A Test of Cognitive Dissonance Theory to Explain Parents' Reactions to Youths' Alcohol Intoxication

TERESE GLATZ, HAKAN STATTIN, AND MARGARET KERR Orebro University

A Test of Cognitive Dissonance Theory to Explain

Parents’ Reactions to Youths’ Alcohol Intoxication

Studies have shown that parents reduce controland support in response to youths’ drinking. Whythey react this way, however, is still unknown.From cognitive dissonance theory, we derivedhypotheses about parents’ reactions. We used alongitudinal, school-based sample of 494 youths(13 and 14 years, 56% boys) and their parents.General Linear Model (GLM) analyses wereused to test the main hypotheses. In accordwith our hypotheses, parents who encounteredtheir youths intoxicated became less opposed tounderage drinking over time. In addition, par-ents who remained strongly opposed to youthdrinking experienced more worries than parentswho became less opposed. Alternative explana-tions for the results were tested, but were notsupported. The findings suggest that to elimi-nate the dissonance between their strict attitudesagainst youth drinking and their knowledge oftheir own youths’ drinking, parents changedtheir attitudes and became more lenient.

Beginning in middle adolescence, there is asharp increase in alcohol drinking (Patrick &Schulenberg, 2010). Because early onset ofdrinking is related to health and social problems,such as risky sexual behaviors (Cooper, Peirce,& Huselid, 1994), drug use, and delinquency(Komro, Tobler, Maldonado-Molina, & Perry,2010), parents typically view underage drinking

Center for Developmental Research at JPS, Orebro Univer-sity, SE-701 82 Orebro, Sweden ([email protected]).

Key Words: cognitive dissonance theory, parental attitudes,youth alcohol intoxication.

as a problem (Beck, Scaffa, Swift, & Ko, 1995).How parents react when they find out thattheir own youth has started to drink, however,has received little attention in the literature.This question is important, because theoriessuggest that escalations in youth problembehavior might best be seen as part of atransactional process in which parents react toyouth problem behaviors and youths react toparenting behaviors (Patterson, 1982; Sameroff,1975). To date, however, most of the researchhas focused on one part of the process—youths’reactions to parenting. The less understood partis parents’ reactions to youth problem behaviors.

Most parents of young adolescents areopposed to youth drinking (van der Vorst,Engels, Meeus, & Dekovic, 2006), and whenasked, parents report that they would do some-thing about their youths’ drinking if they foundout about it. Most commonly, they envisageusing a combination of discussion and disci-plinary action (Beck et al., 1995; Tyler, Tyler,Kaljee, & Hopps, 1994). There are few studies inwhich parents’ actual reactions to youth drinkinghave been examined, but those that have beendone have shown that adolescents’ alcohol usepredicts lessened parental control (Huh, Tristan,Wade, & Stice, 2006; Stice & Barrera, 1995) andsupport (Stice & Barrera, 1995). These resultsare at odds with the ways parents say they wouldreact to their youths’ drinking if they found outabout it. Up to now, however, theoretical expla-nations for parents’ reactions to youth drinkinghave been lacking.

Longitudinal studies on parents’ reactionsto youth problem behaviors, more generally,

Family Relations 61 (October 2012): 629 – 641 629DOI:10.1111/j.1741-3729.2012.00723.x

630 Family Relations

show results similar to those on youth drink-ing: When parents encounter youth problems,they tend to lessen, rather than increase, theirattempts to change their youths’ behavior. Forexample, youths’ externalizing behaviors havebeen related to decreases in parental control andsupport (Hafen & Laursen, 2009; Huh et al.,2006; Kerr & Stattin, 2003; Kerr, Stattin, &Pakalniskiene, 2008; Stice & Barrera, 1995) anddegradations in family management (Dishion,Nelson, & Bullock, 2004). In addition, youthsmoking has been shown to predict less restric-tive house rules about smoking (Huver, Engels,Vermulst, & de Vries, 2007). These findings sug-gest that parents, when confronted with youthproblem behaviors, tend to decrease their behav-ioral attempts to change their youths’ behaviors.It is still unknown, however, why parents reactthis way to problematic behaviors in their youths.

Some explanations have been proposed forparents’ reduced attempts to change theiryouths’ problematic behaviors. One is thatparents might feel threatened by their youths’behavior, and they might shy away to avoidconflicts (Huh et al., 2006). Another is that lowfamily management paves the way for youths’deviant peer involvement, which causes parentsto reduce their attempts to manage youths’behaviors even further (Dishion et al., 2004).A third explanation is that parents interprettheir youths’ behavior as a sign that they needautonomy (Huver et al., 2007; Kerr & Stattin,2003). All these explanations were providedpost hoc in empirical studies and were notexplicitly tested. At least two studies, however,have proposed specific ideas a priori and testedthem. The first study proposed and showedfindings to support the idea that parents feelintimidated by their youths’ problem behaviors,and to avoid conflicts, they monitor their youthsless (Kerr & Stattin, 2003). The second studyproposed that parents’ reactions are a normalresponse to social signals from their youths(Kerr et al., 2008). The results showed thatwhen parents perceived their youths as cold andclosed they decreased in support and control overtime, but they increased in the same behaviorsif they perceived their youths as warm andopen toward them. Thus, some explanationsfor parents’ reactions have been offered. To ourknowledge, however, no previous study has usedan established theoretical framework to developand test hypotheses about parents’ reactions tounderage drinking.

