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Relations of Parenting to Adolescent Externalizingand Internalizing Distress Moderated by Perception ofNeighborhood DangerJonathan S. Goldner a , Dakari Quimby b , Maryse H. Richards b , Arie Zakaryan b , SteveMiller c , Daniel Dickson b & Jessica Chilson ba Under the Rainbow, Mount Sinai Hospital , Chicago , Illinoisb Department of Psychology , Loyola University Chicago , Chicago , Illinoisc Department of Psychology , Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science , NorthChicago , IllinoisPublished online: 25 Nov 2014.

To cite this article: Jonathan S. Goldner , Dakari Quimby , Maryse H. Richards , Arie Zakaryan , Steve Miller , DanielDickson & Jessica Chilson (2014): Relations of Parenting to Adolescent Externalizing and Internalizing Distress Moderated byPerception of Neighborhood Danger, Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, DOI: 10.1080/15374416.2014.958838

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15374416.2014.958838

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Relations of Parenting to Adolescent Externalizingand Internalizing Distress Moderated by

Perception of Neighborhood Danger

Jonathan S. Goldner

Under the Rainbow, Mount Sinai Hospital, Chicago, Illinois

Dakari Quimby, Maryse H. Richards, and Arie Zakaryan

Department of Psychology, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

Steve Miller

Department of Psychology, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science,North Chicago, Illinois

Daniel Dickson

Department of Psychology, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

Jessica Chilson

Department of Psychology, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

Parental monitoring and warmth have traditionally been studied in the context of White,middle-class families. This article explores optimal levels of these parenting behaviors inpreventing adolescent psychopathology in impoverished, urban high-crime areas whileaccounting for child perceptions of neighborhood danger. In this study, data were col-lected longitudinally at 2 time points 1 year apart from a sample of 254 African Americanyoung adolescents (T1: M age¼ 12.6 years, 41% male) and their parents. Parental moni-toring and warmth, child perception of neighborhood danger, and child internalizing andexternalizing behaviors were measured using questionnaires. Child internalizing behaviorswere also measured using a time sampling technique capturing in vivo accounts of dailydistress. Findings indicated associations between parental monitoring and children’sexternalizing behaviors along with linear and quadratic associations between parentalmonitoring and internalizing behaviors. Monitoring and warmth were differentiallyrelated to symptoms depending on neighborhood danger level. When children perceivedless danger, more monitoring related to less externalizing. When children perceived moredanger, more warmth related to less internalizing. In addition, adolescents’ perceptions ofneighborhood danger emerged as equally strong as monitoring and warmth in predictingsymptoms. This study underscores the influence of carefully considering parentingapproaches and which techniques optimally prevent adolescents’ externalizing, as wellas prevent internalizing difficulties. It also highlights how context affects mental health,specifically how perceptions of danger negatively influence adolescents’ psychopathology,emphasizing the importance of initiatives to reduce violence in communities.

Correspondence should be addressed to Maryse H. Richards, Loyola University Chicago, Department of Psychology, 1032 West Sheridan Road,

Chicago, IL 60660. E-mail: mrichar@luc.edu

Color versions of one or more of the figures in the article can be found online at www.tandfonline.com/hcap.

Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 0(0), 1–14, 2014

Copyright # Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

ISSN: 1537-4416 print=1537-4424 online

DOI: 10.1080/15374416.2014.958838

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In her seminal work examining preschool children andtheir parents, Diana Baumrind (1972) devised atypology of parenting styles. She found that ‘‘authoritat-ive’’ parents, those high in both control and warmth,had better adjusted preschoolers. Extending these find-ings from preschool into adolescence, numerous studieshave testified to the value of authoritative parenting ascompared to authoritarian (high in control, low inwarmth), permissive (low in control, high in warmth)or disengaged (low in control and warmth) parenting.Authoritative parenting has been linked to higher levelsof self-control, reliance, and worth (Steinberg, Brown, &Dornbusch, 1996). Although adolescent behavior hasbeen linked to different components of parenting, themajority of studies have focused on two overarchingthemes derived from Baumrind’s work: parental control(involving managing and supervision) and warmth(involving communication; Smetana, Crean, & Daddis,2002).

Early studies of parenting have mostly looked atEuropean American, often middle-class, families(Garcia-Coll, Meyer, & Brillon, 1995), promptingresearchers to examine the extent to which the dimen-sions of authoritative parenting are used by membersof other ethnicities and socioeconomic statuses.Baumrind (1972) herself examined a small subsampleof African American families from her original studyand found different emphases of parenting and differentcorrelates. These findings, as well as others like them(Steele, Nesbitt-Daly, Daniel, & Forehand, 2005), haveprompted attempts to develop typologies of parentingbetter suited to African American families and thecontexts in which they live (Weis, 2002).

The current study examines two important compo-nents of authoritative parenting (i.e., behavioral controlin the form of parental monitoring, and parentalwarmth) in an urban, low-income, African Americanyoung adolescent sample to determine the extent towhich they provide protection from daily internalizingand externalizing behavior (Garcia-Coll et al., 1995;Mistry, Vandewater, Huston, & McLoyd, 2002).Further, in an effort to better understand how adoles-cents might react differently to parenting when livingin high-crime areas, this article examines how children’sperceptions of neighborhood danger affect theirreactions to parenting.

