Journal of Family Psychology Copyright 2002 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.

2002, Vol. 16, No. 1, 58 – 69 0893-3200/02/$5.00 DOI: 10.1037//0893-3200.16.1.58

Parental Management of Adolescent Peer Relationships in Context:

The Role of Parenting Style
Nina S. Mounts
Northern Illinois University

Three hundred 9th-graders and their best friends participated in this short-term longitudinal
study. Confirmatory factor analysis of the Parental Management of Peers Inventory (N.
Mounts, 2000) suggested that the 4-factor structure provided a good fit to the data. Significant
differences in adolescents’ perceptions of parental management of peers occurred across 4
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parenting style groups. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the relation among
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5 aspects of parental management of peers and adolescents’ Time 1 drug use, friends’ Time
1 drug use, and adolescents’ Time 2 drug use. The parental management styles of monitoring,
guiding, prohibiting, and supporting all had significant paths in the model, whereas neutrality
was not significant. Multiple group comparisons were used to examine whether parenting
style moderates the relation between parental management of peers and the drug use
outcomes. Parenting style functioned as a moderator for 7 of the paths in the model.

Drawing on Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological theory,
researchers have devoted much time to examining the link-
ages between parent and peer relationships. Much of the
research on linkages between parent and peer contexts has
focused on parenting and social competence in younger
children (Parke & Ladd, 1992). Because of changes that
occur in both parent– child and peer relationships during
adolescence, it is interesting to consider the ways in which
adolescents’ relationships with parents may affect their re-
lationships with peers. During adolescence, there is an in-
crease in susceptibility to peer influence (Berndt, 1979)
concomitant with an increased interest in peer relationships
more generally (Savin-Williams & Berndt, 1990). At the
same time, there is a decline in susceptibility to parental
influence (Steinberg & Silverberg, 1986). In addition, nu-
merous investigators have found that peer influence is a
strong predictor of adolescent substance use (Hawkins,
Catalano, & Miller, 1992; Urberg, Cheng, & Shyu, 1991),
premarital sexual activity (Billy & Udry, 1985), delinquent
behavior (Magnusson, Stattin, & Allen, 1986), and that it is
also related to school adjustment (Berndt, 1999). Because of
this, the nature of this linkage between parent and peer
contexts is of interest.
Recently, there has been recognition in the literature that
there are several facets to parental influences on children.
Support for this study was provided by B/START Grant
MH57232-01 from the National Institute of Mental Health. I
acknowledge David Valentiner for his advice on the data analyses.
Karen Bogenschneider provided helpful comments on drafts of the
article. Penny Brucker, Jennifer Marchand, Benjamin Perry, and
Steven Toefl conducted the data collection. I am especially grateful
to the children, parents, and schools for their participation in this
project.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Nina S. Mounts, Department of Psychology, Northern Illinois
University, DeKalb, Illinois 60115. E-mail: nmounts@niu.edu
Several researchers have suggested a distinction between
parenting style and parenting practices (Darling & Stein-
berg, 1993; Mize, Russell, & Pettit, 1998). According to
these researchers, parenting style is characterized by the
attitudes toward the child and the emotional climate of the
parent– child relationship rather than specific, goal-directed
behavior. In contrast, parenting practices have specific goals
and specific content. That is, when parents use parenting
practices, their focus is on affecting a particular aspect of
the child. Parke and O’Neil (1999) suggested a tripartite
model in which parenting style is one of the facets of
parenting that affects peer relationships. In this model,
parenting practices are subdivided into those practices in
which parents function as a direct instructor in regard to
peer relationships and those practices in which parents
function to provide children with opportunities for peer
interactions.
The literature that explores the ways in which parent and
peer contexts are linked during adolescence is not extensive.
However, some research exists that focuses on parenting
style and its relation to peers (Fuligni & Eccles, 1993;
Mounts & Steinberg, 1995). Fuligni and Eccles found that
when adolescents believed that their parents were restrictive
and asserted too much power, they reported higher levels of
peer orientation. Similarly, Mounts and Steinberg reported
that when adolescents reported that their parents used a
nonauthoritative style, they were more likely to be influ-
enced by their peers to use drugs.
Although a number of studies have examined parenting
practices associated with young children’s peer relation-
ships (Ladd & Golter, 1988; Mize & Pettit, 1997), the
literature that examines parenting practices associated with
adolescents’ peer relationships is quite limited. There is a
considerable amount of research that examines parental
monitoring during adolescence (Bogenschneider, Raffaelli,
& Tsay, 1998; Stattin & Kerr, 2000; Steinberg, Lamborn,
Darling, Mounts, & Dornbusch, 1994). Because parents