Most parents of early adolescents are opposedto underage drinking (van der Vorst et al.,2006), and few young adolescents drink. Thischanges considerably during the next few years,and during these years, some parents willcome face to face with this change when theyencounter their youths intoxicated. How doesencountering a youth intoxicated affect parents’opposition to underage drinking? Theoretically,the juxtaposition between parents’ opposition tounderage drinking and the first-hand knowledgethat their youth has been intoxicated can be seenas a case of cognitive dissonance, or a clashbetween two cognitions. According to cognitivedissonance theory (Festinger, 1957), dissonanceis an aversive state in which people experiencediscomfort, and to reduce this discomfort, peoplemust change one of the cognitions. Studiesof cognitive dissonance and substance usehave shown that people tend to change theirattitudes about a health-comprising behaviorto reach consistency between their behaviorand attitudes (Halpern, 1994; Makela, 1997;McMaster & Lee, 1991; Peretti-Watel, 2006;Tagliacozzo, 1979). For example, smokers tendto underestimate the risks associated with theirown smoking behavior, and through this, theyreduce the dissonance produced by knowingthat they smoke and that smoking is a healthhazard (Halpern, 1994; McMaster & Lee,1991; Tagliacozzo, 1979). Applied to youthdrinking, when parents who are opposed toyouth drinking encounter their own youthintoxicated, they might experience dissonancebetween their opposition to youth drinking andtheir knowledge that their own youth has beenintoxicated. According to cognitive dissonancetheory (Festinger, 1957), they would eliminatethe dissonance by becoming less opposed toyouth drinking. To our knowledge, however,this has never before been proposed or tested.

In this study, we tested two hypothesesderived from cognitive dissonance theory(Festinger, 1957). First, the theory suggests thatparents who experience a clash between theirattitudes about appropriate youth behavior andtheir knowledge of their own youths’ behaviorshould respond by changing their attitudes ratherthan trying to change the behavior of theiryouths. Earlier studies have shown that peopletend to change their attitudes about their ownhealth-related behaviors instead of changingthe actual behaviors (Halpern, 1994; Makela,1997; McMaster & Lee, 1991; Peretti-Watel,

Parents’ Reactions to Youths’ Alcohol Intoxication 631

2006; Tagliacozzo, 1979), but the idea has neverbefore been applied to parents’ attitudes aboutyouth behavior. Thus, we hypothesized that afterencountering their youths intoxicated, parentswith strict attitudes against youth drinkingwould be more likely to change their oppositionto youth drinking than to increase controlof their youths’ whereabouts and activities.Second, cognitive dissonance theory suggeststhat reducing dissonance should be followed by areduction in discomfort. In this study, we defineddiscomfort as parents’ worries that their youthswould begin to abuse alcohol, and we testedhow this was related to parents’ experiencesof encountering their youths intoxicated andtheir changes in attitudes to youth drinking.We hypothesized that among parents whoencountered their youths intoxicated, those whomaintained their opposition to youth drinkingwould experience more discomfort than thosewho became more tolerant to youth drinking.

In addition, we tested two alternative explana-tions for our expected findings. The first involvedwhat youth behavior parents actually react to.Youth drinking and delinquency often co-occur(Komro et al., 2010), and it is possible that par-ents’ reactions might be reactions to their youths’problem behavior generally, rather than to drink-ing, specifically. Consequently, we examinedparents’ reactions to their youths’ drinkingover and above the influence of the youths’delinquency. The other concerned the directionof influence between youths’ alcohol intoxica-tion and parents’ opposition to youth drinking.According to this alternative explanation, par-ents’ lenient attitudes would prompt youthsto drink more over time, rather than youths’drinking prompting parents to change theirattitudes.

METHOD

Participants and Procedure

Data were drawn from a longitudinal cohort-sequential study in a midsized, Swedish town(about 26,000 inhabitants). The target sam-ple was all youths who were registered ingrades 4 (approximately age 10) through 12(approximately age 18) each year over 5 years(starting in 2001). The target sample at thefirst wave included 3,120 pupils. At the startof the study, the mean income level in thistown was somewhat lower than in the rest of

the country (20,394 U.S. dollars/person, com-pared with 20,958 U.S. dollars/person for thewhole country). The unemployment rate was6.5% (in comparison with 5.8% nationally),and the average percentage of immigrants inthe town was 11.8% (in comparison with 8.4%nationally).

The University Ethics Review Board approvedthe study and all procedures before the projectstarted. School principals were asked if theywanted their schools to participate, and allagreed. Thus, youths were contacted through theschools. Parents or other caretakers acting in theparental role were contacted by mail. Because99% of these were biological parents, we refer tothem hereafter as parents. Before each data col-lection, parents received information by mail andcould refuse to allow their youths’ participation.Only 1% of parents did so. Neither parents noryouths were paid for participating in the project,but a drawing for movie tickets was held in eachclass. Every year over 5 years, the youths in 4ththrough 12th grades filled in questionnaires inschool about their home situations, leisure time,and school experiences. Participation was vol-untary. At the first wave of the data collection,2,721 youths (87.2% of the target sample) partic-ipated in the project. Trained research assistantsdistributed questionnaires to the youths in theirclassrooms. Teachers were not present. Parentsreceived questionnaires by mail and participatedin Waves 1, 3, and 5.

