Anxiety experienced by teenagers: potential influences of parental education and gender differences

The present study represents an analysis of the anxiety experienced during adolescence. Anxiety in this case is reported towards two factors, namely educational practices applied by the parental couple in the form of operational conditioning differences and gender differences regarding the prevalence of anxious states present among boys compared to girls. The study is based on the premise that potential contradictions in applying operational conditioning in the parental couple, respectively when one of the parents approves and the other punishes the same behavior of the child may impact not only the parent - child relationship but also the anxiety during adolescence, as the teenager finds it difficult to assess what to expect as a consequence of one's own behavior. Also gender differences were analyzed considering the reach body of literature supporting the idea that females are more prone to anxiety compared to males. Our results indicate that there is an effect of contradictions present in parental educational practices and the presence of anxiety during adolescence. No statistically significant difference was found between female and male participants to the study. Further considerations are offered for future investigations on the subject.