58
 PARENTAL MANAGEMENT OF ADOLESCENT PEER RELATIONSHIPS
enable or restrict access to peers by monitoring, monitoring
is considered to be a parenting practice with which parents
manage peer relationships (Parke & O’Neil, 1999). There is
strong support in the literature for the relation between
parental monitoring and involvement with deviant peers
during adolescence (Brown, Mounts, Lamborn, & Stein-
berg, 1993). Several studies reported a significant relation
between low levels of parental monitoring and delinquent
child behavior. Steinberg (1986) found that adolescents in
self-care after school who were monitored distally by their
parents, through telephone calls home, were less susceptible
to antisocial peer pressure than were adolescents whose
parents did not monitor them. Similarly, Fuligni and Eccles
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(1993) found that high levels of monitoring were associated
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with a less extreme peer orientation. In contrast, Bogen-
schneider et al. (1998) reported no significant relation be-
tween monitoring and peer orientation. These mixed results
in regard to monitoring at least suggest that there are other
variables that may act to moderate the relation between
monitoring and peer relationships. Beyond research that
examines monitoring, there is very little research that ex-
amines the ways in which parents affect the peer relation-
ships of adolescents.
Vernberg, Beery, Ewell, and Abwender (1993) conducted
one study that did examine parenting practices, other than
monitoring, associated with adolescents’ peer relationships.
Four groups of friendship facilitation strategies were iden-
tified as being useful in helping seventh- and eighth-graders
form friendships after a move to a new school district.
Parents reported that they met with other parents, facilitated
proximity to peers, talked with their adolescent about peer
relationships, and encouraged activities with other adoles-
cents as strategies for helping their young adolescent make
new friends after a family relocation. Variability across
families in the frequency of use of these strategies in the
first 3 months following a family relocation was found.
Adolescents whose parents reported the highest frequency
of friendship facilitation strategies had greater success in
making friends.
In a study conducted by Youniss, DeSantis, and Hender-
son (1992), hypothetical situations were used to assess the
number of parent behaviors that would be directed toward
the adolescent in a hypothetical situation involving peers. A
modest number of parent behaviors directed toward man-
agement of peer relationships was recorded using this
method.
In another study of parenting practices associated with
adolescents’ peer relationships, Mounts (2000) identified a
number of strategies used by parents to affect adolescents’
peer relationships, including guiding, which is when parents
talk with the adolescent about the consequences of being
friends with particular people. Neutrality is when parents do
not interfere with their children’s peer relationships, per-
haps because of the parents’ belief that who their child
selects as friends is their own individual choice. Prohibiting
is when parents let adolescents know that they do not want
them to associate with particular peers. Finally, supporting
is when parents do things such as providing an environment
59
at home where adolescents can have their friends over.
These strategies were the focus of the present investigation.
Darling and Steinberg (1993) suggested that to move the
socialization literature forward, researchers must begin to
consider both parenting style and parenting practices jointly
when examining their effects on children. As such, they
suggested that the way in which parenting style affects
children’s development is through the attitudes that the
parents hold in regard to the child. The parenting style that
parents have provides a context within which the parenting
practices are made more or less effective. In short, they
suggested that parenting style moderates the effects that
parenting practices have on children’s development. Few
empirical studies exist that examine the joint contributions
of parenting style and parenting practices to child or ado-
lescent development. One study that examined the ways in
which parenting style functions as a moderator comes from
the work of Steinberg, Lamborn, Dornbusch, and Darling
(1992). They found that when parents were nonauthorita-
tive, it attenuated the effects of parental school involvement
in determining school performance, whereas parental in-
volvement in school had an even stronger effect in the
presence of the authoritative parenting style.
Mize and Pettit (1997) examined the ways in which
parenting style and parenting practices affect children’s
social competence. Using a sample of 3- to 6-year-old
children, Mize and Pettit’s results partially supported the
moderator model suggested by Darling and Steinberg
(1993). Contrary to expectation and to the work of Steinberg
et al. (1992), effective parenting styles did not operate to
make parenting practices even more effective. Rather, Mize
and Pettit’s work suggested that the positive parenting prac-
tices became even more important in the absence of more
positive parenting styles. When mothers were low in their
levels of general parental responsiveness, constructive
coaching in peer relationships was related to lower levels of
aggression than when mothers had low levels of responsive-
ness and did not use constructive coaching. In contrast,
coaching did not affect aggression when mothers had mod-
erate or high levels of responsiveness toward their children.
Steinberg et al.’s (1992) and Mize and Pettit’s studies have
served as an important starting point for further investiga-
tion of the joint contributions of parenting style and parent-
ing practices to development. In the present investigation,
the focus was on adolescents’ perceptions of parental man-
agement of peer relationships and parenting style and their
association with adolescents’ Time 1 and Time 2 drug use
and friends’ Time 1 drug use.
Five questions were of interest in the present investiga-
tion. First, is the four-factor structure of the Parental Man-
agement of Peers Inventory (PMPI; Mounts, 2000) con-
firmed in this sample? The four-factor structure used in
previous investigations (Mounts, 2000, 2001) was subject to
confirmatory factor analysis. Second, are the parenting style
variables and the parenting practices variables distinct from
one another? Several researchers suggested that these par-
enting variables are conceptually distinct from one another
(Darling & Steinberg, 1993; Mize et al., 1998; Parke &
O’Neil, 1999). Before analyzing the moderator relation be-
 60 MOUNTS
tween the parenting style and parenting practices variables,
it is important to establish that they are, in fact, empirically
distinct from one another.
Third, are there differences in adolescents’ perceptions of
peer management across authoritative, authoritarian, indul-
gent, and uninvolved parenting style groups? It may be
expected that some parenting practices would be used more
within certain parenting style contexts and less within other
parenting style contexts. I hypothesized that adolescents
who reported that their parents used the authoritative style
would report lower levels of prohibiting; higher levels of
monitoring, guiding, and supporting; and moderate levels of
neutrality. In contrast, I hypothesized that adolescents who
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reported that their parents used the authoritarian style would
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report higher levels of monitoring and prohibiting and lower
levels of guiding, neutrality, and supporting. I also hypoth-
esized that adolescents who reported that their parents used
the indulgent parenting style would report higher levels of
neutrality and supporting and lower levels of monitoring,
guiding, and prohibiting. Finally, I hypothesized that ado-
lescents who reported that their parents used the uninvolved
style would report the highest levels of neutrality in con-
junction with the lowest levels of monitoring, guiding,
prohibiting, and supporting.
Fourth, in what ways are adolescents’ perceptions of
parental management practices related to adolescents’ Time
1 drug use, adolescents’ Time 2 drug use, and friends’ Time
1 drug use? Figure 1 presents the hypothesized relation
between the parenting practices variables, adolescents’
Time 1 drug use, adolescents’ Time 2 drug use, and friends’
Time 1 drug use.
Fifth, does the relation between parental management of
peers and the drug use outcomes vary within different
Figure 1. Hypothesized structural equation model of relation between parental management
strategies and drug use.
parenting style contexts? As suggested by Darling and
Steinberg (1993), one would expect different types of man-
agement to be more effective within some parenting style
contexts than others. This question assesses processes that
occur within the parenting style context rather than simply
examining the mean differences across the four parenting
style groups that were the focus of the third question in this
investigation. As such, there could be mean differences in
management across the parenting style groups, but the re-
lation between management and the drug use outcomes may
be very similar across the four groups. Alternatively, mean
differences in management may emerge, and the relation
between management and drug use outcomes may be dif-
ferent across the groups.
Similar to Steinberg et al. (1992), I hypothesized that the
negative relation between adolescents’ perceptions of mon-
itoring and adolescents’ perceptions of guiding and the
outcome variables would be enhanced by the authoritative
style. For adolescents’ perceptions of parental neutrality in
regard to peer relationships, I hypothesized that higher
levels of neutrality within the authoritative context would
not be associated with higher levels of Time 1 and Time 2
drug use for adolescents. Further, I hypothesized that higher
levels of neutrality would not be associated with having
friends with higher levels of Time 1 drug use. However, I
hypothesized that adolescents’ perceptions of higher levels
of neutrality within the indulgent or uninvolved contexts
would be associated with higher levels of adolescents’ Time
1 and Time 2 drug use as well as with having friends with
higher levels of Time 1 drug use. I hypothesized that higher
levels of prohibiting within the context of the authoritative
or indulgent styles would have minimal effects, whereas
higher levels of prohibiting within the authoritarian style
 PARENTAL MANAGEMENT OF ADOLESCENT PEER RELATIONSHIPS
would have the most negative effects on adolescents be-
cause the context of the authoritarian relationship is already
quite restrictive. Finally, as suggested by the work of Mize
and Pettit (1997), I hypothesized that adolescents’ percep-
tions of higher levels of support may offset some of the
negative effects of the authoritarian and uninvolved styles.
Method
Sample
The 300 participants included in these analyses were drawn
from a larger, 1-year longitudinal study of parental influences on
ninth-graders’ peer relationships. The school was located in a
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small, midwestern city. All ninth-graders present in the school on
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the testing days were asked to complete questionnaires. Question-
naire data were collected from adolescents and their friends in two
waves (beginning of the school year and end of the school year).
Data from friends were matched with target ninth-graders’ data
and used in the analyses.
The demographics of the sample were as follows: Approxi-
mately 40% of the sample were boys and 60% of the sample were
girls. The family structure of the adolescents was as follows: intact
(58%), single parent (21%), stepfamily (17.3%), and other (3.7%).
The majority of the sample was White (83.8%); the remainder of
the sample was composed of African Americans (8.2%), Asians
(3.2%), Hispanics (1.6%), Native Americans (1.6%), and others
(1.6%). Father’s education was represented by less than a high
school education (17%), high school graduate (35%), trade school
or some college (27%), college graduate (14.1%), and graduate
degree (6.9%).
Procedure
Because the investigation involved questions regarding adoles-
cents and their best school friends, there was concern that a
standard active consent procedure (in which parents of the adoles-
cents and the parents of the adolescents’ friends return signed
consent forms) would produce a very small sample. Therefore, I
decided to use a passive consent procedure in this investigation. In
consultation with the administrators of the participating school and
the university’s Institutional Review Board, a consent procedure
was used in which assent was solicited from the adolescents and
their friends, whereas passive consent was sought from the parents.
All parents in the school were mailed a letter, via first-class mail,
approximately 4 weeks prior to the first scheduled data collection.
Parents were asked to call either the school or the research office
if they did not want their child to participate in the research study.
Approximately 1% of the adolescents in the school had consent
withheld.
Assent was solicited from all students on the day of the first data
collection. Students were provided a written description of the
study, including their role in the study and the voluntary nature of
their participation. Students who wished to participate signed the
form and then proceeded to respond to the questionnaire. Students
who did not wish to participate in the investigation were allowed
to work on school-related activities at their desks or were allowed
to go to the library. No adolescents refused to participate in the
research study.
Data were collected using self-report questionnaires adminis-
tered to adolescents in classroom-size groups (about 25 to 30
students) during a required social studies class. Research staff
distributed the questionnaires and instruction sheets and read the
instructions aloud at the beginning of the class period. Students
61
had the entire class period (approximately 45 min) to complete the
questionnaire. Graduate students who were members of the re-
search team circulated through the classrooms to answer any
questions, to check to see that identification numbers were re-
corded accurately, and to collect the completed materials at the end
of the class period. Identification numbers were used to match
adolescent questionnaires across all waves of data collection. To
maximize the sample size, research assistants returned to the
school on multiple occasions to collect data from adolescents who
were not available to complete questionnaires when the main data
collection occurred.
Measures
Parenting style. Adolescents’ perceptions of parental warmth
and of behavioral control were assessed using the 56-item revision
of the Child’s Report of Parent Behavior Inventory (CRPBI;
Burger & Armentrout, 1971; Schaefer, 1965). Adolescents re-
sponded to items about their parent such as “Gives me a lot of care
and attention” (Warmth subscale) and “Does not insist I obey
if I complain or protest” (Behavioral Control subscale [reverse
coded]). Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted on these
items to examine the two-factor structure reported in previous
investigations. Not surprisingly, factor loadings were all signifi-
cant, and the analyses suggested a good fit to the data, ␹2(701, N ⫽
300) ⫽ 1,272.77; normed fit index (NFI) ⫽ .96; comparative fit
index (CFI) ⫽ .98; relative fit index (RFI) ⫽ .96; root-mean-
square error of approximation (RMSEA) ⫽ .05. Bentler and Bon-
nett (1980) suggested that a NFI greater than .90 suggests a good
fit. The closer the CFI is to 1, the better the fit (Bentler, 1990). RFI
values close to 1 indicate a very good fit (Arbuckle & Wothke,
1999).
Factor scores were used to compute the parental warmth and the
behavioral control variables. Median splits on the parental warmth
and behavioral control variables were then conducted to create the
four parenting style groups. Adolescents who reported high paren-
tal warmth and high behavioral control were considered to be from
authoritative homes, those who reported low warmth and high
behavioral control were considered to be from authoritarian
homes, those who reported high warmth and low behavioral con-
trol were said to be from indulgent homes, and those who reported
low warmth and low behavioral control were said to be from
uninvolved homes. Using this method, I placed 27.2% of the
adolescents in the authoritative parenting style group, 22.5% in the
authoritarian parenting style group, 22.8% in the indulgent parent-
ing style group, and the remaining 27.5% in the uninvolved par-
enting style group.1
Parenting practices. Adolescents’ perceptions of parental
monitoring were assessed using a five-item scale on which ado-
lescents indicated the degree to which their activities were moni-
tored by their parents (Dornbusch et al., 1985). Adolescents re-
1
An alternate strategy for creating the parenting style groups
was suggested by one of the reviewers, and analyses were con-
ducted to ascertain similarity in groupings across the two methods.
In the alternate method, factor scores were derived from an addi-
tional exploratory analysis that was conducted on the single factors
(parental warmth and behavioral control) that were tested in the
two-factor confirmatory factor analysis. Median splits were then
conducted on the factor scores to create the parenting style groups.
The strategy described in the text and this alternate strategy
yielded comparable results. Across both methods of parenting style
group formation, approximately 98% of the adolescents were in
the same parenting style group.
 62 MOUNTS

