Parent-Adolescent Conflicts among First-Generation College Students

RM 217

Family Conflict Among First-Generation College Students: Does Culture Matter? / The goal of this study was to examine the degrees and sources of conflict between primary caregivers and first generation college students across ethnic groups. First-generation Latino students have reported greater parent-child conflicts than students from other ethnic backgrounds (i.e., African, Asian, and Euro/White Americans) whereas Asian American students have reported the lowest level of family conflict compared to other groups. Our study was rooted in the concept of familyism, which is measured along three continuums; Structural, behavioral and attitudinal (Steidel & Contreras, 2003). We tested four specific hypotheses: 1) Academic motivation will be positively associated with family conflict among first-generation, Latino college students; 2) Academic motivation will be negatively associated with family conflict among Euro/white college students; 3) Asian American students will report the lowest levels of parent-child conflicts compared to other ethnic groups; 4) Asian American students with low GPAs will report high family conflict. We collected data from college students (N = 280) using an online survey that contained the Familyism Scale (Steidel & Contreras, 2003), the Network of Relationships Inventory (Furman & Buhrmester, 2009), the Inventory of School Motivation (Xu & Barnes, 2011), and the Parental Involvement Mechanism Measurement (Liu, Black, Algina, Cavanaugh, & Dawson, 2010). Our hypotheses were supported except that hypothesis one demonstrated a weak association. We discuss our findings according to principles of familyism, individualism, and collectivism and mention that future research may wish to examine the extent to which participants feel differentially tied to their ethnic (minority) group versus the dominant U.S. culture. We also suggest that future research examine the extent to which financial or work obligations interfere with students’ academic motivation among first-generation students, including whether parents have encouraged their children to work. In terms of limitations, our study included a majority female sample (70%). We recommend that future research examine this topic with more men because cultural expectations tend to differ for men and women, particularly in traditionally patriarchal cultures. Therefore, women may experience more family conflict than men when pursing academic or career goals.