Distributive-Justice Reasoning in Families With Adolescents

Determinants of adolescent distributive-justice reasoning skills in a face-to-face resource-allocation task with parents (mother and father) were examined with 45 families. Adolescents' distributive-justice reasoning was associated with satisfaction with family cohesion, mother-adolescent communication, and empathy, but not with father-adolescent communication, gender, or socioeconomic resources. Parental distributive-justice practices during the resource-allocation task reveal very different roles for mothers and fathers.