Table 1
Means, Standard Deviations, and Intercorrelations Among the Major Variables
Variable M SD 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
1. Monitoring 2.28 .54 .14* .13* ⫺.11 .22*** ⫺.37*** ⫺.26*** ⫺.36***
2. Guiding 1.02 .25 — .09 .49*** .50*** .01 ⫺.17** ⫺.12
3. Neutrality 1.41 .36 — ⫺.16** .29*** ⫺.07 ⫺.08 ⫺.10
4. Prohibiting 1.50 .41 — .25*** .18*** .13* .15*
5. Supporting 1.28 .34 — ⫺.14* ⫺.19** ⫺.15*
6. Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use 1.78 .88 — .52*** .74***
7. Friends’ Time 1 drug use 1.68 .70 — .54***
8. Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use 1.70 .83 —
* p ⬍ .05. ** p ⬍ .01. *** p ⬍ .001.
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sponded to items such as “How much do your parents really know Friends’ Time 1 drug use was calculated by first calculating
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where you are at night?” Adolescents used a three-point scale
ranging from 1 (don’t really know) to 3 (know a lot). Alpha for the
scale was .82. A high score on the scale indicates a high level of
parental monitoring.
Adolescents’ perceptions of direct parental involvement in peer
relationships were assessed using four scales derived from the
25-item PMPI (Mounts, 2000). A four-point Likert-type scale was
used on which responses ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4
(strongly agree). Perceptions of parental guiding were assessed
with nine items; adolescents were asked to respond to items such
as “My parents talk to me about the pros and cons of hanging
around with certain people.” Perceptions of parental neutrality
were assessed with five items; adolescents responded to items such
as “My parents tell me that who I have as friends is my personal
choice.” Perceptions of parental prohibiting of peer relationships
were assessed with six items that demonstrated the extent to which
parents attempted to limit adolescents’ interactions with particular
peers, for example, “My parents tell me if they don’t want me to
hang around with certain kids.” A high score on this scale indicates
a high level of prohibiting of friendships. Perceptions of parental
supporting of peer relationships was assessed using five items;
adolescents were asked to respond to items such as “My parents
encourage me to invite kids they like over to my house.”
Friendship nominations. As suggested by Kandel (1978), ad-
olescents were asked to name their three best friends in the same
school and grade. This information was used to match adolescents
and their friends to obtain measures of friends’ Time 1 drug use.
Because adolescents may inflate the degree of similarity between
themselves and their friends, having friends report on their own
drug use and using those measures of drug use in analyses sub-
stantially increases the validity of the assessment (Bauman &
Fisher, 1986).
Adolescents’ and friends’ drug use. Adolescents and their best
friends were asked to report “How often in the last three months
have you” used various types of drugs. McCord (1990) suggested
that although self-reports of antisocial behavior are subject to
under- and overreporting, they appear to be more valid methods of
assessing problem behaviors in adolescence than are police
records. Furthermore, they are more valid than observational meth-
ods because many antisocial behaviors are not readily observable.
Participants completed this measure at Time 1 (beginning of the
school year) and at Time 2 (end of the school year). Friends
completed this measure at Time 1. Four response options were
given ranging from Never to Often. A high score on these scales
indicates high levels of drug use. Drug use was assessed using a
five-item scale that assesses students’ use of alcohol, marijuana,
and other drugs (Lamborn, Mounts, Steinberg, & Dornbusch,
1991). Alphas for this scale were .92 and .93 at Time 1 and Time
2, respectively.
individual friend’s Time 1 drug use scores. Then, the Time 1 drug
use scores of the friends were averaged. At least two friends had
to complete the Time 1 drug use measure for them to be included
in the analyses. These scores were then entered as the friends’
Time 1 drug use score in all analyses.
Results
Means and standard deviations for the major variables as
well as correlations among the major variables are presented
in Table 1.
Confirmatory Factor Analysis
Because the PMPI has been used in previous investiga-
tions but has not been examined using confirmatory factor
analyses, I used confirmatory factor analysis to examine the
factor structure of the scale. The confirmatory factor anal-
ysis suggested a good fit to the data, ␹2(269, N ⫽ 300) ⫽
820.35; NFI ⫽ .96; CFI ⫽ .97; RFI ⫽ .95; RMSEA ⫽ .07.
Results are presented in Table 2. Factor loadings were all
significant. The NFI was .96, suggesting a good fit to the
data. Similarly, the CFI was .97, indicating a good fit to the
data. The correlations among the four factors were as fol-
lows: guiding and neutrality (r ⫽ .15, p ⬍ .05), guiding and
prohibiting (r ⫽ .59, p ⬍ .001), guiding and supporting (r ⫽
.72, p ⬍ .001), neutrality and prohibiting (r ⫽ ⫺.25, p ⬍
.001), neutrality and supporting (r ⫽ .41, p ⬍ .001), and
prohibiting and supporting (r ⫽ .34, p ⬍ .001).2 Factor
scores from the confirmatory factor analysis were used to
create the four parental management variables.
Correlations Between the Parenting Style Variables
and Parental Management of Peers
Because the focus of this investigation was on adoles-
cents’ perceptions of two different aspects of parenting, it
2
Because the correlation between guiding and supporting was
.72, at the suggestion of one of the reviewers, I conducted an
additional confirmatory factor analysis in which guiding and sup-
porting were combined into one factor rather than two separate
factors. The chi-square difference between the two models sug-
gested that the model in which the factors were separate had a
better fit to the data than did the model in which the guiding and
supporting factors were combined.
 PARENTAL MANAGEMENT OF ADOLESCENT PEER RELATIONSHIPS 63