PARENTAL MONITORING

Parental monitoring appears to be ‘‘critical’’ in the pre-vention of problem behavior (Hoeve et al., 2009). Lowlevels of monitoring of adolescents have been associatedwith a host of problem behaviors: increases in substance

use (Van Ryzin, Fosco, & Dishion, 2012), early sexualactivity (Wight, Williamson, & Henderson, 2006),aggression (Graber, Nichols, Lynne, Brooks-Gunn, &Botvin, 2006), and delinquency generally (Hoeve et al.,2009).

Although numerous studies have linked parentalmonitoring strategies to externalizing difficulties inyoung people, far fewer have examined potential linkswith internalizing symptoms. Parents’ efforts to beaware of their children’s activities, whereabouts, andcompanionship can be thought to stem from affectionand a desire to protect their children (Simons, Lin,et al., 2002). Thus, low levels may very well convey theopposite—that parents are not concerned about theirchildren. When young people realize this fundamentalmessage, they may experience feelings of sadness andanxiety at being left alone to fend for themselves.Although this possibility has gone virtually unexploredin the literature, the existing evidence seems to supporta link. In two cross-sectional studies, low-incomeBahamian youth with depressive symptoms perceivedsignificantly lower levels of parental monitoringthan nondepressed youth (Yu et al., 2006), whereasbehavioral control was negatively associated withinternalizing symptoms in a suburban EuropeanAmerican sample (Barber, Olsen, & Shagle, 1994).

PARENTAL WARMTH

Parental warmth typically refers to the emotionalatmosphere created by the caregiver. It ‘‘includes amother’s responsiveness to her child’s needs, sensitivityto her child’s signals, [and] shared expressions of posi-tive emotions and praise’’ (Weis, 2002, p. 143). Respon-sive parenting has extensively been shown to protectagainst internalizing (Hipwell et al., 2008). Yu and col-leagues (2006) found that impaired communicationbetween parent and child was associated with higherrates of depressive symptoms. Parental warmth was alsoassociated with lower levels of teacher reported shyness,sadness, anxiety, and withdrawal for African Americansixth-grade students (McCabe, Clark, & Barnett, 1999).

The provision of warmth by parents has been shownto be effective in warding off child externalizing beha-vior (McKee, Colletti, Rakow, Jones, & Forehand,2008). Vazsonyi, Pickering, and Bolland (2006) foundthat parental warmth (as well as consistent disciplinarypractices) significantly accounted for reduced problembehaviors and violence perpetration for early to lateadolescent low-income, urban African Americans. Inaddition, among African American, lower income maleadolescents, parental support moderated the relationbetween racial discrimination and violent delinquency(Simons, Simons, et al., 2002). A literature review of

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parenting behaviors and child outcomes (Fletcher,Steinberg, & Williams-Wheeler, 2004) found thatwarmth is more closely linked to psychosocial develop-ment and internalizing distress than parental monitor-ing, whereas parental monitoring is more stronglyassociated with problem behavior.

NEIGHBORHOOD AND PARENTING

The use and effectiveness of different parenting stylesmay also be a function of the environment in which fam-ilies live. Living in dangerous communities appears toaffect the behavior of young people by stimulating vig-ilance and possibly problematic behavior (Daly, Shin,Thakral, Selders, & Vera, 2009). Studies of AfricanAmerican urban adolescents have determined that stu-dents who felt unsafe in their neighborhoods were morelikely to carry a weapon for protection, get into physicalfights, and be involved with the police (Dowdell, 2006).Violence exposure increases youth’s threat appraisals orhow an individual processes violence exposure and inter-prets its impact on his or her welfare (Kliewer &Sullivan, 2008). Such appraisals have been theorized tobe linked to the significance individuals attach to events,coping efforts, and adjustment difficulties (Kliewer &Sullivan, 2008; Lazarus, 1991). In predominatelylow-income, urban samples, studies have demonstratedthat threat appraisals affect internalizing and externaliz-ing problems independently from violence exposure(Kliewer & Sullivan, 2008; Schwab-Stone et al., 1995).One aspect of threat appraisals—perception of neigh-borhood danger—is examined in this study. Youthwho grow up in dangerous environments experienceanticipatory stress levels even when stressors are notpresent (Kiser, 2007). Beyond the amount or degree ofdanger present in a community, research has demon-strated one’s perception of neighborhood danger to beintegral to one’s functioning. Greater perceived neigh-borhood danger has been linked to such outcomes asstronger positive beliefs about aggression (Colder, Mott,Levy, & Flay, 2000), as well as less effective copingstrategies in high-crime neighborhoods (Rasmussen,Aber, & Bhana, 2004). The negative effects of exposureto violence are more determined by one’s sense of safetythan the objective threat alone (Blechman, Dumas, &Prinz, 1994; Rasmussen et al., 2004). How individualsperceive danger, as opposed to the actual danger itself,may be largely responsible for the psychological impactof neighborhood danger.

