The Role of parenting and family background on Turkish adolescents' academic achievement

Abstract

The major aim of the present study was to investigate the prediction of adolescents' academic achievement in the Turkish culture. Authoritativeness of the mother and the father, maternal employment, parental marital satisfaction, parental educational level and importance of education were proposed as predictive variables within a model. In the model it is suggested that (1) the predictive variables could have a direct effect on adolescents' academic achievement, (2) authoritativeness of mother and father could have a mediating role between parental education, maternal employment, parental marital satisfaction, and academic achievement, (3) importance of education and parental marital satisfaction could have a moderating role between authoritativeness of mother and father and academic achievement. A sample of 302 high-school students attending four private schools in Istanbul and living within an intact family were included in the study. A background questionnaire, Authoritativeness Measure (for mothers and fathers separately), importance of education questions and a parental Marital Satisfaction Scale were used for collecting data. The results indicated that for all adolescents, psychological autonomy of the mother and importance of education (asked in the negative) predicted academic achievement, with maternal psychological autonomy granting being a stronger predictor. No mediating effects of psychological autonomy granting