Perceived Parenting Style and Adolescent Self-Compassion: A Longitudinal, Within-Person Approach

Objectives Caregiver responses are important in shaping how children, and later adolescents, engage in their own self-compassionate responding and uncompassionate self-responding. However, longitudinal research exploring the relationship between parenting style and adolescent self-compassion is limited. We examined the degree to which psychologically controlling and supportive parenting styles were linked to changes in compassionate self-responding (CSR) and uncompassionate self-responding (USR), both contemporaneously and longitudinally. We further explored the extent that any effects were heterogeneous: Does parenting influence self-compassion for some adolescents but not others? Method We measured CSR, USR, parental support, and parental psychological control in a group of 2596 adolescents annually over 4 years (Grades 9 to 12 inclusive, M ages = 14.65 (T1) to 17.73 (T4) years). Results The multi-level modelling analysis of individual relationships between parenting and self-compassion revealed relatively independent effects of perceived parenting on CSR and USR respectively. Individual changes in supportive parenting were more strongly associated with changes in CSR than with USR, and within-person changes in psychologically controlling parenting were more strongly associated with USR than with CSR. Further, the strength of these relationships was heterogeneous, with parenting having a larger effect on some than others. Longitudinally, controlling parenting predicted the development of USR. Conclusions Overall, the link between parenting and adolescent self-compassion significantly varied, with some adolescents reporting a large change in self-compassion in years when parenting changed, and some reporting little to no change in self-compassion in years when parenting practices changed. The present study therefore highlights the importance of parenting in understanding self-compassion and the need for further research that seeks to identify factors that moderate the link between parenting and self-compassion. Preregistration This study is not preregistered.