African American parents in low-income, urbanareas have demonstrated stricter parenting practicesthan parents living in rural areas (Steele et al., 2005).Restrictive parenting may be beneficial in neighbor-hoods where concerns about safety surpass desire for

adolescent autonomy (Furstenburg, 1993). Studies onthe impact of neighborhood on parenting have notalways demonstrated a direct, linear relation betweensocioeconomic status and levels or effectiveness ofmonitoring. Some findings indicated that strict parentalcontrol benefited African American youth regardless ofsocioeconomic status (Lamborn, Dornbusch, &Steinberg, 1996), whereas others have shown that amoderate level of behavioral control is optimal in suchcommunities (Mason, Cauce, Gonzales, Hiraga, &Grove, 1994). Warmth, though, has had a linearrelationship in protecting children from stressors inlow-income areas (Furstenburg, 1993).

THIS STUDY

This work aims to address several significant gaps in theliterature with regard to parenting behavior, perceptionof neighborhood danger, and child adjustment.Although parental monitoring appears to benefit adoles-cents by warding off acting-out behavior, it remainsunclear whether extreme (vs. moderate) monitoring inAfrican American families who reside in more danger-ous, urban neighborhoods is effective or counterproduc-tive. Thus, both linear and quadratic relations areexamined. In addition, the role of parental monitoringhas not been studied adequately in relation to internaliz-ing distress, although the few studies available seem toindicate possible benefits. Finally, although someresearch has examined ways that children respond totheir perceptions of neighborhood danger, no studyto date has examined how children’s perceptions ofneighborhood danger might temper the outcome ofparents’ efforts to monitor them.

The importance of warmth has generally been estab-lished in relation to young people’s internalizing andexternalizing distress. Not enough information is knownabout the effects of child perception of neighborhooddanger in relation to parents’ warmth and its outcomes.It is also unclear whether parental warmth would havethe same impact as parental monitoring on adolescentexternalizing in high-crime, urban areas as has beenfound in the European American, low-crime areas.

The final critical way in which this study breaks fromprevious work is through the addition of the ExperienceSampling Method (ESM) to assess feelings related tointernalizing distress. None of the parenting behaviorsand perceptions reviewed in the aforementioned litera-ture has been studied relative to time sampled reportsof adolescents’ daily moods. These reports provideimmediate accounts of daily emotion that are unham-pered by recall bias. Using both cross-sectional andlongitudinal analyses, this study more clearly elucidatesthe relations between child perception of neighborhood

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danger, parental monitoring, parental warmth, andchild internalizing and externalizing distress.

The following hypotheses are proposed. First,parental monitoring is expected to show a curvilinearrelation to child internalizing and externalizing such thatcontrol will lead to decreases in distress and problembehaviors, except at the highest levels of monitoring,where adolescents are expected to exhibit greaterpsychological difficulties in rebellion against such tightcontrol. Second, child perception of neighborhooddanger is expected to moderate the relation betweenparental monitoring and child internalizing and externa-lizing. Specifically, at the highest level of parental moni-toring, adolescents will exhibit greater sadness andanxiety as well as problem behaviors, except when theyperceive especially high neighborhood danger.

It is hypothesized that high levels of parental warmthwill be associated with less child psychological distressand fewer behavioral difficulties. Child perception ofneighborhood danger, however, will moderate thisrelation such that at the highest levels of child percep-tion of danger, warmth will be less effective at wardingoff child distress.

METHODS

Participants

Data were collected as part of a larger 3-year longitudi-nal study aimed at examining African Americanstudents’ exposure to violence from sixth grade(1999–2000 school year) to eighth grade (2001–2002school year). Participants were enrolled in six urbanChicago public schools located in high-crime neighbor-hoods according to Chicago Police Departmentstatistics obtained in the year prior to the study’s incep-tion. During recruitment, staff went into the student’sclassrooms and verbally reviewed the study design andwhat was needed from participants, answered questions,and sent home materials for the parents to consent.Each young person had to return both a parent=guardian consent and a child assent form to be involvedin the study. Consistent with recruitment rates of youthfrom similar demographics (e.g., Cooley-Quille &Lorion, 1999), 301 (58%) of the 519 sixth-grade studentsasked to take part in the study agreed to participate.Students received up to $40 in Year 1 as a reward forparticipation, with an increase of $15 in each subsequentyear. Parents received $25 for each time they completeda packet of questionnaires.

This specific study examined the latter 2 years of thelarger project, beginning in the seventh grade with asample of 254 African American seventh-grade students,41% of whom were male and 59% of whom were female.

The average age of these students at Time 1 was 12.6years old. There were 222 students (87%) retained inthe eighth grade at Time 2, 41% of whom were male,with an average age of 13.6 years. No significant groupdifferences were found between the retained sample andthe group of participants lost due to attrition in parentaleducation, annual household income, or parents’ mari-tal status. In addition, among the outcome variables, asignificant group difference between retained and nonre-tained youth was only found for the externalizing ques-tionnaire with nonretained individuals reporting higherexternalizing (t¼ 2.64, p< .01). The majority of theparticipants lived in lower income households. Medianfamily income was between $10,000 and $20,000 accord-ing to parents or guardians. Eighty-three percent ofparents had, at minimum, a high school degree, and10% reported having a college or graduate=professionaldegree. Nearly half of the participants (48%) lived insingle-parent households, and the median householdsize was five.