For this study, we aggregated data from twowaves to maximize sample size and increasepower in the analyses. We used youths who were13 and 14 years old at Wave 1 and Wave 3 andfollowed them over 2 years. Hence, the 13- and14-year-olds at Wave 1 were followed to Wave3, when they were 15 and 16 years old, and the13- and 14-year-olds at Wave 3 were followedto Wave 5, when they were 15 and 16 years old.From here on, we label the first of the two wavesTime 1 (T1) and the second Time 2 (T2).

Of the 1,373 youths who participated at T1,937 (68%) of their parents filled in the ques-tionnaires. From this sample of parents, we firstselected the parents who had not encounteredtheir youth intoxicated at T1 (n = 870, or 93%of the parents who answered this question atT1). Second, we only used reports from the par-ents who were most opposed to youth drinkingat T1 (those who scored 4 on the 4-point scalemeasuring parents’ opposition to youth alcohol


use; see description below). At T1, 700 par-ents endorsed the most restrictive attitude. Thisrepresented 75% of the parents who answeredthis question at T1. The choice not to includeparents with more lenient initial attitudes wasbased on the premises of cognitive dissonancetheory (Festinger, 1957). By limiting the sam-ple to parents with the strictest initial attitudesand no experience of having encountered theiryouths intoxicated, we ensured that the condi-tions were in place for the creation of dissonanceif parents subsequently encountered their youthsintoxicated. At T1, 658 parents had not encoun-tered their youth intoxicated and endorsed themost restrictive attitude. This represented 70%of the parents who answered both these ques-tions at that time point. Third, to be includedin the sample, parents needed to have informa-tion about their opposition to youth alcohol useand whether they had encountered their youthsintoxicated at T2 (494 of the 658 parents at T1,or 75%, met these criteria). Thus, for this study,the analytic sample consisted of 494 parents ofyouths (277 boys and 217 girls) aged 13 or 14 atT1 who had strict attitudes and had not encoun-tered their youths intoxicated at T1 and had alsoprovided data about their attitudes and whetherthey had encountered their youths intoxicatedat T2. About 72% of questionnaires were filledout by mothers, 13% by fathers, and the rest byeither both parents together or another caretaker.In Table 1, characteristics of the sample arepresented.

Measures

Encountering the youth intoxicated. Parentswere asked: ‘‘Have you ever encounteredyour youth drunk?’’ (Kerr & Stattin, 2000).The response options were 1 (No, hasn’thappened), 2 (Yes, once), and 3 (Yes, two ormore times). We dichotomized this measure todifferentiate parents who had encountered theiryouth intoxicated at least once (coded 1) fromthose who had not (coded 0). Of the parents inour analytic sample, 95 (19%) had encounteredtheir youths intoxicated by the time their youthswere 15 or 16 years old (T2).

Parents’ opposition to youth alcohol use.Parents were asked which of four descriptionsbest reflected their own attitudes (Kerr et al.,2008; Koutakis, Stattin, & Kerr, 2008): 1 (It isnatural for youths our son or daughter’s age

Table 1. Descriptive Information About the Youth andParent Samples

Youth sample

Age (M) 13.54Gender

Boys 56%Girls 44%

EthnicityScandinavian 95%Non-Scandinavian 5%

HouseholdTwo-parent 70%One-parent 21%

Parent sample

Mother FatherEthnicity

Scandinavian 94% 92%Non-Scandinavian 6% 8%

EmploymentFull-time 58% 95%Part-time 37% 2%Not working 5% 3%

EducationElementary school 10% 11%High school 59% 71%University 31% 18%

to be curious about trying alcohol. We trustthat our son/daughter drinks in a responsibleway.); 2 (A youth our son or daughter’s ageis adult enough to be responsible for his/heractions. If they want to drink alcohol, theywill, regardless of what parents do or say. Wehave given our son/daughter alcohol to drink athome, so it will not be as exciting. Hence, weknow what he/she is drinking, and the risk thathe/she will get home-distilled alcohol or drugs islessened.); 3 (We think it is totally unacceptablefor our son/daughter to drink alcohol outsidethe home. On the other hand, we have allowedour son/daughter to taste wine or beer whenwe are having it with a weekend dinner orsomething like that.); and 4 (A youth our son ordaughter’s age is way too young to drink alcoholat all. We think it is obvious that adolescentsunder 18 years should not concern themselveswith alcohol.). This measure is sensitive tothe child’s chronological age (Koutakis et al.,2008). Similar measures about parents’ attitudesto youth drinking have been used in NorthAmerican (Ennett et al., 2001) and European


samples (Koning, van den Eijnden, Engels,Verdurmen, & Vollebergh, 2010).

Parental discomfort. To measure parental dis-comfort about youths’ problematic drinking,parents were asked: ‘‘Are you worried that youryouth will start to abuse alcohol?’’ This questionwas included in a more general parental worriesscale, which has been used and validated in ear-lier studies (Kerr et al., 2008). The mean forparental worries about alcohol abuse was simi-lar to the means for parental worries about otherissues (using drugs, not finishing school, gettingin trouble with the police, and having deviantfriends). Thus, worrying that a youth would startto abuse alcohol should be a relevant alcohol-related worry for Swedish parents. The responsescale ranged from 1 (No, not at all) to 5 (Yes,very much).