Table 2
Factor Loadings From the Confirmatory Factor Analysis of Items on the Parental Management of Peers Inventory
Factor loading Item
Guiding friendships
.28 My parents talk to me about the pros and cons of hanging around with certain people.
.55 My parents tell me that who I have for friends will affect my future.
.56 My parents want me to be friends with kids who don’t drink alcohol or do drugs.
.55 I’m only friends with kids who are good students because my parents want me to be.
.60 I’m only friends with kids who don’t drink or do drugs because my parents want me to be.
.57 My parents only want me hanging around with kids who are like our family.
.48 If my friends do things that my parents don’t approve of I stop being friends with them.
.38 My parents influence my selection of friends.
.42 My parents try to be in charge of my friendships.
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Neutrality
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.66 My parents tell me that who I have as friends is my personal choice.

.65 My parents don’t interfere with my friendships.
.46 My parents do not concern themselves with my friendships.
.69 My parents think that who I have for friends is my own business.
.40 My parents don’t talk to me about my friends.
Prohibiting friendships
.69 My parents tell me that they don’t like my friends.
.70 My parents tell me if they don’t want me to hang around with certain kids.
.70 My parents tell me that they don’t approve of the things my friends do.
.42 My parents want me to be friends with kids who are good students.
.62 My parents let me know who they want to be my friends.
.53 My parents think that if my friends are doing bad things, I must be doing them too.
Supporting friendships
.54 My parents encourage me to invite kids they like over to my house.
.56 My parents encourage me to do activities with kids they like.
.52 My parents help me think of ways to meet new kids.
.54 My parents want me in certain activities at school because of the kinds of kids I’ll meet in them.
.54 My parents support me in my activities because they like the friends I meet in them.

