Parental control of the personal domain and adolescent symptoms of psychopathology: A cross-national study in the United States and Japan

One hundred seventy U.S. (M = 16.1 years) and 125 middle-class Japanese (M = 16.6 years) adolescents completed a questionnaire assessing perceptions of who (adolescent or parent) controls the personal, conventional, prudential, and overlapping domain behaviors of the adolescent. Participants also completed an inventory assessing self-reported psychological symptoms. Adolescents in both countries indicated that they should have more say over personal issues and that parents should have more say over conventional and prudential issues. Self-reports of internalizing symptoms were positively correlated with amount of perceived control over personal issues for U.S. and Japanese students and for parental control over overlapping domain issues for Japanese students. There were no associations between parental control of conventional or prudential behaviors and psychological symptoms.