Parental control. Parents answered five ques-tions concerning setting and enforcing rules thatrequired youths to give information about theiractivities and associations away from home(Kerr & Stattin, 2000). The questions were:‘‘Does the youth need to have your permis-sion to stay out late on a weekday evening?’’‘‘Does the youth need to ask you before he orshe can make plans with friends for a Saturdayevening?’’ ‘‘If the youth has been out past cur-few, do you require him or her to explain whathe or she has been doing and whom he or shehas been with?’’ ‘‘Does the youth have to tellyou where he or she is at night, whom he orshe is with, and what he or she is doing?’’ and‘‘Before the youth goes out on a Saturday night,does he or she have to tell you where he or she isgoing and with whom?’’ The response optionsranged from 1 (No, never) to 5 (Yes, always).The α reliabilities were .70 and .76 at T1 andT2, respectively.

Youth delinquency. Parents answered 10 ques-tions about their youths’ engagement in differ-ent delinquent activities (Kerr & Stattin, 2000;Magnusson, Duner, & Zetterblom, 1975). Thequestions were about shoplifting, vandalizingpublic or private property, breaking into a build-ing, being in a physical fight in public, carryinga weapon, and stealing a car. The response scaleranged from 1 (Never) to 5 (More than 10 times).The α reliabilities were .68 and .69 at T1 andT2, respectively. The correlation between theparent-reported measure of youth delinquency

and youths’ reports of their own delinquencyat T1 for youths aged 13 to 16, using thesame 10 questions for both reporters, was .39(p < .001). It was higher for the 13- and 14-year-olds (r = .52, p < .001) than for the 15-and 16-year-olds (r = .26, p < .001). Hence,substantial associations existed between par-ents’ and youths’ reports of youth delinquency,particularly when the youths were younger.

Frequency of youths’ intoxication. Youthsanswered a question regarding their frequencyof intoxication: ‘‘Have you, during the last year,drunk so much beer, liquor, or wine that youbecame drunk?’’ (Kerr & Stattin, 2000; Mag-nusson et al., 1975). The answer options rangedfrom 1 (No, it has not happened) to 5 (Morethan 10 times). The percentages of youths inthis sample who had been drunk at differentages are close to those found in national surveys(Hvitfeldt & Gripe, 2010).

Statistical Analyses

We used General Linear Model (GLM) analysesto answer the main questions in this study. Asmall number of participants had missing val-ues on some of the outcome measures and wereexcluded from one or more of the analyses. Thisexplains the different numbers of participantsin the GLM analyses. It should be mentioned,however, that the number of participants whosedata were deleted due to partial missing data inthe analyses was very small (maximum 16 per-sons in the analysis involving parental control).In addition to the GLMs, we used the MPlusprogram (Muthen & Muthen, 1998 – 2006) toexamine the direction of influence betweenyouths’ alcohol intoxication and parents’ oppo-sition to youth alcohol use, as was suggested inthe second alternative explanation. Effect sizes(ES) were calculated using Cohen’s d (Cohen,1988), and a confidence interval of 95% wasused. In this study, we controlled for severalfactors that might have influenced the results ofthe study. First, inconsistent results have beenreported regarding parents’ reactions to girls andboys (Hoeve et al., 2009; Stattin & Kerr, 2000).Consequently, we controlled for youths’ gen-der in all analyses. Second, parents might reactdifferently to 13-year-olds’ drinking than to 14-year-olds’, so we also controlled for age. Finally,it is possible that parents’ socioeconomic status(SES) is important for the results of this study. In


earlier studies, parental education has been usedas a proxy for parents’ SES (Hamilton, Noh, &Adlaf, 2009; Humensky, 2010). Consistent withthis, we controlled for parents’ education in allanalyses.

Attrition Analyses

Some parents fulfilled the criteria for beingincluded in the sample at T1 (n = 658), but didnot have the relevant data at T2 (n = 164). These164 parents who were lost through attrition overthe 2 years represented 25% of the sample at T1(n = 658). Parents who fulfilled the criteria atboth T1 and T2 (n = 494) were included in oursample. We used logistic regression analysis todetermine whether parents who participated bothat T1 and T2 (n = 494) differed from parentswho participated at T1 but not at T2 (n = 164).At T1, these two groups were compared on youthdemographic information (age, gender, familystructure, and cultural background), parents’employment, education, cultural background,and all variables used in the study. The resultsshowed only one difference: youths of theparents in our sample were intoxicated lessfrequently than youths whose parents werelost through attrition (odds ratio = .64, p =.008). The Nagelkerke R2 for this model wasonly .07.

RESULTS

Descriptive Information About the StudyMeasures

Correlations between all variables used in thestudy, as well as means and standard deviations,are presented in Table 2. At both T1 and T2,youths’ delinquency and alcohol intoxicationcorrelated significantly with each other, and theywere both significantly associated with lack ofparental control and parental worries about youthalcohol abuse. Moreover, parental control at T2correlated significantly with parents’ restrictiveattitudes toward youth drinking.

Hypothesis 1: Parents Who Have EncounteredTheir Youth Intoxicated Will Become LessOpposed to Youth Drinking Rather Than

Increase Their Control Attempts

According to dissonance theory (Festinger,1957), parents who are opposed to youth

Tab

le2.