Procedures

The ESM was used to collect information from the part-icipants about their location, activities, companionship,thoughts, and emotions. Participants carried program-mable watches and small notebooks with them overthe course of a 1-week period. When not in school, theadolescents received random signals approximatelyevery 1½ hours on average. To minimize classroom dis-ruption, only two signals were programmed during eachschool day. Trained research assistants instructed parti-cipants on how to complete the forms properly, andresearch staff members went to the school every day toanswer participants’ questions and ensure compliancewith ESM standards. Students received 51 signalsthroughout the week. Consistent with previous literatureusing the same sample, if the adolescents responded tofewer than 15 of these signals (less than 30%), they wereremoved from the analysis (Larson, Richards, Sims, &Dworkin, 2001). The median number of responses was42 (82% of the total). This rate falls within established,satisfactory parameters of ESM responding (Larson,1989).

Each day during the week of ESM data gathering,youth were asked to complete different small packetsof questionnaires. These measures assessed a numberof domains such as child functioning, family relation-ships, and perceptions of neighborhood. Parents werealso asked to answer several short questionnaires onsimilar topics, as well as on family socioeconomic status.Youth completed the child perception of neighborhooddanger measure, parental warmth measure, internalizingsymptoms questionnaire report, externalizing symptomsquestionnaire report, and daily internalizing ESM

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report. Parents completed the parental monitoringmeasure and one of the externalizing measures.

Measures

Child perception of neighborhood danger. Thisscale was derived from the items most relevant to neigh-borhood danger from Mason and colleagues’ (1994)Neighborhood Environment Scale. This measure hasdemonstrated good reliability and validity in a sampleof young African American adolescents. The itemsinclude statements about the extent to which differentthings happened in the community that include ‘‘Violentcrime with a weapon’’ and ‘‘Kids belong to streetgangs.’’ Youth responded on a 4-point scale from (0)never happens to (3) happens very often. Cronbach’salphas were .93 at Time 1 and .93 at Time 2.

Parental warmth. The Feeling of ClosenessMeasure assesses the adolescents’ relationship with theirparents with seven items (Blyth & Foster-Clark, 1987).This measure has demonstrated good internal reliabilityand validity with a sample of young African Americanadolescents (Hammack, Robinson, Crawford, & Li,2004). A sample question is, ‘‘How much do you go toyour mother for advice?’’ Youth provided answers ona 5-point scale from (1) not at all to (5) very much.The same questions were asked regarding mother andfather, separately. Reports of maternal warmth andpaternal warmth were significantly correlated (Time 1r¼ .33, p< .001; Time 2 r¼ .23, p¼ .001). Thus, whenboth mother and father reports were available they wereaveraged to obtain the parental warmth score. TheCronbach’s alphas for the Maternal Warmth scale were.85 at both Time 1 and Time 2; for the Paternal Warmthscale, it was .93 at Time 1 and .91 at Time 2.

Parental monitoring. A questionnaire used sevenitems to assess how much control parents tried to assertin monitoring, supervising, and being aware of theirchildren’s activities (Lamborn et al., 1996). A sampleitem was, ‘‘How often do you know if your child comeshome by curfew on weekend nights?’’ Parents respondedon a 5-point scale from (1) almost never to (5) almostalways. Cronbach’s alphas were .80 and .78 for Time 1and Time 2, respectively.

Internalizing symptoms (questionnaire report). Theinternalizing measure was formed from the Children’sDepression Inventory (CDI), developed to measure thecognitive, social, and behavioral symptoms of distressin young people ages 8 through 17 (Kovacs, 1985) andthe State-Trait Anxiety Inventory for Children (STAIC;

Spielberger, 1973), a 20-item questionnaire report thatincludes such statements as ‘‘I worry too much.’’ TheSTAIC is answered by choosing from 3 responses includ-ing hardly ever, sometimes, and often. Cronbach’s alphasfor STAIC were .91 at Time 1 and .90 at Time 2. Cron-bach’s alphas for the CDI were .88 at Time 1 and .83 atTime 2. Because these two scales are correlated (Time 1r¼ .51, p< .001; Time 2 r¼ .48, p< .001) and tap intosimilar constructs, they were standardized and then aver-aged to form the internalizing distress scale. This is con-sistent with previous literature (Li, Nussbaum, &Richards, 2007). Internalizing was measured using childself-report due to generally low correlations betweenparent and child report on this construct (Achenbach,McConaughy, & Howell, 1987). Both the CDI (Wong,Eccles, & Sameroff, 2003) and STAIC (Bannon, McKay,Chacko, Rodriguez, & Cavaleri, 2009) had good internalreliability and validity with African American youth. Inthis study, the internal reliability for the internalizingsymptoms (questionnaire) composite was .93 at Time 1and .92 at Time 2.

