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Adolescent Violence towards Parents: Maintaining Family Connections When The Going Gets Tough
Author(s) -
Paterson Rosemary,
Luntz Helen,
Perlesz Amaryll,
Cotton Sue
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
australian and new zealand journal of family therapy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.297
H-Index - 19
eISSN - 1467-8438
pISSN - 0814-723X
DOI - 10.1002/j.1467-8438.2002.tb00493.x
Subject(s) - intervention (counseling) , psychology , anxiety , project commissioning , qualitative research , domestic violence , social psychology , qualitative property , clinical psychology , developmental psychology , suicide prevention , publishing , poison control , psychiatry , medicine , sociology , political science , medical emergency , social science , machine learning , computer science , law
This paper explores some of the dilemmas, difficulties and decisions faced by mothers whose adolescent sons or daughters act in violent and abusive ways and refuse any counselling. A group intervention program, designed to assist these mothers in more fully understanding and addressing their adolescent's behaviour, was evaluated using both quantitative and qualitative methods. Self‐report questionnaire data indicated that following the group intervention the mothers reported less violence in their homes, and significantly less personal anxiety and fatigue. However, these women continued to experience high levels of depression, and the reasons for this are discussed. These findings are integrated with information from post‐intervention, in‐depth interviews which indicated that participants valued the group experience because they realised that they were not alone, their problems were understood, and they developed a wider range of strategies to deal with their children's violent behaviour.