Cor

rela

tions

and

Des

crip

tive

Info

rmat

ion

ofP

aren

ts’

and

Yout

hs’

Beh

avio

rsat

T1an

dT2

Var

iabl

e1

23

45

67

89

10M

(SD

)

1.Y

outh

s’de

linqu

ency

T1

—11

.30

(0.7

4)2.

Pare

ntal

wor

ries

T1

.17∗

∗∗—

1.91

(0.9

0)3.

Pare

ntal

cont

rolT

1−.

10∗

−.03

—4.

36(0

.65)

4.Y

outh

s’in

toxi

catio

nT

1.1

4∗∗

.17∗

∗∗−.

11∗

—1.

26(0

.78)

5.Pa

rent

s’re

stri

ctiv

eat

titud

esT

2−.

05−.

13∗∗

.14∗

∗−.

09∗

—3.

57(0

.94)

6.Y

outh

s’de

linqu

ency

T2

.40∗

∗∗.0

9∗−.

03.0

8−.

07—

11.5

6(1

.36)

7.Pa

rent

alw

orri

esT

2.1

8∗∗∗

.40∗

∗∗−.

01.0

9−.

11∗

.20∗

∗∗—

1.94

(0.8

9)8.

Pare

ntal

cont

rolT

2−.

06−.

04.6

0∗∗∗

−.04

.22∗

∗∗−.

10∗

−.01

—3.

95(0

.82)

9.Y

outh

s’in

toxi

catio

nT

2.1

3∗∗

.15∗

∗−.

04.3

3∗∗∗

−.15

∗∗.1

6∗∗

.32∗

∗∗−.

11∗

—2.

41(1

.57)

10.E

ncou

nter

edyo

uth

into

xica

ted

T2

.26∗

∗∗.1

5∗∗

−.02

.18∗

∗∗−.

21∗∗

∗.2

8∗∗∗

.28∗

∗∗−.

05.4

1∗∗∗

—0.

19(0

.39)

∗ p<

.05,

∗∗p

<.0

1,∗∗

∗ p<

.001

.


drinking and encounter their youths intoxicatedshould experience dissonance. Theoretically,parents could eliminate this dissonance by tryingto reduce their youths’ drinking, by increasingtheir control attempts, or by becoming lessopposed to youth drinking. From earlier studiesof cognitive dissonance (Halpern, 1994; Makela,1997; McMaster & Lee, 1991; Peretti-Watel,2006; Tagliacozzo, 1979), we expected thatparents would be more likely to change theirown attitudes than to try to change their youths’behavior. To test for differences between parentswho had encountered their youths intoxicated(n = 95) and those who had not (n = 399),we used repeated-measures GLMs where weincluded two Group (having encountered youthintoxicated or not) × Time interactions, withparents’ control and opposition to youth drinkingas the within-subjects factors.

The results for parental control showed thatparents generally controlled their youths lessover time, F(1, 478) = 105.37, p < .001. Fur-ther, the Group × Time interaction, with parents’control as the within-subjects factor, was non-significant, F(1, 478) = 0.27, p = .601. Par-ents who encountered their youths intoxicated(M = 4.33, SD = 0.65, at T1, and M = 3.86,SD = 0.75, at T2) were not significantly dif-ferent from parents who did not encounter theiryouths intoxicated (M = 4.37, SD = 0.65, atT1, and M = 3.97, SD = 0.83, at T2) in theirover-time changes in control. Thus, parentswho encountered their youths intoxicated didnot try to change their youths’ behavior more,through control attempts, than parents who didnot encounter their youths intoxicated. The ques-tion is whether these two groups differed inattitude changes.

The results for parents’ attitudes showedthat parents generally became less opposed toyouth drinking over time, F(1, 490) = 112.81,p < .001. In addition, there was a significantGroup × Time interaction, with opposition toyouth drinking as the within-subjects factor,F(1, 490) = 19.32, p < .001 (ES = .46 at T2).As shown in Figure 1, the decreasing trend foropposition to youth drinking was particularlyevident for parents who encountered their youthintoxicated between T1 and T2. In terms ofeffect size, the differences in means at T2between the parents who had encountered theiryouth intoxicated and the parents who hadnot produced a Cohen’s d of .39, which is asmall to medium effect. To sum, these results

FIGURE 1. OPPOSITION TO YOUTH DRINKING AT T2 AMONG

PARENTS WHO ENCOUNTERED THEIR YOUTH INTOXICATED

BETWEEN T1 AND T2 AND THOSE WHO DID NOT.

were consistent with our hypothesis that whenencountering their youths intoxicated parentswould become less tolerant to youth drinkingrather than increasing their control attempts.

Hypothesis 2: After Encountering Their YouthsIntoxicated, Parents Who Maintain Their

Opposition to Youth Drinking ShouldExperience More Discomfort Than ParentsWho Become More Lenient Toward Youth

Drinking

If becoming less opposed to youth drinkingreflects dissonance reduction, then the parentswho encountered their youth intoxicated andmaintained their opposition to youth drinkingover time should experience more discomfort(i.e., worries about the youths’ alcohol abuse)than the parents who encountered their youthintoxicated and became less opposed to youthdrinking over time. We defined parents as hav-ing become less opposed to youth drinking ifthey scored 4 on the attitude measure at T1, butscored 1, 2, or 3 at T2. In contrast, we definedthem as having maintained their opposition toyouth drinking if they scored 4 on the attitudemeasure at both T1 and T2. Of the 494 parentsincluded in the sample, we created four groups:(a) parents who did not encounter their youthsintoxicated between T1 and T2 and became lessopposed to youth drinking (n = 69), (b) parentswho did not encounter their youths intoxicatedbetween T1 and T2 and maintained their atti-tudes (n = 330), (c) parents who encounteredtheir youths intoxicated between T1 and T2 andbecame less opposed to youth drinking (n = 35),and (d) parents who encountered their youthsintoxicated between T1 and T2 and maintainedtheir attitudes (n = 60).


