Behavioral problems and their relations to parental style in ecological migrant adolescents

Objective To explore behavioral problems and their relations to parental style in ecological migrant adolescents.Methods Using multistage randomized sampling,1 453 eco-migrant teenagers aged 12 to 16 years were selected in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (Ningxia) for a survey between March and July 2012.The teenagers were asked to finish the Parental Bonding Instrument and a self-developed questionnaire on behavior related factors and their parents were asked to finish the Achenbach's Child Behavior Checklist.Results Among the teenagers,the boys showed higher mean total score and scores for all sub-factors of behavior problems than the girls and the scores for aggressive and delinquent behavior of the boys were significantly higher than those of the girls (both P<0.05).There were no significant differences in the mean total score and sub-factors scores among the teenagers of various age groups.The results of correlation analysis demonstrated that paternal control and maternal control were inversely related to total score of behavior problems (P<0.01);whereas,paternal care,paternal autonomy,and maternal care were positively related to total score of behavior problems (P<0.05);partial correlation analyses revealed that the correlation between the total scores of behavioral problems and the five parental style factors mentioned above remained after adjusting for behavior-related variables.Multivariate linear regression analysis showed that the parental style factor positively associated with total score of behavioral problems was maternal control in the male (β=0.093) and female (β=0.112) teenagers;the parental style factors reversely associated with total score of behavioral problems included paternal care and maternal care in the male (β=-0.074 and β=-0.161) and female (β=-0.109 and β=-0.122) teenagers.Conclusion There is a significant gender difference in behavior problems among eco-migrant teenagers and improvements in parental style may reduce the occurrence of behavior problems of the eco-migrant teenagers.