Introduction amily is a basic unit of society that has evolved along with changes in the needs and demands of the individuals and society (Kozlowska & Hanney, 2002). Single-parent family is a kind of family in which either the father or mother is absent because of divorce, marital separation, out of -wedlock pregnancy, or death (Greenberg, 2002). Single parent status affects children mentally, emotionally and psychologically (Singh & Kiran, 2012). Several recent studies confirm that the change in family structure might increase problems in children and adolescents. These children are at higher risk of health problems ( Scharte & Bolte, 2013 Family structure is an important factor in the development of behavioral problems in children (Ryan, Claessens & Markowiz, 2015).Studies revealed that children in single-parent families showed more behavioral problems than children of two parent families (Srivastava, 2005; Seifollah Poor-Bonab & Keshavarzy -Arshady, 2015). Children and adolescents of single parent families exhibited more problems in terms of depression (Larson & Halfon, 2013), anxiety (Fagan and Churchill, 2012), aggression (Usakli, 2013), somatization symptoms and conduct disorder (Seifollah Poor-Bonab & Keshavarzy -Arshady, 2015), withdrawal (Liu, Guo, Okawa, Zhai, Uchiyama, Neiderhiser & Kurita, 2000), antisocial behavior and hyperactivity (Strohschein, 2012) in comparison with those of intact families. On the other hand, some studies indicated no serious behavioral problems in children of single-parent families compared with children of two-parent families (Hakim Shooshtray, Panaghy & Hajebi, 2008). There is an important research gap based on the contradictory findings obtained from studying behavioral problems in singleparent and two-parent adolescents. Several factors affect behavioral problems, including parental behaviors, family interactions, socio-economic factors (Slobodska, 2015),stress and identity status (Burt& Paysnick, 2014), objective quality of life (Shek, 2005), and early maladaptive schemas (Demehri, Movallai & Ahmadi, 2015). Yong (1999) alsoemphasized the relationship between behavioral problems and early maladaptive schemas.
Early maladaptive schemas are formed in early childhood based on early experiences derived mainly from the parental or the caregiver's environment (Young, Klosko & Weishaar, 2010; Hoffart, Sexton, Hedley, Wang & Holthe, 2005). These Schemas arise in childhood or adolescence as a result of interaction between the child's emotional mood and terrible events (Young, Klosko & Weishaar, 2003). Parental origins of schemas are important because they indicate that family schemas have developed (Jalili, Zargar, Salavati& Kakavand, 2011). Studies showed that the fatherless adolescent schemas were very inconsistent (Khdabkhshy-Kolaee, Alizadeh, Mansoor, Pour-Ebrahim, & Falsafinejad, 2015). There were differences in dysfunctional schemas based on adolescent's gender and age. Thus, adolescents experienced a greater degree of maladaptive schemas (Zafiropoulou,Avagianou & Vassiliadou, 2014). Some other researches showed that there were meaningful relationships between items of early maladaptive schemas and symptom somatization (shahamat, 2011), eating disorders (Cooper, 1997), substance use disorders (Ball & Cecero, 2001) In addition to behavioral problems and early maladaptive schemas, it seems that adolescents of single-parent and two-parent families are different in terms of self-esteem. Self-esteem is a psychological term which refers to a person's overall evaluation or appraisal of his or her own worth (Kiran, 2003).Many factors affect children's self-esteem. Sock and Shin (2010) compared the factors influencing children's selfesteem in two parent families and single parent families. The results showed that internal control, problematic behavior, school record, and parent-child comm.-. unication significantly predicted the level of self-esteem in two parent families. On the other hand, social support, family hardiness, internal control, problematic behavior, school record, and parent-child communication significantly predicted the level of selfesteem in single parent families. Researchers examined self-esteem in children of single-parent families. Whereas some researches showed that the children from single parent families had lower self-esteem compared with peers from two parent families (Kevorkian, 2010;Glennon, 2002;Wineburgh, 2000;Mandara& Murray, 2000), some other researches indicated that there was no statistically significant difference in the level of self-esteem among students from single parent families and those from two parent families (Kinga, Kimani & Muriithi, 2014).