FIGURE 2. WORRIES ABOUT YOUTH ALCOHOL ABUSE

AMONG PARENTS WHO BETWEEN T1 AND T2(A) ENCOUNTERED THEIR YOUTH INTOXICATED OR NOT

AND (B) BECAME LESS OPPOSED TO YOUTH DRINKING OR

NOT.

A repeated-measures GLM with worriesas the within-subjects, repeated measure wasused to examine differences between thesefour groups. The results showed significantover-time differences in worries between thegroups, F(3, 479) = 3.06, p = .028. As seenin Figure 2, among parents who encounteredtheir youths intoxicated, those who maintainedtheir strict attitudes increased in worries fromT1 to T2. This was not true for parents whobecame less opposed to youth drinking. At T1,these two groups did not differ significantlyin worries, t (93) = 0.19, p = .848, but at T2they did, t (93) = −2.55, p = .004 (ES = .47at T2). In addition, using Group C (parents whoencountered their youths intoxicated betweenT1 and T2 and became less opposed toyouth drinking) as a reference group, weexamined whether this group differed fromthe three other groups in their changes inworries over time. We did this by using groupmembership as a predictor of the slope ofparental worries. The results showed that GroupC differed significantly from Group D (parentswho encountered the youth intoxicated betweenT1 and T2 and maintained their attitudes) intheir over-time changes in worries (β = .16,p = .001). Parents who had encountered theiryouths intoxicated and changed their attitudes(Group C) did not differ significantly from thetwo groups of parents who had not encounteredtheir youths intoxicated (Groups A and B). Tosum, the results for the parents who encounteredtheir youths intoxicated were consistent withour hypothesis; those who maintained theiropposition to youth drinking between T1 andT2 reported more discomfort over time than

those who became less opposed to youthdrinking.

Test of an Alternative Explanation for WhyParents Became Less Opposed to Youth

Drinking

Because youth drinking and delinquency oftenco-occur (Komro et al., 2010), it is possiblethat parents reacted to the youths’ problembehavior more generally, rather than drinking,specifically. There were significant correlationsbetween youths’ reports of their alcoholintoxication and parents’ reports of theiryouths’ delinquency both at T1 (r = .11,p = .016) and T2 (r = .16, p = .001). Inaddition, encountering the youth intoxicated wassignificantly related to parents’ reports of youthdelinquency at T2 (r = .30, p < .001).

To test whether parents’ changes in oppo-sition to youth drinking were due to theirknowledge of their youths’ delinquency ratherthan their knowledge of their youths’ intoxica-tion, we performed a repeated-measures GLMwith parental opposition to youth drinking as thewithin-subjects, repeated measure and havingencountered the youth intoxicated at T2 versusnot as the between-subjects measure. In this anal-ysis, we controlled for parents’ reports of youths’delinquency at T2. We used parents’ reports ofyouths’ delinquency, rather than youths’ self-reports, because parents should only be expectedto react to what they actually have knowledgeabout. The results showed a significant Group ×Time interaction, F(1, 483) = 19.50, p < .001.Parents who encountered their youths intoxi-cated became less opposed to youth drinkingover time than parents who did not, after con-trolling for parents’ knowledge of their youths’delinquency. The GLM analysis showed no sig-nificant effects involving delinquency. Overall,then, parents becoming less opposed to youthdrinking seemed to be a reaction to their youths’drinking, specifically, rather than to their youths’problem behavior, more generally.

Test of an Alternative Explanation for the LinkBetween Encountering the Youth Intoxicatedand Change in Opposition to Youth Drinking

In this study, encountering the youth intoxicatedand becoming less opposed to youth drinkingboth happened between T1 and T2, whichraises questions about the direction of influence.


Parents’ attitude changes might be a response totheir youths’ intoxication, as we have assumed,but youths’ intoxication might be a responseto parents’ attitudes as well. To examinethe direction of influence between youths’intoxication frequency and parents’ attitudes, weused an auto-regressive cross-lagged model withyouths’ reports of their intoxication frequencyand parents’ attitudes at T1 and T2, includingboth within-time associations and stability paths.We used the MPlus program (Muthen & Muthen,1998 – 2006) to test this model.

In this analysis, we used youths’ own reportsof their intoxication rather than parent reports.This choice was based on parents’ possible lackof knowledge about their youths’ intoxication.In line with the alternative explanation, if youthsview less strict attitudes in parents as a sign thatit is okay to drink alcohol, we would see theeffects in youths’ own reports of their intoxica-tion. Thus, using youth reports made sense whentesting this alternative explanation. The samplefor this analysis was parents who had not encoun-tered their youth intoxicated at T1 but who mighthave endorsed any of the four alternatives con-cerning their attitudes about youth drinking (n =638). The reason for including all parents, inde-pendent of their attitudes at T1, was to ensurethat the whole variation in parents’ attitudes toyouth drinking was represented. As reported inFigure 3, the results showed that youths’ intox-ication frequency predicted decreases in par-ents’ opposition to youth drinking 2 years later(β = −.08, p = .028), controlling for opposi-tion to youth drinking at T1. The path fromparents’ attitudes to youths’ intoxication did notreach significance (β = −.01, p = .815). Thus,youth drinking predicted changes in parents’ atti-tudes about youth drinking; parents’ attitudes didnot predict changes in youth drinking.

