Longitudinal Relations Between Parents’ Familism Values and Warmth and U.S. Latine Adolescents’ Prosocial Behaviors and the Mediating Role of Adolescents’ Familism Values

Abstract

Prosocial behaviors, or actions that are intended to benefit others, are important indicators of social competence and development in adolescence. Latine adolescents living in the United States (U.S. Latines) experience cultural socialization of familism values that may promote the development of prosocial behaviors. Further, parents’ own familism values help promote adolescents’ prosocial behaviors through socializing children toward behaviors that align with the values of support and obligation. Warm parents, in particular, model behaviors that are consistent with familism values and values of prosocial behavior that allow for adolescents to internalize messages of prosocial behavior and be motivated to perform these behaviors themselves. Using large, nationally-representative data from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study, this project examined longitudinal relations among parents’ familism values, parental warmth, adolescents’ familism values, and adolescents’ prosocial behaviors. Parents reported on their familism values when adolescents were 10-11 years old and adolescents’ prosocial behavior at 12-13 years. Adolescents reported their parents’ warm and supportive behaviors when they were 10-11 years old, their own familism values at age 11-12 years, and their prosocial behavior at age 12-13 years. Both parents’ own familism values and parental warmth at age 10-11 years were positively related to adolescents’ prosocial behavior at age 12-13 years both directly and indirectly through a positive relation with adolescents’ familism values at age 11-12 years. Findings support cultural socialization theories and prosocial development models as well as have implications for the development of prosocial behaviors among U.S. Latine adolescents.