Heterogeneity of social skills trajectories: associations with problem behavior in adolescents born to unmarried parents

Royer, Addison Paige (2022) Heterogeneity of social skills trajectories: associations with problem behavior in adolescents born to unmarried parents. Masters thesis, Northern Arizona University.

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Abstract

Ample empirical evidence documents risk factors associated with adjustment problems in children born to unmarried parents. These risk factors include lower socioeconomic status, poor parental mental health, and reduced father involvement. However, comparatively less is known about protective factors that buffer adolescents born to unmarried parents from problem behaviors. Prosocial or adaptive social skills—defined as the effectiveness in which one can meet social and cultural expectations for interacting with others—are a promising target for scholarly investigation, as social skills are both malleable and have the ability to generate greater resources for the child. This study used a subsample of children born to unmarried mothers (n = 2,555) from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study database, resilience theory, and growth mixture modeling (GMM) with regression to examine whether particular variations in patterns of social skills development over twelve years’ time is associated with lower levels of adolescent problem behavior at age 15, while accounting for risk factors for male and female children. Findings from GMM suggest that two groups of trajectories generally characterized social skills development over time for both male and female children. Two latent classes emerged for both males and females: a high declining and a low improving. Regression analysis revealed for both males and females that these social skill trajectory subgroups could not predict child problem behavior at age 15 as measured by the Child Behavior Checklist.

Item Type:	Thesis (Masters)
Publisher’s Statement:	© Copyright is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the Cline Library, Northern Arizona University. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author.
Keywords:	child behavior; fragile families; growth mixture modeling; resilience theory; social skills; unmarried mothers; adolescents; behavior problems
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology
MeSH Subjects:	F Psychiatry and Psychology > F04 Behavioral Disciplines and Activities
NAU Depositing Author Academic Status:	Student
Department/Unit:	Graduate College > Theses and Dissertations College of Social and Behavioral Science > Psychological Sciences
Date Deposited:	31 May 2023 17:21
Last Modified:	31 May 2023 17:21
URI:	https://openknowledge.nau.edu/id/eprint/5928

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