The Interaction between Psychopathological Symptoms and Conflictual Parent-Child Relationship in Predicting Social Skills and Coping Strategies

The quality of early parent-child relationship affects children's later emotional development, social competence and school performance (Caputi, Lecce, & Pagnin, 2017). Moreover, the perception of a warm relationship with parents supports the use of adaptive social skills and approach-oriented coping strategies (Chan, 2011). Children characterized by psychopathological symptoms are likely to experience difficulties in social adjustment over time (Burt, Obradovic, Long, & Masten, 2008) and typically present a dysfunctional coping style (Seiffge-Krenke, Weidemann, Fentner, Aegenheister, & Poeblau, 2001). In turn, children adopting maladaptive coping strategies usually have rejecting, ignoring, inconsistent, or punishing parents (Chan, 2011). This study investigates the effects of the interaction between psychopathological symptoms and parent-child relationship, controlling for their main effects, on social skills and coping strategies.