A longitudinal examination of the associations between fathers' and children's attributions and negative interactions

The present investigation examined the concurrent and longitudinal relation s between attributions and negative behavioral interactions in the context of the father-child dyad. Participants were 177 fathers and their young ado lescents recruited from. nonmetropolitan counties in the southeast. Results indicated that for children, attributions about their father play a signif icant role in their negative behavioral interactions with their father both within and across time. Interestingly, father earlier negative behavioral interactions with their children predicted children subsequent attributions about their father in the longitudinal analyses. In addition, both attribu tions and behavioral interactions were highly stable across time for both f athers and children.