up of teens with no history of psychiatric diagnoses, might have poorer self-concepts and perceptions of parents that are significantly more negative. This study is designed to test this expectation by comparing the self-perceptions and parental perceptions of a group of pre-teens placed in residential home settings due to diagnosed emotional disturbance and a group of pre-teens living at home with their biological parents who have no psychiatric history.
It is important to find out whether pre-teens living in group homes perceive themselves and their parents more negatively than teens living in parental home situations for several reasons. First, such an examination has theoretical importance because it tests a relatively new theory of childhood and adolescent disturbance. While there have been previous studies of the theory, more work needs to be done in order to establish it as a viable explanation of childhood/adolescent disturbance; this because a fundamental criterion of evidence in scientific study is replication.
Moreover, previous studies of Rohner's theory have been primarily cross-cultural studies examining foreign populations (see Literature Review); however, this study examines the theory for American populations. Therefore, if findings are as predicted they will not only add additional support to Rohner's Theory of Parental Acceptance and Rejection, they will also add generalizability to the existing research.
The study also has practical significance. One of the many roles of the youth-care workers in residential settings is to teach adolescents prosocial behavior; if this behavior is lacking because it was not modelled by parents (such as Rohner's theory suggests), then youth-care workers can emphasize loving, accepting behaviors as part of their efforts to provide treatment to these youths.
In other words, caregivers in residential settings can use the information as a database concerning one of the...