was important to establish that the constructs were, in fact,
distinct. High correlations between the parenting style di-
mensions and the parenting practices were consistent with
the position that the constructs were not distinct. Such a
finding would make it questionable to conduct analyses that
examine parenting style as a moderator of parental manage-
ment of peers. I computed the correlations of the parenting
style variables with the parental management variables by
conducting a confirmatory factor analysis on the parenting
style variables and the parental management variables. The
range in the absolute value of the correlations was between
.02 and .39, with the mean of the absolute values being .17.
This suggested that the constructs were distinct and that
further examination of the moderator effect was appropriate.
Parenting Style Group Differences in Parental
Management of Peers
To examine differences in adolescents’ perceptions of
peer management strategies (monitoring, guiding, neutral-
ity, prohibiting, and supporting) across the four parenting
style groups (authoritative, authoritarian, indulgent, and un-
involved), I conducted five separate analyses of variance
(ANOVAs). Because management strategies may vary
across gender groups, I also included gender as an indepen-
dent variable in the analyses. No significant gender differ-
ences were found, nor were there significant Parenting
Style ⫻ Gender interactions. Thus, I conducted a reanalysis
with gender dropped from the model. To control for fami-
lywise error associated with conducting multiple ANOVAs,
a significance level of p ⬍ .01 was set for the F values
associated with the five ANOVAs. I conducted Bonferroni
tests to assess differences between pairs of parenting style
groups. Results of these analyses are presented in Table 3.
I found significant differences in adolescents’ perceptions
of management across the four parenting style groups for
monitoring, F(3, 296) ⫽ 10.71, p ⬍ .001; neutrality, F(3,
296) ⫽ 5.37, p ⬍ .001; and supporting, F(3, 296) ⫽ 4.43,
p ⬍ .005. I found no differences across the parenting style
groups for adolescents’ perceptions of guiding, F(3, 296) ⫽
.37, p ⫽ ns, or prohibiting, F(3, 296) ⫽ .57, p ⫽ ns. For
monitoring, adolescents from authoritative homes reported
significantly higher levels of monitoring than adolescents
from authoritarian, indulgent, and uninvolved homes re-
ported. Adolescents who were from authoritative homes and
indulgent homes reported significantly higher levels of neu-
trality than did adolescents from authoritarian homes. Fi-
nally, adolescents from authoritative homes reported signif-
icantly higher levels of supporting than adolescents from
authoritarian or uninvolved homes reported.
 64
Table 3
Means and Standard Deviations of the Parenting Practices Within the Four Parenting Style Groups
Authoritative Authoritarian
Variables M SD M SD
Monitoring 2.54a,b,c 0.42 2.18a
Guiding 1.00 0.19 1.00
Neutrality 1.49a 0.29 1.29a,b
Prohibiting 1.51 0.34 1.52
Supporting 1.38a,b 0.30 1.23a
Note. Means with subscripts that are the same within a row are significantly different from one another at p ⬍ .05.
Relation Between Parental Management of Peers
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and Drug Use Outcomes
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Structural equation modeling was used to examine the
relation between adolescents’ perceptions of parental man-
agement and the Time 1 and Time 2 outcomes. It should be
noted that none of the variables included in this set of
analyses or the moderator effect analyses were latent vari-
ables. Therefore, the model being tested was not a structural
model but a path model that was being tested using some of
the procedures available in structural equation modeling
statistical programs. In particular, testing the moderator
effect using traditional path-analytic multiple regression
procedures would be difficult given the categorical nature of
the parenting style variable.
The model presented in Figure 1 was used to test the
relation between the five Time 1 parenting practices, ado-
lescents’ Time 1 drug use, adolescents’ Time 2 drug use,
and friends’ Time 1 drug use using structural equation
modeling. Some aspects of the model have been tested in a
previous investigation (Mounts, 2001); however, the entire
model has not been examined. These analyses were a test of
a main effect model wherein all of the parental management
variables were predictors in the model. The purpose of this
set of analyses was to allow a comparison between the
parameters in the baseline model and the parameters in the
interaction model. To facilitate comparison between the
models, path coefficients for this baseline model as well as
the interaction model are presented in Table 4. The path
coefficients for the baseline model are reported in the first
column of Table 4.
Adolescents’ perceptions of parental monitoring, guiding,
neutrality, prohibiting, and supporting were treated as ex-
ogenous variables. The endogenous Time 1 variables were
adolescents’ drug use and friends’ drug use, and the endog-
enous Time 2 variable was adolescents’ drug use. As illus-
trated in Figure 1, causal paths were permitted between the
exogenous variables and the Time 1 and Time 2 endogenous
variables. Pathways were also permitted between the Time
1 and Time 2 endogenous variables. In this fully saturated
model, all variables were allowed to freely correlate with
one another, ␹2(0, N ⫽ 300) ⫽ 0.00.
As can be seen in Table 4, adolescents who reported that
their parents used higher levels of monitoring reported
lower levels of Time 1 drug use. Adolescents who reported
that their parents used higher levels of guiding associated
with friends who reported lower levels of Time 1 drug use.
MOUNTS
Indulgent Uninvolved
M SD M SD
0.53 2.32b 0.54 2.14c 0.53
0.26 1.04 0.24 1.02 0.30
0.45 1.50b 0.28 1.38 0.37
0.46 1.48 0.34 1.44 0.45
0.34 1.33 0.32 1.22b 0.36
When adolescents reported that their parents used higher
levels of prohibiting, they reported higher levels of Time 1
drug use and associated with friends who reported higher
levels of Time 1 drug use. Adolescents who reported that
their parents used higher levels of supporting reported lower
levels of Time 1 drug use. As one would expect, adolescents
who reported higher levels of Time 1 drug use associated
with friends with higher levels of Time 1 drug use. Simi-
larly, adolescents who reported higher levels of Time 1 drug
use reported higher levels of Time 2 drug use as well.
Finally, associating with friends with higher levels of Time
1 drug use was related to higher levels of adolescents’ Time
2 drug use, even after controlling for the adolescent’s own
Time 1 drug use.
According to Glasgow, Dornbusch, Troyer, Steinberg,
and Ritter (1997), using the adolescents’ Time 1 drug use as
a control in the analysis limits the amount of variance that
other predictors in the equation can explain. Not including
the adolescents’ Time 1 drug use, however, may have
placed more significance on the remaining predictors than
was appropriate. This procedure enabled a closer look at the
relation between the parenting variables and changes in
drug use over a short time period and was a more conser-
vative test of the relation between the parenting variables
and the adolescents’ Time 2 drug use. Using this procedure
of controlling for adolescents’ Time 1 drug use, these results
suggest that parenting practices may affect changes in ad-
olescents’ drug use over time and may affect associations
with friends despite the fact that the data are correlational in
nature.
Parenting Style as a Moderator of the Parental
Management of Peers’ Effects
In the final set of analyses, I examined the moderating
effect of parenting style on management practices using
structural equation modeling. In this set of analyses, a
multiple-group structural equation model approach using
Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS; Arbuckle &
Wothke, 1999) was used to test for differences in the
relationships in Figure 1 across each of the four parenting
style groups. Parker, Baltes, and Christiansen (1997) sug-
gested that several steps are necessary to test models across
groups. In the first step, the fully variant model was esti-
mated to generate the path coefficients between the eight
constructs (monitoring, guiding, neutrality, prohibiting, sup-
porting, adolescents’ Time 1 drug use, friends’ Time 1 drug
 PARENTAL MANAGEMENT OF ADOLESCENT PEER RELATIONSHIPS 65

use, and adolescents’ Time 2 drug use) for each of the four

11.18***
11.65**

14.96**
11.34*

7.63*

8.75*

8.94*
groups. These coefficients are presented in the second
␹2

0.22
2.02

0.26

0.93

1.07
4.94
6.03

0.31
3.40

2.42
2.75
through fifth columns of Table 4, with each column pre-
senting data for one of the four parenting style groups.
Because the fully variant model was saturated, the model
provided a perfect fit to the data, ␹2(0, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 0.00. In
Uninvolved