Youths’ Gender, Age, and Parental Educationas Control Variables

In all analyses, youths’ gender and age andparental educational level were used as between-subjects factors to control for possible effects onthe results. The results showed that, generally,these control variables did not influence the pro-cesses over time. The only significant differencewas for changes in parental control. Parents ofboys showed steeper decreases in control overtime than parents of girls, F(1, 478) = 4.45,p = .035. No other significant differences were

FIGURE 3. CROSS-LAGGED MODEL EXAMINING DIRECTION

OF INFLUENCE BETWEEN PARENTS’ STRICT ATTITUDES

ABOUT YOUTH ALCOHOL USE AND THEIR YOUTHS’ALCOHOL INTOXICATION FREQUENCY.

-.13**-.06 (ns)

.34***

.36***Strict Attitudes T1

Intoxication frequency

T1

Intoxication frequency

T2

Strict Attitudes T2

found in any of the analyses. Thus, for the mostpart, parents reacted similarly to boys and girlsand to 13-year-old and 14-year-old youths andindependent of their own educational levels.

DISCUSSION

In this study, we examined how parents reactwhen they encounter their youth intoxicated.The unique aspect of this study is that it offersa theoretically based explanation for parents’reactions to problematic youth behaviors. Fromcognitive dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957),we predicted that parents who encountered theiryouths intoxicated would experience cognitivedissonance, and to reduce the discomfortassociated with dissonance, they would changetheir attitudes and become more tolerant ofyouth drinking over time rather than trying tochange their youths’ behaviors. The results wereconsistent with this hypothesis.

Two alternative explanations for the resultsin this study were tested. First, we examined thehypothesis that parents reacted to youths’ prob-lematic behaviors more generally rather than toyouths’ drinking per se. The results suggestedthat parents’ reactions were not attributable totheir youths’ delinquent behavior, generally, butto their specific, first-hand encounters with theiryouths’ intoxication. The second alternativeexplanation dealt with the direction of influ-ence between youths’ intoxication and parents’attitudes. This alternative explanation positedthat, in contrast to our assumption that parents’attitude changes were responses to their youths’intoxication, increased intoxication among theyouths was a response to lenient parental atti-tudes. We examined the over-time ordering of


these two events using a cross-lagged modeland found evidence for our hypothesis: Youths’intoxication frequency predicted decreases inparents’ opposition to youth drinking, but par-ents’ lenient attitudes did not predict increasesin youths’ intoxication frequency. In this model,we controlled for the stability of youths’ intox-ication and parents’ opposition to youth drink-ing, and we included within-time associationsbetween these two variables. In addition, we pre-dicted changes over 2 years. These two aspectsmake it hard to obtain strong cross-laggedeffects. Thus, it is noteworthy that our hypoth-esized path was significant, whereas the reversepath was not.

It is possible that decreases in strict attitudescould be explained by other processes, ratherthan being a result of dissonance reduction. First,becoming less opposed to youth drinking mightbe an indication of general disengagement inparents (Dishion et al., 2004). If this explana-tion were true, then we should have seen thatparents who encountered their youth intoxicatedand became less opposed to youth drinking also(because of their general disengagement) madefewer attempts to manage their youths’ behavior.We did not find this. Parents who became morelenient toward youth drinking over time did notreduce their control of their youths more thanparents who maintained their opposition to youthdrinking. For this reason, parental disengage-ment does not seem to be a viable explanation forthe results of this study. Second, as children getolder, parents might think it is more acceptablefor them to drink alcohol, and a decrease in con-trol and strict attitudes to alcohol might be a nat-ural process. In addition, parents probably wantto limit their youths’ drinking in the future andmight use strategies other than increasing controlto accomplish this goal. It has been suggestedthat parents use reasoning rather than powerassertion when they have long-term socializationgoals (Kuczynski, 1984), which might explainthe general decrease we found in parents’ con-trol over time. Consistent with our expectations,however, in comparison with parents who hadnot encountered their youths intoxicated, thosewho did showed a sharper decrease in strictattitudes over time. Hence, the decrease in strictattitudes among these parents indicates that thereis something more than just normal developmenttoward more acceptance of youth drinking.

According to dissonance theory (Festinger,1957), reducing dissonance should result in

reduced discomfort; not eliminating dissonanceshould leave people in an uncomfortable state.Consistent with this, our results showed thatparents who encountered their youths intoxi-cated and kept their strict attitudes increasedin worries over time. In addition, parents whoencountered their youths intoxicated and becameless opposed to youth drinking showed a smalldecrease in worries over time. These two groupsof parents differed significantly in their changesover time. Thus, in line with our hypotheses,the change in attitudes could be interpreted asa strategy to reduce the discomfort caused bythe dissonance between parents’ opposition toyouth drinking and the knowledge of their ownyouths’ drinking.

