The Influence Of Parent-child Attachment And Peer Attachment On The Development Of Children's Aggressive Behavior

Aggressive behavior in children and adolescents has been a long-term research area in developmental psychology.Existing longitudinal studies have mainly focused on the general developmental trajectory of children's aggressive behavior and paid less attention to the heterogeneous developmental trajectories.Moreover,previous research has concerned less with the predictors of children's aggressive behavior,such as parent-child and peer relations.Only a fewer researchers began to study Chinese children's aggressive behavior,without taking migrant children into account.Based on Bronfenbrenner's bio-ecological model of human development and by adopting a three-wave longitudinal research approach,this study investigated the developmental characteristics of children's aggressive behavior and how parent-child attachment and peer attachment played their roles in the development of migrant and urban children's aggressive behavior.This research consisted of two studies:the pilot study and the main study.In the pilot study,1018 4th to 6th grade migrant children(N=572)and their urban counterparts(N=343),were recruited.The purpose of the pilot study was to examine the psychometric properties of the three questionnaires,including aggressive behavior,parent-child attachment and peer attachment,and to preliminarily investigate the relationship among parent-child attachment,peer attachment and aggressive behavior.The main study was a three-wave longitudinal study,which began in May 2015(T1)and recollected data every six months.A total of 934 children in 4th grade from 7 primary schools in Nanjing and Shanghai were investigated,including 604 migrant children and 253 urban children.The main study used the revised questionnaire in the pilot study and the purpose was to explore the developmental characteristics of aggressive behavior,investigate the influence of parent-child attachment and peer attachment on different aggressive behavior trajectories,especially the mediating role of peer attachment in the relationship between parent-child attachment and developmental trajectories.The results of the pilot study go as follows:(1)the measures had acceptable reliability and validity,including the revised aggressive behavior questionnaire,the revised IPPA,and the retrospective report of parents' behavior.(2)Among the migrant and urban children,parent-child attachment and peer attachment were significantly correlated with aggressive behavior.(3)Among the two groups,the influence of parent-child attachment and peer attachment on aggressive behavior had similarities and differences.Both secure attachment and avoidant attachment significantly predicted aggressive behavior among migrant children,whereas avoidant attachment and ambivalent attachment significantly predicted aggressive behavior among urban children.For peer attachment,this study found that negative peer attachment positively predicted aggressive behavior in these two groups,while positive peer attachment only negatively predicted the aggressive behavior in migrant children.While examining the effects of parent-child attachment and peer attachment on aggressive behavior,it showed that the secure attachment,avoidant attachment and negative peer attachment significantly predicted the aggressive behavior of migrant children,but the influence of positive peer attachment was no longer significant.For urban children,negative peer attachment still significantly predicted aggressive behavior.The results of the main study go as follows:(1)the measures had acceptable psychometric properties,and the criteria of measurement invariance of multi-group and longitudinal invariant were met,including the parent-child attachment questionnaire,peer attachment and aggressive behavior questionnaire.(2)Overall,there were significant individual differences at the initial levels of children's aggressive behavior,but the average developmental trajectories of children's aggressive behavior was relatively stable.The average level of aggressive behavior showed no differences in migrant children and urban children.(3)The development of aggressive behavior in children was heterogeneous.Five trajectories were identified,respectively:persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory(4.8%),persistently low aggressive behavior trajectory(67.7%),high—decreasing trajectory(10.7%),low—increasing trajectory(13.1%),low—rising trajectory(3.8%).(4)Parent-child attachment had a direct effect on the aggressive behavior trajectories,but the effect was different between migrant children and urban children.The high level of secure attachment could reduce the possibility of the persistently high and rising development of aggressive behavior in the migrant children,but also reduced the possibility of the descending development of aggressive behavior in urban children.The high level of avoidant attachment promoted the development of aggressive behavior in urban children,but reduced the level of aggressive behavior in migrant children.Ambivalent attachment only negatively predicted the persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory in urban children,and had no significant effect on the migrant children.(5)Peer attachment had a direct effect on the aggressive behavior of migrant children,but the direct effect was not significant for urban children.(6)For migrant children,parent-child attachment both directly affected the development of children's aggressive behavior and indirectly affected it through peer attachment,while parent-child attachment only directly affected these aggressive behavior trajectories among urban children.For example,for migrant children,compared to the persistently low aggressive behavior trajectory,the secure attachment indirectly influenced the persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory through positive peer attachment.The avoidant attachment not only indirectly affected the persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory through positive peer attachment,but also indirectly affected all the subgroups through negative peer attachment,such as persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory,high-decreasing trajectory,low—increasing trajectory and low-rising trajectory.The ambivalent attachment indirectly affected the persistently high aggressive behavior trajectory,high—decreasing trajectory,and low—rising trajectory through peer attachment.Finally,the contributions and shortcomings of this research were discussed,as well as its implications for children's social adaptation,especially for migrant children.