.98*a,b,c

a,b,c
.75***

.44***
.77***
addition, the model for each of the parenting style groups

⫺.98**
a,b

d
.33b

.22b

.06b
for the unconstrained model was fully saturated, ␹2(0, N ⫽
.09

⫺.43

.27
⫺.33

.19

⫺.09
.16

.06
⫺.53

.12
288) ⫽ 0.00.
Next, using an omnibus test, I examined the relationships
between the eight constructs to assess whether they were
Indulgent

equivalent across the four parenting style groups. In this

.42***
.59***
.39***
b,c
⫺.47*

.72*

.36*a

.16b
step, all paths in the model were held invariant across the
⫺.77c

.04c
.25

⫺.63

.07

.16
⫺.03

.14
⫺.08
⫺.13

.10
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four parenting style groups. A significant chi-square differ-

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ence between the fully variant model and the invariant

model for these analyses would demonstrate that the con-
structs did not function equivalently across the four groups.
Authoritarian
⫺.68***

.54***

.87***
.13a,c,d

A nonsignificant chi-square difference would have indicated

⫺.45*a,b

a,b
.59*
⫺.55b

⫺.27b
.11a

that the constructs functioned equivalently. Because the

.06

⫺.52

.08
⫺.01
⫺.33

.51
⫺.01
⫺.18
⫺.25

fully variant model was saturated, ␹2(0, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 0.00,

Note. Coefficients in the same row with the same subscripts are significantly different from each other at p ⬍ .05.

the chi-square for the invariant model was equal to the

chi-square difference. The chi-square difference for the
fully invariant model was significant, ␹2(54, N ⫽ 288) ⫽
Authoritative

76.90, p ⬍ .05, and showed a significant decrease in model

.64***

.94***
a,b
.31**
⫺.48**
a,b

fit. This result indicates that the model did not function
⫺.86*a

a
.56a

⫺.17a
.16

⫺.35
.13
.33
.02
⫺.13

⫺.20

⫺.26

.08
.20
.13

equivalently across the four parenting style groups, suggest-

ing that the model differed within the parenting style
contexts.
In the next step, each individual path in the model was
Main effect model

held invariant while the remaining 17 paths were free to

vary. This procedure assessed whether each path functioned
Path Coefficients and Comparisons Within the Four Parenting Style Groups

.27***
⫺.55***

.40***
.64***
⫺.48**
.35**

similarly across the four parenting style groups. A signifi-

.23*
⫺.34*

⫺.01
.07
.07

⫺.03
⫺.02

⫺.08
⫺.16
⫺.05

.18
.12

cant chi-square for a path indicated that the path was not
equivalent across the four parenting style groups. These
analyses were used to identify the ways in which the models
differed across the four parenting style contexts. The results
of these chi-square analyses are presented in the last column
of Table 4. Of the 18 paths tested, 7 of them had a signif-
Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

icant chi-squares when the path was held invariant across

Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use

Friends’ Time 1 drug use 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

the four groups. These paths were guiding to adolescents’

Time 1 drug use, ␹2(3, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 11.34, p ⬍ .05;
monitoring to friends’ Time 1 drug use, ␹2(3, N ⫽ 288) ⫽
11.65, p ⬍ .01; neutrality to friends’ Time 1 drug use, ␹2(3,
N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 7.63, p ⬍ .05; guiding to adolescents’ Time 2
Monitoring 3 Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use

Monitoring 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

Prohibiting 3 Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use

Prohibiting 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

Supporting 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use
Supporting 3 Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use

drug use ␹2(3, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 8.75, p ⬍ .05; prohibiting to

Neutrality 3 Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use

Neutrality 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

Guiding 3 Adolescents’ Time 1 drug use

Guiding 3 Adolescents’ Time 2 drug use

adolescents’ Time 2 drug use, ␹2(3, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 11.18, p ⬍

* p ⬍ .05. ** p ⬍ .01. *** p ⬍ .001.
Monitoring 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use

Prohibiting 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use

Supporting 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use
Neutrality 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use

.05; adolescents’ Time 1 drug use to adolescents’ Time 2

Guiding 3 Friends’ Time 1 drug use

drug use, ␹2(3, N ⫽ 288) ⫽ 14.96, p ⬍ .01; and friends’

Path

Time 1 drug use to adolescents’ Time 2 drug use, ␹2(3, N ⫽

288) ⫽ 8.94, p ⬍ .05. These results provide evidence that
these paths did not function in the same way across all of the
parenting style groups.
To interpret the differences across the four parenting style
contexts, the significant chi-square for the each of the seven
significant paths described above were followed by six
pairwise analyses. In these analyses, the significant path
Table 4

