Assessing adolescents’ perspectives of the quality of the parent-teen relationship

Although adolescents provide a unique and important perspective on the parent-teen relationship that can inform developmental theory and family-based intervention, traditional measures of their views are based on ‘paper and pencil’ surveys. This project aims to examine the feasibility and usefulness of a brief method of coding adolescents’ 3-minute speech samples regarding their thoughts and feelings about their relationship with their parent. In addition to investigating aspects of adolescents’ behavioural and emotional wellbeing that may be associated with the quality of their speech samples, we will also identify important developmental themes that may provide new insight into what they value in their relationships. The results are envisaged to provide support for a novel approach to assessing adolescents’ perspectives of the parent-teen relationship that can be applied in research and intervention settings.