For a number of youth problem behaviors,there is mounting evidence that when parentsencounter problems, they tend to reduce theirattempts to change the behavior (Hafen &Laursen, 2009; Huh et al., 2006; Kerr & Stattin,2003; Kerr et al., 2008; Stice & Barrera, 1995).The findings of this study are convergent withthose, not in showing behavioral changes, butin showing changes in parents’ willingness todefine the behavior as problematic. This, initself, is important knowledge, because parents’attitudes about youth drinking have been shown,in an intervention program, to play a significantrole in reducing youth drinking (Koutakis et al.,2008). In this intervention program, parentswere encouraged to maintain strict attitudestoward youth drinking, and they were offeredstrategies to communicate their attitudes to theiryouths. Overall, maintaining strict attitudes wasassociated with less youth drinking over time.The results of the current study suggest thatin the normal course of events parents do nottend to maintain their strict attitudes, and thisseems to be especially so when youths beginusing alcohol in a problematic way. The currentstudy provides insights about why parents donot maintain their strict attitudes in the normalcourse of events, and that knowledge can be usedto improve interventions to reinforce parents’strict attitudes.

The present study has some limitations thatwarrant mention. We used only two waves oflongitudinal data with a 2-year interval, andbecause of that, we had to test our theoreticalmodel in different steps, rather than in onemodel. All the results are consistent with ourhypotheses from cognitive dissonance theory(Festinger, 1957), however, even with the


2-year interval between measurements, whichcontributes to our confidence in the results.Another limitation is that we do not knowabout the parents’ own drinking habits. Parents’drinking has been found to be moderatelyassociated with youth alcohol use (van Zundert,van der Vorst, Vermulst, & Engels, 2006; White,Johnson, & Buyske, 2000), and parents whothemselves drink alcohol have been found to useless restrictive alcohol-specific rules than otherparents (van der Vorst et al., 2006). In this study,we do not know if parents’ own drinking affectedtheir reactions when they had encountered theiryouths intoxicated, and this is a limitation. Itis possible that heavy-drinking parents feel thatthey cannot impose strict limitations on theiryouths’ drinking because they are setting a poorexample. If this were so, however, we shouldexpect their attitudes toward youth drinking to berelatively lenient already at T1. By limiting ouranalytic sample to the most restrictive parents atT1, we decreased the likelihood of these parentsbeing included, which helps to lessen concernabout this issue. Nonetheless, whether and howparents’ drinking might moderate their reactionsto youth intoxication remains to be investigatedin future studies.

The findings reported in this study shouldbe seen in their cultural context. In manysocieties, youth drinking is not an issuebecause most youths do not drink, and inother societies, drinking among youths is notconsidered problematic by most parents. It islikely that parents in countries with relativelylenient attitudes toward youth drinking are lesslikely to face cognitive dissonance than parentsin countries that have stricter attitudes towardyouth drinking. Studies conducted in northernEuropean countries (e.g., van der Vorst et al.,2006) as well as North America (e.g., Becket al., 1995) have shown parental attitudes toyouth drinking similar to those shown in thisstudy. Overall, it can be expected that thefindings reported in this study should be mostgeneralizable to countries where most parentsconsider youth drinking a problem. The factthat parents might react differently in differentcultures is, however, an important aspect to beexamined in future research.

Despite these limitations, this study has sev-eral strengths. One is the testing of theoreticallybased hypotheses about how youth influencetheir parents. A second strength is the use ofa developmentally appropriate design in the

sense that we examined how parents reactedto youth intoxication at the ages of 13 to 16,which is the time when youth normally startto engage in drinking (Patrick & Schulenberg,2010) and other problematic behaviors (Moffitt,1993). Because parents are initially opposed tounderage drinking, this is a legitimate time toexpect a clash between parents’ attitudes andyouth drinking. Further, in this study we usedparents’ reports of their attitudes, which havenot been used often in past research. Commonly,youths’ reports of their parents’ attitudes havebeen used, and they make interpretations some-what unclear. Basing the study on parents’ ownreports gives us greater confidence in the results.

Another strength of this study is thelongitudinal design. Many studies concerningyouth drinking have been cross-sectional, andparents’ possible reactions to youth alcoholuse have not been considered. With thelongitudinal design, we were able to show thatyouths’ drinking predicted changes in parents’opposition to youth drinking, which would nothave been possible with cross-sectional data.

Finally, we had a high participation rateamong parents. At T1, 68% of parents whowere targeted participated in the project. Sucha high participation rate among parents isvery uncommon in the literature, and it givesus confidence that we covered the individualvariations that existed in the sample.

Recent theorizing and empirical findingssuggest transactional processes in which parentsreact to youth problem behaviors and youthreact to parenting behaviors (Patterson, 1982;Sameroff, 1975). For many years, the lessunderstood part of this process has been parents’reactions to youth problem behaviors. Theresults of this study showed that parents becameless opposed to underage drinking after theyhad encountered their youth intoxicated. Thisreaction was explained as a way of eliminatingthe dissonance they experienced between theirattitudes and their youths’ behavior. Thetheoretical nature of this study and the empiricalresults help to fill a gap in earlier research,and as such, the study represents a step towardproducing the knowledge needed for a betterunderstanding of transactional family processes.

NOTE

This research was supported by a grant to Margaret Kerr andHakan Stattin from the Swedish Research Council.


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Documents

A Test of Cognitive Dissonance Theory to Explain Parents' Reactions to Youths' Alcohol Intoxication