was held invariant across two of the four parenting style

groups at a time (authoritative vs. authoritarian, authorita-
tive vs. indulgent, authoritative vs. uninvolved, authoritar-
 66 MOUNTS
ian vs. indulgent, authoritarian vs. uninvolved, and indul-
gent vs. uninvolved). A significant chi-square on these
analyses would indicate that the path was different for those
two parenting style groups. Results of the pairwise analyses
are presented using the subscripts in the second through fifth
columns of Table 4.
The path between guiding and adolescents’ Time 1 drug
use was significantly different between adolescents who
reported that their parents used the uninvolved style versus
the other three parenting style groups. For adolescents who
reported that their parents used the uninvolved style, higher
levels of guiding were associated with higher levels of Time
1 drug use. High levels of guiding for adolescents in au-
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thoritative homes were associated with low levels of Time 1
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drug use, whereas the authoritarian and indulgent groups
had a nonsignificant, but negative, association between
guiding and adolescents’ Time 1 drug use.
The path between monitoring and friends’ Time 1 drug
use was significantly different for adolescents who reported
that their parents used an authoritative style versus the
authoritarian and uninvolved styles. For adolescents who
reported that their parents used the authoritative style,
higher levels of monitoring were associated with having
friends with lower levels of Time 1 drug use. In contrast,
monitoring was not associated with friends’ Time 1 drug
use characteristics for adolescents who reported that their
parents used the authoritarian style, the indulgent style, or
the uninvolved style.
The path between neutrality and friends’ Time 1 drug use
characteristics was significantly different between adoles-
cents who reported that their parents used an authoritarian
parenting style and those who reported that their parents
used the indulgent or uninvolved style. For adolescents who
reported that their parents used the indulgent style, higher
levels of parental neutrality were associated with selecting
friends with higher levels of Time 1 drug use. In contrast,
for adolescents who reported that their parents used the
authoritarian style, higher levels of neutrality were associ-
ated with selecting friends with lower levels of Time 1 drug
use. When parents used the authoritative or uninvolved
style, parent neutrality was not associated with friends’
Time 1 drug use.
The path between guiding and adolescents’ Time 2 drug
use was significantly different between the uninvolved
group and the authoritative and indulgent groups. For ado-
lescents from uninvolved homes, high levels of guiding
were associated with lower levels of Time 2 drug use,
whereas guiding was not related to the Time 2 drug use for
adolescents from authoritative and indulgent homes. The
paths between the adolescents from authoritarian homes and
uninvolved homes were not significantly different from one
another.
The path between prohibiting and adolescents’ Time 2
drug use was significantly different between the uninvolved
group and the remaining three groups. As can be seen in
Table 4, higher levels of prohibiting were associated with
higher levels of Time 2 drug use for adolescents in the
uninvolved group. Prohibiting had a nonsignificant associ-
ation with adolescents’ Time 2 drug use for adolescents
from authoritative, authoritarian, and indulgent homes.
Parenting style group differences emerged for the path
between adolescents’ Time 1 drug use and adolescents’
Time 2 drug use. Although for all groups, higher levels of
adolescents’ Time 1 drug use were associated with higher
levels of Time 2 drug use, this relation was much more
modest and nonsignificant for the adolescents from the
authoritarian parenting style group.
Finally, I found significant parenting style differences
between friends’ Time 1 drug use and adolescents’ Time 2
drug use. For adolescents from authoritarian families, hav-
ing friends with higher levels of Time 1 drug use was
related to higher levels of adolescents’ Time 2 drug use. The
results for the authoritative and indulgent groups were sta-
tistically significant and similar in direction to the results for
the authoritarian group. That is, having friends with higher
levels of Time 1 drug use was related to higher levels of
Time 2 drug use. However, the magnitude of the relation
between friends’ Time 1 drug use and adolescents’ Time 2
drug use was significantly different from one another be-
tween adolescents from the authoritative and authoritarian
groups. The relation between friends’ Time 1 drug use and
adolescents’ Time 2 drug use was nonsignificant and was
also significantly different from the path associated with the
authoritarian group.
Discussion
The findings from the confirmatory factor analysis sug-
gest that the four factors derived from earlier studies
(Mounts, 2000, 2001) of the PMPI provided a good fit to the
data for this data set. Given that this measure is relatively
new, future studies should continue to explore the psycho-
metric properties of this measure for adolescents of different
ages and ethnic backgrounds. The analyses suggested that
the parenting style and the parenting practices constructs are
separate constructs. Future investigations of the linkages
between parenting style and parenting practices should as-
sess whether the measures that are being used to assess
these constructs are, in fact, distinct.
The findings also support the notion that parental man-
agement of peer relationships varies across the four parent-
ing style groups. Contrary to the hypotheses, there were no
differences between the parenting style groups on prohibit-
ing or guiding. Prohibiting occurred with similar frequency
across all four parenting style groups, suggesting that this is
a strategy that all parents use, despite the fact that its effects
may vary within different parenting style contexts.
Analyses of the relations presented in Figure 1 suggest
that four of the five parenting practices contributed to at
least one of the outcome variables. Consistent with previous
literature, higher levels of monitoring were associated with
lower levels of Time 1 drug use. Surprisingly, higher levels
of prohibiting were associated with higher levels of drug use
but only for Time 1. The directionality of this relation is
unclear. It could be that when parents prohibit, they drive
their adolescents toward drug involvement. Alternatively, it
could be that parents are prohibiting in response to their
 PARENTAL MANAGEMENT OF ADOLESCENT PEER RELATIONSHIPS
adolescents’ drug use. Higher levels of support were related
to lower levels of Time 1 drug use. As expected, higher
levels of guiding were related to associating with friends
with lower levels of Time 1 drug use, whereas higher levels
of prohibiting were associated with having friends with
higher levels of Time 1 drug use. Consistent with previous
research, there were significant positive relations between
adolescents’ Time 1 drug use and friends’ Time 1 drug use.
In addition, as expected, adolescents’ Time 1 drug use and
adolescents’ Time 2 drug use were significantly positively
related. Further, friends’ Time 1 drug use was associated
positively with adolescents’ Time 2 drug use, even when
controlling for the adolescents’ Time 1 drug use. This
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finding suggests that friends’ Time 1 drug use had an effect
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on adolescents’ drug use over time, as has been suggested in
previous research (Hawkins et al., 1992).
The results provide modest support for the model pro-
posed by Darling and Steinberg (1993), in which parenting
style moderates the relations between parenting practices
and the outcome variable. Specifically, the analyses dem-
onstrate that the model differs somewhat across the parent-
ing style contexts. I found significant parenting style group
differences for the path between guiding and adolescents’
Time 1 drug use. The authoritative, authoritarian, and in-
dulgent groups were significantly different from the unin-
volved group on this path. Higher levels of guiding were
associated with lower levels of Time 1 drug use for adoles-
cents who reported that their parents used the authoritative,
authoritarian, or indulgent styles. In contrast, higher levels
of guiding were associated with higher levels of Time 1
drug use for adolescents who reported that their parents
used the uninvolved style. It could be that the uninvolved
parents do not generally engage in guiding but resort to it
when they discover that their children are involved in drug
use. Alternatively, the lack of parent– child relationships in
the uninvolved group may have caused adolescents to do the
opposite of what their parents wanted them to do when their
parents engaged in guiding.
The results are consistent with the work of Mize and
Pettit (1997), who found that parenting practices seemed to
compensate for some of the weakness in parenting style. It
is interesting that the results for the uninvolved group sug-
gest that the monitoring is not enough to compensate for the
problems associated with the uninvolved style. Conversely,
when considering the adolescents who reported that their