Externalizing symptoms. This scale was createdusing the Externalizing scale of the Child BehaviorChecklist (CBCL; Achenbach, 1991) and the JuvenileDelinquency Scale (JDS; Tolan, 1988). A sample itemon the CBCL is ‘‘gets in many fights.’’ These items areanswered on a 3-point scale from (0) not true to (2) verytrue or often true. The internal consistency for the Exter-nalizing scale of the CBCL was .94 at Time 1 and .91 atTime 2. The JDS is a 23-item scale that includes suchstatements as ‘‘I have used a weapon to rob someone.Youth responded on a 6-point scale from (0) never to(5) 5 times or more. The internal consistency for theJDS was .88 at Time 1 and .83 at Time 2. Upon deter-mining that the two subscales were significantly corre-lated (Time 1 r¼ .23, p< .01; Time 2 r¼ .28, p< .001)and tap into similar constructs, they were then standar-dized and averaged to create the externalizing symptomsquestionnaire report. Both the CBCL (Nyborg & Curry,2003) and JDS (Li et al., 2007) demonstrated good inter-nal reliability and validity with a sample of AfricanAmerican youth. In this study, the internal reliabilityfor the externalizing symptoms composite was .91 atTime 1 and .88 at Time 2.

Daily internalizing (ESM report). This scale wasderived from ESM report of emotional experience. Ateach signal, youth were asked to what extent they feltdifferent emotions on a 4-point scale from (1) not atall to (4) very much. The emotion was considered presentat a given signal point when respondents indicated theywere feeling it more than ‘‘not at all.’’ A mean score ofeach internalizing-related feeling state was calculated

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across daily ESM reports. The scale is composed of theoverall average of the mean levels for the following dif-ferent internalizing-related feeling states: nervous,ignored, worried, disappointed, sad, and embarrassed(Sweeney, Goldner, & Richards, 2011). Cronbach’salphas for the scale were .69 at Time 1 and .80 at Time2.

RESULTS

Analysis Plan

Bivariate correlations among all variables, as well asmeans and standard deviations for each variable, arepresented in Table 1. The regression analyses are pre-sented in Table 2. They were conducted with the defaultsoftware setting (i.e., listwise deletion). Missing datawere analyzed using Little’s Missing Completely atRandom test. The analysis revealed that the data didnot deviate from what would be expected if it was miss-ing completely at random, v2(477)¼ 444.095, p¼ .858);thus, parameter estimates are not likely to be biaseddue to missingness. All regression analyses were conduc-ted cross-sectionally in seventh and eighth grades andthen longitudinally from seventh to eighth grade. In alllongitudinal analyses, the Time 1 measure of the out-come variable was placed into an initial step to controlfor it and assess change over time. Each hierarchicalregression analysis was run first with the linear parentalmonitoring term and followed by the addition of thequadratic parental monitoring term in the subsequentstep predicting the dependent variable. Third, percep-tion of neighborhood danger was entered as a maineffect. Next the interaction of linear parental monitoringand neighborhood danger was entered. In the final step,the interaction of quadratic parental monitoring andneighborhood danger was entered.

Parental Monitoring and Child Perception ofNeighborhood Danger: Externalizing Symptoms

All hierarchical regressions were conducted with gendercontrolled in the first step, the linear parental monitor-ing in the next step, and quadratic parental monitoringin the third step. These analyses revealed that withinboth seventh grade (b¼�.27, p< .01) and eighth grade(b¼�.28, p< .001), higher levels of linear parentalmonitoring were associated with lower levels of externa-lizing symptoms; however, the expected relationbetween quadratic parental monitoring and externaliz-ing symptoms was not found. When testing the hypothe-sized interaction between linear and quadratic parentalmonitoring with perception of neighborhood danger,interaction terms were created by centering the linear

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and quadratic monitoring variables along with theperception of neighborhood danger variable andmultiplying them together, respectively. Perception ofneighborhood danger (the moderator) was added inthe fourth step and the interaction terms were enteredseparately in the last two steps, to predict externalizingsymptoms. When students were in both seventh grade(b¼ .21, p< .01) and eighth grade (b¼ .37, p< .001),their perception of neighborhood danger predictedgreater levels of externalizing symptoms. In eighthgrade, the addition of perception of neighborhood dan-ger into the regression actually led to the nonsignificanceof parental monitoring variables in relation to externa-lizing symptoms (although this did not hold true forthese students in seventh grade). This suggests theimportance of perception of neighborhood danger overand beyond monitoring for externalizing. Longitudin-ally, these variables did not predict externalizingsymptoms.

When students were in eighth grade, initially theinteraction between perception of neighborhood dangerand linear parental monitoring in predicting externaliz-ing symptoms was found to be significant (b¼�.22,p< .01). However, this relation was no longer significantwhen a quadratic monitoring term was entered andemerged as significant (b¼�.33, p< .01; Figure 1). Asimple slopes analysis was conducted (Aiken & West,1991), inputting values for parental monitoring at 1standard deviation above and below the mean of percep-tion of danger to determine effects on externalizingsymptoms. This analysis revealed that for those studentswho perceived low levels of danger in their community,a curvilinear trend emerged where lowest levels of

parental monitoring predicted higher externalizing,moderate levels of monitoring predicted the lowest levelsof externalizing, and highest levels of monitoring wererelated to midrange externalizing (t¼ 3.46, p< .001;Figure 1). Among adolescents who perceived the highestlevels of neighborhood danger, monitoring was notrelated to externalizing (t¼�1.48, p¼ .14). No signifi-cant longitudinal results emerged for externalizing.

