are in the process of differentiating themselves emotionally from their parents, which makes valid attachment research with this age-group difficult (Gullone & Robinson, 2005; Kerns & Richardson, 2005). The girls in our sample reported higher scores on attachment to their mother, demonstrating an emotional intimacy between daughters and mothers reflecting sociocultural norms in many cultures across the world. Not unexpectedly, the girls reported higher scores for attachment to their chosen peer than the boys did. The Chinese girls seem to present a similar pattern to that reported from research conducted in the West, signifying that emotional relationships with both mothers and peers are perceived as more central for girls than boys (Hay & Ashman, 2003; La Greca & Lopez, 1998).

Our final aim was to investigate the relationship between self-reported parental rearing, attachment, and anxiety. Feelings of social anxiety affect many children during middle and late childhood and it is important to search for both theoretical and empirical explanations within different cultural contexts. In accordance with earlier data presented from China by Zhou et al. (2008), our results indicated no significant differences in total level of social anxiety between boys and girls, but in contrast to their results, the younger adolescents in our sample scored significantly higher in FNE as did the girls when the sample was split according to gender. In addition, the SAS-A mean total score in our sample was lower than what was found in the Chinese sample investigated by Zhou and coworkers (44.56 compared with 49.47) and more in line with what was reported from their Spanish comparison group (43.17). This might indicate that some groups of modern Chinese adolescents are in the process of developing a more Western-like pattern of rating their anxiety feelings, a finding that needs to be further investigated before any conclusions can be drawn.

The third aim of our work was to explore the predictive power of parental rearing and attachment to parent and peer when gender and age were controlled for. Our results showed, in line with what has been reported in earlier studies (Nishikawa et al., 2010), that parental rejection, both paternal and maternal, was associated with social anxiety, but in contrast to what was reported by Roelofs et al. (2006), perceived parental anxious rearing did predict neither feelings of anxiety, nor did overprotection as was described by Bögels, van Oosten, Muris, & Smulders (2001). As was expected, peer attachment predicted the level of social anxiety, suggesting that secure adolescents were less bothered by feelings of social anxiety. In addition, attachment to mother predicted the level of anxiety indicating that a secure state of mind regarding attachment to the mother is associated with low level of anxiety feelings during adolescence.

The limitations of our study have to be acknowledged. First, the research was performed on the basis on self-reporting, a methodology in frequent use with adolescents because they have been considered to be good informants about internalizing difficulties, peer relationships, and friendships (Loeber, Green, & Lahey, 1990). However, it can be argued that self-reports are sensitive to social expectations and that the respondents are only reflecting their explicit perceptions of parenting and attachment. With these limitations in mind, the design of the research presented here did not offer possibilities to make in-depth assessments of the adolescents’ state of mind regarding attachment to their parents and peers, as this was not realistic with the present sample size. As stated, the EMBU-C was translated by one of the authors and a proper back-translation was not viable, however, as was also discussed in the method section, the consensus discussions with two Chinese English-speaking teachers during the process of translation meant that the translation was considered to be good enough for the purpose of this study. Second, the fact that no students refused to participate has to be considered, and it can be speculated that the validity of the results attained was hampered by perceived group pressure. Furthermore, it can be argued that the answers were influenced by the students’ expectations in the classroom situation, but the rate of participation might also reflect an interesting tendency toward positive compliance among Chinese adolescents.

Third, because the study was designed to be cross-sectional, there might have been a risk of shared method variance. Methods believed to address the same or theoretically close dimensions were used in one sample and data were collected on just one occasion. To minimize systematic spill-over effects from one measure to another, the scales in the set of questionnaires were presented in a different orders for different classroom groups of students. Finally, it is important to stress that no conclusions can be drawn about possible causal relationships between parental rearing, attachment, and anxiety in the Chinese culture. Whether the identified parental factors cause childhood anxiety still needs to be investigated.

Still, we believe that our results can add to the understanding of the links between parental rearing and anxiety. As Brown and Whiteside (2008) stated, earlier results have been contradictory and have often been criticized for using retrospective data. Our results, which are based on concurrent perceptions as measured in the EMBU-C and in IPPA in a Chinese sample of adolescents, confirm not only the importance of peer relationships but also the parental influence and the adolescent’s relationship with their parents, and especially with the mother. Even though the attachment to father does not predict social anxiety, our data does not imply that his parenting is unimportant. Both mothers’ rearing and attachment to mother were related to fathers’ rearing and attachment to father, signifying the parental importance of both parents, but fathers’ impact on the adolescents’ well-being might be more indirect and channeled through mothers’ behavior, as suggested by Bögels and Phares (2008).

The results presented in this paper have to be discussed in the light of the present situation for young people in China. The Chinese society is today undergoing tremendous social changes and the impact on the emotional well-being of the younger generation needs to be monitored. We can conclude that the Chinese adolescents in our sample, coming from an urban area in Beijing, do not rate their level of social anxiety as different compared with reports from Western adolescents. As our results are not totally congruent with the picture earlier presented from China, we want to stress the importance of exploring the associations between family factors and social functioning further. We want to encourage more longitudinal, as well as cross-sectional, studies on adolescent well-being and social functioning in East Asia. Such research might shed light not only on how to support troubled adolescents within the culture but also increase the general understanding of the emotional maturation during this period of life.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

We want to thank the students and staff in Jinsong Beijing Fourth Secondary School for their cooperation.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biograhies

Pia Risholm Mothander, PhD, is an associate professor in Clinical Psychology at Stockholm University, department of Psychology, Stockholm, Sweden.

Mo Wang, MSc, is a master student in Psychology at Stockholm University, Department of Psychology, Stockholm, Sweden.

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