Parents and peers as providers of support in adolescents' social network: a developmental perspective
Journal of Community Psychology, Vol. 38, No. 1, Pg. 16-27.
Jorge F. del Valle, Amaia Bravo, Mónica López
The authors carried out an assessment of social support networks with a
sample of 884 Spanish adolescents aged 12 to 17. The main goal was to
analyze the development of the figures of parents and peers as
providers of social support in the two basic dimensions of emotional
and instrumental support. In peers, they distinguished between the
contexts from which they came (school, associations, and friends from
the community) to observe whether there were different tendencies. The
results of the MANOVA indicate significant effects on both dimensions
for the factors age, provider, and interaction between the two. The
authors conclude that the tendencies for decline in the provision of
support from parents and the corresponding increase in support from
peers during adolescence are different for each dimension, and also for
the different types of friends, according to context. Parents maintain
a good level of instrumental support, but not of emotional support.
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