Parental Monitoring and Child Perception ofNeighborhood Danger: Internalizing Symptoms

When internalizing was examined, among students inseventh grade, the quadratic monitoring term emergedas significant, such that both the lowest and highestlevels of parental monitoring predicted higher levels ofESM report of internalizing distress (b¼ .41, p< .01),and moderate monitoring predicted the lowest levels ofESM report of internalizing. In the final step of theregression analysis, there were no significant interactionsbetween parental monitoring, either linear or quadratic,and child perception of neighborhood danger to predictESM report of internalizing distress.

Similar to seventh grade, when in eighth grade, asexpected, parental monitoring predicted lower levels ofquestionnaire report of internalizing symptoms whenentered into the regression equation (b¼�.27,p< .001). However, this relation was no longer significantwhen a quadratic monitoring term was entered andemerged as significant, such that both the lowest andhighest levels of parental monitoring predicted higherlevels of questionnaire reported internalizing distress(b¼ .34, p< .05), and moderate monitoring predictedthe lowest levels of questionnaire report of internalizing.Among the students in eighth grade, when perceptionof neighborhood danger was entered into hierarchicalregressions, with these two parental monitoring variablesas main effects, higher levels of perceived danger signifi-cantly predicted higher levels of questionnaire reportedinternalizing symptoms (b¼ .21, p< .01). No interactionswere found between perception of neighborhood dangerand parental monitoring in predicting internalizing symp-toms. No significant cross-sectional results emerged foreighth-grade ESM internalizing.

Longitudinally, when examining ESM report of inter-nalizing distress, higher perception of neighborhooddanger in seventh grade longitudinally predicted moredaily internalizing (ESM report) in eighth grade(b¼ .20, p< .05). As shown in Figure 2, a significantinteraction was found between perception of neighbor-hood danger and the quadratic parental monitoringwhen predicting ESM report of internalizing from sev-enth to eighth grade (b¼ .63, p< .05). A simple slopesanalysis revealed that for the low-danger perceptiongroup, as parental monitoring increased, adolescents’

FIGURE 1 Child perception of neighborhood danger as a moderator

of the relation between quadratic parental monitoring and question-

naire report of externalizing symptoms, among eighth-grade students.

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internalizing symptoms decreased (t¼�2.08, p< .05;Figure 2). Among the high-danger perception group,there was no significant relation between parentalmonitoring and internalizing (t¼�.250, p¼ .80).Finally, no significant longitudinal results emerged forquestionnaire report of internalizing distress.

Parental Warmth and Child Perception ofNeighborhood Danger

Gender was controlled in the first step of a regressionequation; the centered main effect of parental warmthwas added in the second step; the centered main effectof perception of neighborhood danger was entered intothe next step; and an interaction term, comprising theproduct of these two variables, was entered into the finalstep. No significant results were found for externalizingsymptoms. For eighth grade internalizing distress, per-ception of neighborhood danger moderated the effectsof parental warmth. Hierarchical regressions revealedhigher levels of warmth (b¼�.25, p< .001) predictedlower levels of questionnaire report of internalizing,whereas perception of neighborhood danger (b¼ .18,p< .01) predicted higher levels of internalizing. Inaddition, among eighth-grade students, an interactionemerged between parental warmth and perception ofneighborhood danger in predicting questionnaire reportof internalizing symptoms, although not as hypothesized(b¼�.13, p< .05). A simple slopes analysis revealedthat for the highest danger perception group, as parental

warmth increased, adolescents’ internalizing symptomsdecreased precipitously (t¼�3.11, p< .001; Figure 3).Among the low danger perception group, there wasno significant relation between parental warmth andinternalizing (t¼�1.58, p¼ .18).

In longitudinal analyses, seventh grade parentalwarmth significantly predicted a decrease in eighth gradeESM-reported internalizing distress (b¼�.16, p< .05).The main effect of child perception of neighborhooddanger and the interaction between parental warmthand child perception of neighborhood danger were notsignificant.

DISCUSSION

This study examined the effects of parental monitoringand warmth on adolescents’ externalizing and internaliz-ing distress, while taking into account the ramificationsof the children’s perceptions of neighborhood danger.These inquiries were addressed using a sample ofAfrican American adolescents from public middleschools located in low-income Chicago neighborhoods.Parental monitoring was associated with children’s exter-nalizing behavior, although a hypothesized quadraticrelation between parents’ monitoring and externalizingdid not materialize. In contrast, quadratic relations werediscovered between parental monitoring and children’sinternalizing distress. This quadratic relation was moder-ated by neighborhood danger for daily internalizing feel-ing states; under perceived high danger, monitoring hadno effect, but under low danger, high monitoringappeared to reduce the daily feelings of internalizing dis-tress. Parental warmth predicated a decrease in dailyinternalizing feelings from seventh to eighth grade.