Due to the contradictory findings in self-esteem and behavioral problems in single parent children and lack of enough research about early maladaptive schemas in this group, a comparison between the early maladaptive schemas, behavioral problems and selfesteem in single-parent and two-parent adolescents seems to be essential to address the research gaps.
Identification of the factors related to single-parent status and the underlying differences in single-parent and two-parent adolescents can be helpful in creating suitable conditions for education. Therefore, this study attempts to examine this question: "Is there a significant difference in early maladaptive schemas, behavioral problems and self-esteem between single-parent and two-parent adolescents?".
The study employed a causal comparative research (ex post facto) design, in which the population was composed of all female high school students in the second semester of 2015-2016 school year in Bonab city. The sample, including 52 female students, consisted of single-parent students who were identified by the screening method and selected using the convenience sampling method. The screening tests performed on the single-parent students were used to randomly select the same number of two-parent students from the same school and the same classroom (both groups were thus matched in terms of early maladaptive schemas, behavioral problems and selfesteem). Therefore, a total of 104 single-parent or twoparent students were studied (52 in each group).
After preparing the required instruments (including Youth Self-Report Scale (YRS), Short form of young Schema Questionnaire(YSQSF) and Self Esteem scale from Cooper Smith (CSE)), the researcher personally attended the girls' schools to identify the single-parent adolescents with the help of school officials, once permission was obtained from Bonab's Department of Education. Then, the same number of two-parent students were randomly selected from the same school and classroom. After providing relevant descriptions, we distributed the questionnaires, which after being completed, were collected from the students on the next day.
IV.
The following questionnaires were used in this study: i. Young Schema Questionnaire -Short form (YSQSF):
The scale is a 75-item questionnaire evaluating (Minaei, 2005). In this study Cronbach's alpha was also calculated for the subscales of anxious/depressed (0.79), withdrawn/ depressed (0.71), somatic complaints (0.64), social problems (0.64), thought problems (0.68), attention problems (0.59), rule-breaking behavior (0.51), aggressive behavior (0.73), and other problems (0.58).
V.
The average performance of the single-parent and two-parent adolescents and the standard deviations of scores on each of the variables, for both groups are presented in Table 1. In order to examine differences in Early Maladaptive Schemas between two groups, multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used by taking other assumptions of MANOVA into account (Table 2). MANOVA showed that there is a significant difference between female adolescent with single-parent and two parent in Early Maladaptive Schemas (Wilks' lambda=0.71, F=2.39, P=0.006) (Table 2). The results showed that Anxious/depressed (F= 8.30, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.005),withdrawn/depressed (F= 5.59, DF= 1, 102; P=0.02 ),social problems (F= 6.66, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.011), attention problems (F= 5.96, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.016), and aggressive behavior(F= 4.26, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.041) are signifycantly different between female adolescents in single parent families and two parents families (table 5). In other words, female adolescents from single parent families obtained significantly higher scores than female adolescents with two parent status in these domains.
In order to examine differences in self-esteem between two groups, an independent samples t-test was conducted (Table 6). Given a violation of Levene's test for homogeneity of variances, F (1,102) =0.03, p = 0.84, a t-test assuming homogeneous variances was calculated. The average score on total self-esteem in the single-parent adolescents (SD = 2.79 and M = 28.86) was compared, using the independent groups t-test, with two-parent adolescents (SD = 2.86 and M = 26.48). The comparison showed no significant difference between the single-parent and two-parent adolescents (p< 0.270 and t (192) = -1.10).
The results of MANOVA for self-esteem's domains in single parent and two parent female adolescents are displyed in table 7 & In order to examine differences in behavioral problems between two groups, the multivariate analysis of variance was used, given the normal distribution of data and other assumptions of variance analysis (Table 4).
