RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MATERNAL PARENTING STYLES AND AFRICAN-AMERICAN AND WHITE ADOLESCENTS INTERPERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

One hundred and fifty adolescents, ages 13 through 19 years, were admi nistered the Parental Authority Questionnaire (PAQ) and the Assessment of Interpersonal Relations (AIR) in a counterbalanced order to examin e the relationship between perceived maternal parenting styles and ado lescents' interpersonal relations with their mothers, male peers, fema le peers and teachers. Parenting styles were categorized according to three parental prototypes identified by Baumrind (1971), permissive, a uthoritarian and authoritative. Students who described their mothers a s authoritative reported better interpersonal relations than adolescen ts with authoritarian or permissive mothers. No significant gender dif ferences were found on any of the measures; however, a significant rac e by relationship type interaction was found. African American student s reported more positive relationships with their mothers than did Whi te students; White students reported more positive relationships with their peers and with their teachers than did African American students .