Adolescents’ perception of neighborhood danger wassignificantly associated with higher levels of bothadolescent internalizing and externalizing. Perception

FIGURE 2 Child perception of neighborhood danger in seventh

grade as a moderator of the relation between seventh-grade quadratic

parental monitoring and eighth-grade ESM report of internalizing

symptoms. Note. ESM¼Experience Sampling Method.

FIGURE 3 Child perception of neighborhood danger as a moderator

of the relation between parental warmth and questionnaire report of

internalizing symptoms, among eighth-grade students.

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of neighborhood danger was initially viewed as apotential moderator for parental warmth and monitor-ing. In the case of parental warmth, warmth actuallyappeared to serve as a moderator that protected againstthe harmful effects of neighborhood danger. As dangerincreased, high levels of warmth protected adolescentsfrom high levels of internalizing.

Parental Monitoring

As hypothesized, greater parental monitoring predictedless child externalizing symptoms in both seventh andeighth grades. However, contrary to expectation, a curvi-linear relation did not manifest between parental moni-toring and child externalizing distress, except for youthperceiving their neighborhood to be lower in danger.Thus, as parents’ monitoring increased so too did theprotective effects on externalizing symptoms, even tothe highest levels of monitoring. The current study mayhave demonstrated that, in these neighborhoods, youngpeople do not rebel against parents when their parentstake a more active role in ensuring that they are cognizantof their children’s whereabouts and companions.

A quadratic relation did, however, manifest itself inrelation to internalizing distress. Among seventh- andeighth-grade students, both the lowest and highest levelsof parental monitoring were associated with higherlevels of ESM report of daily internalizing, as well assymptoms reported on questionnaires. The diminishingeffect of higher levels of monitoring for internalizing,but not externalizing, makes some sense intuitively. Ifparents are successful in exerting very high levels ofmonitoring, their children will have less opportunity toengage in problem behavior. Even if these young peoplefeel rebellious and want to act out in frustration oranger, they will have fewer opportunities to do so thanchildren whose parents are more lax (Hoeve et al.,2009). Frustration at not being allowed out more couldbe turned inward, manifesting itself in more daily feelingof anxiety and dysphoria. The highest levels of monitor-ing also typically indicate a great deal of time inside thehome, under the watchful eye of guardians, and feweropportunities to engage in unsupervised activities withpeers. Given the crucial influence peers begin to havein early adolescence, significant limits on these opportu-nities may lead to lower self-worth and feelings of sad-ness (Baumrind, 1991). In addition, high parentalsupervision reduces the opportunity to explore the worldindependently, which may lead to more insecurity andanxiety (Chorpita & Barlow, 1998).

Child Perception of Neighborhood Danger

We found a substantial impact of adolescents’ percep-tion of neighborhood danger on their psychological

distress. This article originally conceptualized childperception of neighborhood danger as a moderator ofthe relation between parental monitoring and children’soutcomes; however, child perception of danger appearedto be as strong as, or stronger than, parental monitoringin predicting externalizing and internalizing symptoms.Remarkably, adolescents’ perception of high levels ofdanger in their communities weighs approximately asheavily as one of the most potent activities parents canengage in, monitoring, to affect problem behavioramong young adolescents. Perception of neighborhooddanger was strongly positively related to child externa-lizing and accounted for about 13% of the variance(p< .001). Although common method variance mightbe a concern with youth reporting on both neighbor-hood danger and problem behaviors, the externalizingbehavior measure also included parents as informants.This relation is consistent with sparse previous researchavailable in this area, which determined that feelingunsafe in one’s neighborhood is associated with moreweapon carrying and involvement in physical fightsand with police (Dowdell, 2006). Given these cross-sectional findings, the direction of the relation remainsunclear. It may be that feeling unsafe leads to hypervigi-lance and increased likelihood of seeing and respondingto perceived threats in a hostile way. Conversely,engaging in more problem behaviors could confirm amore frequent perception of danger. Finally, it may bethat these variables are transactional and influence oneother.

Parents’ monitoring interacted with their children’sperception of neighborhood danger to affect adoles-cents’ externalizing distress. Among eighth-grade stu-dents who perceived the lowest levels of danger,moderate monitoring was related to the fewest externa-lizing symptoms, whereas higher levels of monitoringwere related to a middle level of externalizing symptoms;among students with high levels of perceived neighbor-hood danger, no relation emerged. This finding sup-ported this article’s hypothesis that externalizingwould decrease in response to monitoring, except atthe highest levels of monitoring, where externalizingsymptoms would increase due to rebellion. The highestlevels of parental monitoring are effective in preventingproblem behavior only among adolescents who do notperceive high levels of danger, consistent with the pat-tern of a vulnerable-reactive moderator variable(Luthar, Cicchetti, & Becker, 2000). Under conditionsof perceived high danger, monitoring did not seem tomake a difference.