MANOVA showed that two groups had a significant difference in the behavioral problems (p=0.048, F= 1.69, Lambda Wilks=0.48). The results of Wilks Lambda test (p < 0.015 and F (3.25 and 4) = 0.88) show a significant difference between the two groups in at least one of the subscales of self-esteem domains (public self-esteem, family selfesteem, education self-esteem, and social self-esteem) (Table7). The results showed that Social self-esteem (F=12.83; df=1,102; P=0.001) is significantly different between female adolescents in single parent families and two parents families (table 8).In other words, from single parent families obtained significantly lower scores on Social self-esteem subscale than female adolescents from two-parent families.
The aim of this study was to compare maladaptive schemes, behavioral problems and selfesteem in female adolescents with single-parent and two parent status. The results indicated that female adolescents with single parent condition obtained higher scores in social isolation/alienation, failure, dependence/ incompetence, vulnerability to harm or illness, subjugation and self-sacrifice schemas compared to female adolescents from two parent families. The results are in line wish the findings of Khodabkhshy Kolaee et al. (2015). According to Young et al. (2003), early maladaptive schemas are formed as a result of interaction between children's emotional mood and terrible events in childhood or adolescence. One of the toughest life events for children was separation or divorce of parents, as well as the death of father or mother (Neuman and Romanowski, 1999). Therefore, obviously, schemas of single-parent female adolescents were more maladaptive than those of two parent female adolescents.
According to the findings, single parent adolescents obtained higher scores in scales of anxious/depressed, withdrawn/depressed, social problems, attention problems, and aggressive behavior compared with two parent ones. These results were consistent with the findings of Kerami, Bolhari, & Asgharnejad, (2007), Ryan, Claessens & Markowitz, (2015). Maginnis, (1997) and Liu, X. Guo, Ch. Okawa, Zhai, Uchiyama, Neiderhiser & Kurita, (2000). These results were in contrastwith the findings of researchers such as Hakim Shooshtray, Panaghy & Hajebi (2008). In Coleman's theory (1980), each of youth issues in a particular chronological age reaches its maximum or peak tension in a particular chronological. This age varies according to different people and different issues of adolescence. Adolescents have difficulties when they are at the age of peak tension. In a situation like this, more behavioral problems arise in adolescents. The cooccurrence of these tensions with problems and tensions associated with single parent status causes more behavior problems in adolescents from single parent families than in adolescents from two parent families.
The results indicated that female adolescents from single parent families had lower social self-esteem compared to female adolescents from two-parent families. The results are consistent with the findings of Atindanbila & Winifred (2012), Kevorkian (2010), Glennon (2002), Wineburgh (2000), Mandara & Murray (2000), and these results were in contrast with the findings of researchers such as Kinga, Kimani and Muriithi (2014). According to Coopersmith(1968), childhood events affect a person's self-esteem. According toBean, Clark, Clemes (1929), solidarity is one of the four conditions of self-esteem. The feeling of solidarity occurs when the adolescent is satisfied with the links that are important to him and approved by others. So it is not surprising that a female who experiences a parent's absencehas lower self-esteem.
The limitations of this study should be taken into accounts the researcher was unable to identify all adolescents with single parent status in Bonab city, and also the population of adolescents was limited only to Bonab city. According to the findings, it is suggested that single-parent families should be provided with counseling services. In addition, education should take action to identify single parent students and provide this vulnerable group with consulting and training service. Moreover, cultural and educational centers should hold training session for head parent of household to train them to deal with single parent adolescents. Future studies can use single parent adolescents who are not enrolled as students as their subjects. In future research, these variables can be examined on children and the young from single parent families.