parents used the authoritative style, in all likelihood, mon-
itoring becomes less important in determining drug use
because of the overarching effect of the parenting style on
the adolescent.
Monitoring functioned very differently within the author-
itative parenting style group versus the authoritarian, indul-
gent, and neglectful groups. Most of the existing research on
monitoring has not considered that monitoring may not
operate in a similar fashion for all parenting style contexts.
The effects of monitoring on associating with drug-using
friends varied across the four parenting style groups. When
adolescents reported that their parents used the authoritative
style, higher levels of monitoring were associated with
having friends with lower levels of Time 1 drug use. In
67
contrast, the relation between monitoring and friends’ Time
1 drug use was not significant for any of the three remaining
parenting style groups. It could be that monitoring within
the context of the authoritative parenting style may be
interpreted differently by adolescents than would monitor-
ing within the remaining three parenting style contexts. For
example, monitoring may be viewed as being less intrusive
or, alternatively, because children of authoritative parents
are more likely to internalize standards, they may be dem-
onstrating that this internalization has occurred within the
context of the peer relationship. These results in regard to
monitoring may also help explain some of the inconsisten-
cies that have been found in the literature between moni-
toring and peer relationships (Bogenschneider et al., 1998;
Fuligni & Eccles, 1993). At the very least, these results
suggest that monitoring may not function the same for all
adolescents as it is usually assumed to operate.
I found interesting differences across the groups for the
path between neutrality and friends’ Time 1 drug use. In
particular, when adolescents reported that their parents used
the authoritarian style, higher levels of neutrality were as-
sociated with selecting friends with lower levels of Time 1
drug use. Given the high level of control that authoritarian
parents exert over their adolescents, this may override any
neutrality that parents may have in regard to peer relation-
ships. That is, adolescents from authoritarian families may
be so aware of the expectations of their parents, that even in
the absence of clear guidance in regard to peer relationships
they still select friends whom they believe would be ap-
proved of by their parents. In contrast, for adolescents who
reported that their parents use an indulgent or uninvolved
style, higher levels of neutrality were associated with having
friends with higher levels of Time 1 drug use. In this case,
the overall tone of the parent– child relationships was very
permissive. In the absence of clear messages from the
parents about the acceptable range of peer relationships,
these adolescents selected friends with higher levels of drug
use.
The relation between guiding and adolescents’ Time 2
drug use was significantly different for the uninvolved
group versus the authoritative and indulgent parenting style
groups. High levels of parental guiding were associated with
lower levels of Time 2 drug use for the adolescents in the
uninvolved group, whereas the relation between parental
guiding and Time 2 drug use was nonsignificant for ado-
lescents in the authoritative and indulgent groups.
The results that examine the path between prohibiting and
adolescents’ Time 2 drug use are similar to those for the
path between guiding and adolescents’ Time 1 drug use.
Again, the relation between prohibiting and adolescents’
Time 2 drug use was negative for the authoritative and
authoritarian groups, whereas the relation was positive for
the uninvolved group. Because these analyses included lon-
gitudinal data, these results lend support to the explanation
that the low level of parental involvement created a climate
whereby parents’ efforts to prohibit drove adolescents to-
ward higher levels of drug use at Time 2.
There are several limitations of the present data set that
also suggest directions for future investigations. First, the
 68 MOUNTS
sample sizes for the four parenting style groups are some-
what smaller than what is generally used when using struc-
tural equation modeling procedures, although analyses us-
ing samples of similar size have been conducted
(Valentiner, Holahan, & Moos, 1994). The small sample
size may have increased the likelihood of a Type II error,
making it less likely that differences across the four parent-
ing style groups would be found. These analyses provided a
conservative test of the parenting style as moderator effect.
Second, the sample used in the present investigation con-
tained only ninth-graders. Future investigations need to
expand the age range across adolescence. Developmental
changes may affect the nature of management techniques
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used, the effectiveness of the techniques in affecting peer
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relationships, and the effects of management practices on
the parental–adolescent dyad. Third, the samples in these
investigations were primarily composed of White adoles-
cents from lower-middle-class and middle-class back-
grounds. It is not clear the ways in which these management
techniques function across varying ethnic or socioeconomic
status groups; however, some researchers are beginning to
address this issue (Brown, Hamm, & Meyerson, 1996).
Fourth, these investigations focused only on adolescents’
reports of parental management. Because parents and ado-
lescents may differ in their perceptions of the ways in which
management occurs and how often it occurs, this is an
important component of any research on direct parental
influences on adolescent peer relationships. Fifth, Parke
(1992) suggested that research on parent–peer linkages
needs to consider bidirectional effects. Particularly as chil-
dren reach adolescence, peers may affect children, which
subsequently may affect parenting practices. More detailed
reports from parents and adolescents on specific instances of
management and events just prior to management would
help illuminate the bidirectionality of effects. Finally, ado-
lescents who are involved in antisocial activities often have
older friends who have drawn them into antisocial activities
(Magnusson et al., 1986). As a result, by restricting the
sample to same-grade friends only, the peers who are the
most important to the adolescents, and likely to have the
most influence over adolescents, may not have been in-
cluded in the sample. Future investigations may use a pro-
cedure in which adolescents and their very best friend from
any context participate in the research study.
Implications for Application and Public Policy
The present investigation should be of interest to practi-
tioners for several reasons. First, it provides evidence that
parents do have an impact on their children’s involvement
in drug use, even when accounting for the effects of friends.
This is good news for parents. Although children may not
always select friends who are engaging in desirable activi-
ties, specific parenting practices may prevent adolescents
from being unduly influenced by these friends.
Second, this investigation provides evidence that parents
can have an effect on the types of friends that adolescents
are associating with. Given that there is a strong relation
between peer behavior and adolescent behavior, parents
who actively manage their adolescents’ peer relationships
are increasing the likelihood that their children will associ-
ate with peers who have lower levels of drug use (except for
adolescents whose parents use an authoritarian style).
Finally, the analysis of the model within the parenting
style contexts suggested that certain parenting practices may
be taught to parents who may be labeled uninvolved. Bo-
genschneider and Stone (1997) suggested that even families
at risk can learn more positive parenting practices. Some of
the results from this investigation could be used to guide
practitioners as they work with distressed families. In par-
ticular, the adolescents from the uninvolved families tended
to show a unique pattern of findings such that high levels of
guiding were associated with high levels of drug use at
Time 1 but low levels of drug use at Time 2. The positive
relation between guiding and Time 1 drug use most likely
occurred because parents were guiding in response to their
children’s drug use rather than the guiding causing the drug
use. This explanation is further supported by the negative
relation between guiding and Time 2 drug use. This finding
suggests that parents who have an uninvolved parenting
style may benefit from information that encourages them to
guide their children’s peer relationships. In addition, the
results suggest that parents who have an uninvolved style
may be encouraging drug use by prohibiting their children
from associating with particular adolescents. Therefore, pre-
vention and intervention efforts with uninvolved parents
may include efforts to demonstrate to parents ways of being
involved in adolescents’ peers relationships without being
prohibitive.
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Received June 20, 2000
Revision received January 26, 2001
Accepted August 3, 2001 䡲