Child perception of neighborhood danger was simi-larly related to adolescents’ internalizing distress as itwas to their externalizing. When adolescents perceivedmore danger in seventh and eighth grades, they exhib-ited more internalizing symptoms. Further, as seventh

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graders believed more danger was present in theirneighborhoods, they showed increases in daily experi-ence of internalizing over one year. Several possiblemechanisms could explain why this would occur. First,and most evidently, awareness of chronic sources ofdanger can raise levels of anxiety. Research has demon-strated a clear link between exposure to communityviolence and anxious and depressive symptoms (Edlynn,Gaylord-Harden, Richards, & Miller, 2008). The dangerthat is present in these young people’s communities islargely out of their control, which may contribute tofeelings of hopelessness and helplessness (Abramson,Metalsky, & Alloy, 1989). It is possible that this longi-tudinal relation is transactional, because youth whoare more anxious tend to fear their environment moreand magnify the dangers around them (Muris, Rapee,Meesters, Shouten, & Geers, 2003).

Parental Warmth and Child Perception ofNeighborhood Danger

High levels of child perception of neighborhood dangerwere expected to serve as a risk factor in the relationbetween parental warmth and child outcome, such thatadolescents with high levels of perceived danger wouldstill have higher levels of internalizing symptoms, evenat the highest levels of parental warmth. Contrary toexpectation, the results revealed that, among eighth-grade students, as well as longitudinally from seventhto eighth grade, parents’ provision of warmth servedto ward off the internalizing distress associated withadolescents’ heightened awareness of danger in theirneighborhood. It is encouraging to find that warmthserves as a ‘‘protective-stabilizing’’ factor according tothe criteria set forth by Luthar and colleagues (2000).Even as the adolescents perceived greater danger,parents’ warmth prevented greater levels of internalizing.

Strengths and Limitations

This study attempts to provide a description of theeffects of parenting in an urban, high-crime communitythat takes into account the ramifications of the degree ofdanger that young adolescents perceive around them.Much of the literature thus far has examined parentalmonitoring and warmth without addressing contextualfactors within the analyses. This study brings a newperspective as it examines adolescents’ view of theirneighborhood, not just in relation to distress, but alsoin how it influences their response to parenting.

This study also employs the ESM technique, which isable to gather an in vivo snapshot of young adolescents’daily experience of sadness, worry, loneliness, and otherinternalizing related feelings. In addition, the designallowed for analyses to be conducted cross-sectionally

for seventh- and eighth-grade students and longitudin-ally from seventh to eighth grade. The study wasconducted in a low-income, urban, African Americancommunity, where high crime rates make perception ofneighborhood danger a particularly salient topic tostudy. Finally, the use of multiple informants and meth-ods also enhanced the value of this work.

Despite many strengths, some limitations existed.Parental monitoring was measured from the parents’point of view, which might not have captured the child’sperspective. Further, the parental monitoring measuremay have pulled for a social desirability effect from par-ents, potentially skewing the data and creating a ceilingeffect. Specifically, the questions asked may imply a‘‘correct’’ answer (e.g., ‘‘how often do you know ifyou child comes home by [curfew] on school days?’’).The high means and standard deviations may be indica-tive of this, rather than high levels of parental monitor-ing. It is also unclear how well these results willgeneralize to samples of other demographics.

Implications

These findings have several implications for how inter-ventions might be developed to help parents negotiatethe difficult circumstances inherent in impoverishedcommunities. Interventions aimed at helping parents,and others working with adolescents, recognize wheredanger exists in their community, pathways that earlyadolescents take to become involved in it, and how todivert adolescents’ courses toward constructive activitiesmay be of great utility in preventing the development ofexternalizing symptoms. Also, this study points to theimportance of carefully considering which monitoringtechniques will best walk the line between preventingadolescents’ externalizing and still allowing enoughautonomy to prevent their internalizing.

One of the clearest messages to emerge from thisarticle is the negative impact of perceived danger onyoung people. It emerged as similar in strength, or evenstronger, than parental warmth and monitoring. Assuch, efforts must be made at the local, state, andnational levels to prevent the conditions that fosterthe development of violence in communities. Adoles-cents have little choice in where they are raised. Thefact that they must be burdened by poverty, crime,and violence is fundamentally unjust in a country thatprides itself on equal opportunity. Programs ought tobe aimed at decreasing overall crime rates by eliminat-ing the perceived need to commit crimes through jobsprograms, community business growth incentives, andother neighborhood-level programs. Community-levelinitiatives that bolster a community’s collective efficacywould also be helpful to this end (Sampson, Raudenbush,& Earls, 1997).

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Future Directions

Future research could expand upon the current projectin several ways. This research points to the importanceof parental monitoring. But it also appears to indicatethat there may be certain monitoring amounts or techni-ques that are optimal. Further examination of whereoptimal levels might be in preventing externalizing andinternalizing are warranted, as well as if certain aspectsof monitoring are especially helpful or even possiblycounterproductive. Gender differences were not exam-ined in this study. Later work could examine the impactof gender on the perception of neighborhood dangerand parenting behaviors, as well as their interaction.Finally, qualitative research that allows members ofinner-city communities to have their voices heard andutilizes the wealth of knowledge gained by these citizenswould help inform work and bridge the gap betweenresearchers and community members.

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