COGNITIVE AND BEHAVIORAL PREDICTORS OF COMMUNICATION IN CLINIC-REFERRED AND NONCLINICAL MOTHER-ADOLESCENT DYADS

This study examines the relation between mothers' and adolescents' per ceptions of one another's behavior and their actual communication beha vior during a problem-solving task. Forty mother-adolescent dyads comp leted self-report and observational measures of conflict and negative beliefs regarding the other. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses indicated that adolescents' negative beliefs about their mothers sign ificantly contributed unique variance in predicting adolescent negativ e communication, beyond the effects of maternal communication behavior . Thus, treatment of parent-adolescent conflict should address adolesc ents' and parents' perceptions of one another, as well as their proble m-solving behavior.