(which includes subjugation, self-sacrifice schema); | |
over vigilance and inhibition (which includes | |
emotional inhibition, unrelenting standards/hyper | |
criticalness schemas). Each question is graded on | |
a scale of 6 degrees (1= completely false, 2= false, | |
3= more true than false, 4= somewhat true, 5= | |
true, 6= completely true). Various studies have | |
supported YSQ-SF's validity and reliability in Iranian | |
samples (Ahi, Mohammadi Far & Besharat, 2007). | |
In the current study, Cronbach's alpha for each | |
schema was obtained. It was 0.72 for emotional deprivation, 0.82 for abandonment/instability, 0.71 for mistrust/abuse, 0.76 for social isolation/ alienation, 0.76 for defectiveness/shame, 0.78 for failure to achieve, 0.77 for dependence/ incompetence, 0.69 for vulnerability to harm of illness, 0.49 for enmeshment/undeveloped self, 0.69 for subjugation, 0.69 for self-sacrifice, 0.71 for emotional inhibition, 0.67 for unrelenting standards, 0.75 for entitlement/grandiosity, and 0.70 for insufficient self-control. | Eysenck personality questionnaire (J-EPQ) and Rutter behavior problems scale was satisfactory. The validity of the YSR was obtained for the boys and girls using Cronbach's alpha (0.89 and 0.94) and using the split -half method (0.84 and 0.87). The subscales of anxious/depressed, withdrawn/ depressed, somatic complaints, social problems, thought problems, attention problems, rule-breaking behavior, aggressive behavior, and general problems had Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient of 0.83, 0.85, 0.78, 0.79, 0.66, 0.78, 0.64, 0.87 and |
0.79, respectively, and split-half reliability | |
coefficients of 0.77, 0.71, 0.68, 0.86, 0.67, 0.87, | |
0.69, 0.86 and 0.83, respectively | |
15 | |
schemas in five domains, including disconnection/ | |
rejection (which includes abandonment/instability, | |
mistrust/abuse, emotional Deprivation, Defective- | |
ness/Shame, Social Isolation/Alienation schemas); |
Single-parent female | two-parent female | |||
adolescent | adolescent | |||
mean | std. deviation | mean | std. deviation | |
age | 16.35 | 0.98 | 16.31 | 0.91 |
emotional deprivation | 12.55 | 6.30 | 13.41 | 5.95 |
abandonment/instability | 15.03 | 7.77 | 15.51 | 7.12 |
mistrust/abuse | 12.68 | 5.95 | 11.17 | 4.68 |
social isolation/alienation | 12.33 | 6.12 | 9.56 | 4.40 |
defectiveness/shame | 10.13 | 5.04 | 9.52 | 4.94 |
failure to achieve | 10.59 | 5.20 | 8.61 | 3.76 |
dependence/incompetence | 10.86 | 4.94 | 8.48 | 3.42 |
vulnerability to harm of illness | 11.65 | 5.64 | 9.60 | 4.17 |
enmeshment/undeveloped self | 12.14 | 5.34 | 10.49 | 3.81 |
subjugation | 13.41 | 6.40 | 10.80 | 3.80 |
self-sacrifice | 18.22 | 5.80 | 16.09 | 3.66 |
emotional inhibition | 13.93 | 7.59 | 12.38 | 5.22 |
effect | Value | F | Hypothesis df | Error df | sig |
Pillai's Trace | 0.29 | 2. 39 ?? | 15.00 | 88.00 | 0.006 |
Willis' Lambda | 0.71 | 2. 39 ?? | 15.00 | 88.00 | 0.006 |
Hoteling's Trace | 0.40 | 2. 39 ?? | 15.00 | 88.00 | 0.006 |
Roy's Largest Root | 0.40 | 2. 39 ?? | 15.00 | 88.00 | 0.006 |
Sum of squares | Df | Mean square | F | sig | |
emotional deprivation | 19.12 | 1 | 19.12 | 0.50 | 0.478 |
abandonment/instability | 5.95 | 1 | 5.95 | 0.10 | 0.744 |
mistrust/abuse | 59.36 | 1 | 59.36 | 2.07 | 0.153 |
social isolation/alienation | 200.32 | 1 | 200.32 | 7.03 | 0.009 |
defectiveness/shame | 9.76 | 1 | 9.76 | 0.39 | 0.533 |
failure to achieve | 101.85 | 1 | 101.85 | 4.93 | 0.029 |
dependence/incompetence | 146.83 | 1 | 146.83 | 8.11 | 0.005 |
vulnerability to harm of illness | 109.12 | 1 | 109.12 | 4.43 | 0.038 |
enmeshment/undeveloped self | 70.94 | 1 | 70.94 | 3.28 | 0.073 |
subjugation | 176.68 | 1 | 176.68 | 6.36 | 0.013 |
self-sacrifice | 118.20 | 1 | 118.20 | 5.02 | 0.027 |
emotional inhibition | 62.65 | 1 | 62.65 | 1.47 | 0.227 |
unrelenting standards hypocriticalness | 34.75 | 1 | 34.75 | 1.15 | 0.285 |
entitlement/grandiosity | 19.63 | 1 | 19.63 | 0.47 | 0.491 |
insufficient self-control self-discipline | 23.96 | 1 | 23.96 | 0.86 | 0.355 |
The results (Table 3) showed that schemas of | 102, P= 0.038), subjugation (F= 6.36; DF= 1, 102, P= | ||||
social isolation/alienation (F= 7.03, DF= 1, 102, P= 0.009), failure (F= 4.93, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.029), dependence/incompetence (F= 8.11; DF= 1, 102; P= | 0.013) and self-sacrifice (F= 5.02, DF= 1, 102; P= 0.02) schemas were higher in single parent female | ||||
0.005), vulnerability to harm or illness (F= 4.43, DF= 1, |
effect | Value | F | Hypothesis df | sig |
Pillai's Trace | 0.12 | 0. 69 ?? | 9.00 | 0.048 |
Willis' Lambda | 0.87 | 0. 69 ?? | 9.00 | 0.048 |
Hoteling's Trace | 0.14 | 0. 69 ?? | 9.00 | 0.048 |
Roy's Largest Root | 0.14 | 0. 69 ?? | 9.00 | 0.048 |
Sum of squares | Df | Mean square | F | sig | |
Anxious/depressed | 180.66 | 1 | 180.66 | 8.30 | 0.005 |
Withdrawn/depressed | 59.11 | 1 | 59.11 | 5.59 | 0.020 |
Somatic complaints | 6.29 | 1 | 6.29 | 0.35 | 0.554 |
Social problems | 65.12 | 1 | 65.12 | 6.66 | 0.011 |
Thought problems | 19.83 | 1 | 19.83 | 1.26 | 0.262 |
Attention problems | 52.11 | 1 | 52.11 | 5.96 | 0.016 |
Rule-breaking behavior | 21.94 | 1 | 21.94 | 2.62 | 0.108 |
Aggressive behavior | 85.47 | 1 | 85.47 | 4.26 | 0.041 |
Other problems | 0.004 | 1 | 0.004 | 0.00 | 0.988 |
Levene's test for equality of variances | t-test for equality of means | ||||
F | sig | T | df | sig | |
Self-esteem Equal variances assumed | 0.03 | 0.84 | -1.10 | 102 | 0.270 |
Equal variances not assumed | -1.10 | 101.94 | 0.270 |
effect | Value | F | Hypothesis df | Error df | sig |
Pillai's Trace | 0.11 | 3. 25 ?? | 4.00 | 99.00 | 0.015 |
Willis' Lambda | 0.88 | 3. 25 ?? | 4.00 | 99.00 | 0.015 |
Hoteling's Trace | 0.13 | 3. 25 ?? | 4.00 | 99.00 | 0.015 |
Roy's Largest Root | 0.13 | 3. 25 ?? | 4.00 | 99.00 | 0.015 |
Sum of squares | Df | Mean square | F | sig | |
public self-esteem | 0.089 | 1 | 0.089 | 0.020 | 0.888 |
family self-esteem | 0.009 | 1 | 0.009 | 0.005 | 0.943 |
social self-esteem | 10.293 | 1 | 10.293 | 12.83 | 0.001 |
education self-esteem | 0.104 | 1 | 0.104 | 0.085 | 0.772 |
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