ABSTRACT
Adolescent-parental conflict is a common phenomenon in many families in the society today. Hence, this study investigated the influence of adolescent-parental conflict on the academic achievement of secondary school students in Delta State using a correlational survey design. Four research questions and four hypotheses were formulated. Through purposive random sampling, Delta Central Senatorial district and its two education zones (Ughelli and Sapele) were sampled out of the three senatorial districts in Delta State. By stratified random sampling, a total of 800 SSI students (400 male and female adolescents each) from 20 out of 381 secondary schools in Delta State were selected for the study. The 800 adolescents used were further stratified into; 200 males and females each with high parental conflict and another 200 males and females each without parental conflict. The total number of respondents therefore was 800 adolescents out of 2,880 SSI students in Delta State with equal number of parents. Structured and validated questionnaire was used in collection of data from both adolescents and parents. SSI promotion examination scores in Mathematics and English Language of the students concerned were collected and used to answer research questions two and three. Adopted for testing, the null hypotheses 1 and 4 was Karl Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation Coefficient. Null hypotheses 2 and 3 were tested using the Wilcoxon rank test and Man-Whitney tests. All the test statistics were subjected to the conventional 5% level of significance. The Mathematics and English Language scores of male and female students with high conflict were correlated. Also, scores of adolescents with and without parental conflicts were also correlated. The results showed that male adolescents having high conflict with their parents performed poorer than their female counterparts. Also, adolescents with high conflicts with their parents performed poorer than their counterparts without conflict. Based on these findings, recommendations were made.
CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
Background of the Study
The relationship between parents and adolescents is in most cases not as cordial as when the adolescents were much younger. More often, there are conflicts between parents and their adolescents at the adolescence stage. The adolescent’s loyalty begins to dwindle at this stage; he starts questioning the parent’s authority and flounces their instructions. The parents on the other hand are anxious about this change in behaviour and the possibility of the adolescent growing up into a responsible individual in future. This anxiety causes them to try to force the adolescent into doing what they (the parents) feel the adolescent should or should not do, and clash with him. This is the root of the conflict.
Adolescence is a developmental stage beginning at the onset of puberty and ending at the beginning of adulthood (Lehey in Nwakaibie, 2006). While an adolescent is the individual at this developmental stage (11-18 years). It will also be necessary at this stage to briefly explain why the adolescent behaves the way he does. At the onset of puberty the endocrine system of the human body becomes very active. The pituitary gland (master gland) at the base of the brain begins to secrete hormones into the blood stream. By the action of these hormones, the body “shoots up” in height and secondary sexual characters begin to develop. These developments trigger off biological, physical, emotional, mental, physiological, sociological and psychological changes (Egbule and Ugoji, 2004).
Even though the adolescent is a unified whole (single entity), these developments go on concurrently in the body yet at different rates; the physical development might be faster than the mental or sociological developments. For these reasons, the adolescent might be clumsy sometimes (Eke, 2004). With the development of the secondary sexual characters, the adolescent begins to experience sexual pressure from the inside and sexual harassment from the outside. These and other factors affect the adolescent’s behaviour negatively generally towards his parents specifically. Adolescents are of three (3) stages: early, mid and late adolescence. The senior secondary is the mid adolescence stage and these developmental changes are more pronounced here. Hence, this research is making use of the senior secondary adolescents.
A parent can be defined as an adult who has reproduced a child(ren), who is a father or a mother. While parenting refers to an act of being a father or a mother or bringing up a child(ren). For this research, a parent includes any adult living with or bringing up an adolescent as a biological; step; by adoption or a guardian of an adolescent(s). Different parents adopt different parenting styles, some of which are: authoritative, Authoritarian, Negligence and over protective parenting styles. The parenting style under which a child grows up, good or bad has a serious effect on the development of the adolescent. The relationship with the parents (cordial or conflict), the cognitive development and his academic achievement all depend on the upbringing right from childhood.
Conflict is defined as disagreement between two or more persons as a result of unexpected behaviour, change in attitude or denial of right over an issue (Mogbo, 2002). Conflict between parents and adolescents at this stage could be as a result of chain reaction. Change in attitude of the adolescent as a result of the developmental stage could trigger off force, excessive control and denial of rights by parents. When adolescent’s needs are not met he clashes with anybody or anything that comes his way.
Communication barrier or improper communication is another important reason for conflict. When adolescents are not given reasons why they should or should not do anything, they feel unnecessarily restricted. They become angry and may even revolt against their parents. (Winex and Anderson, 1987).
Academic achievement is the ability of students to learn in school, attain a particular level, which may serve as a stepping stone to another level. At this level of the adolescent in the secondary school, it is a stepping stone to a higher education and a vocational choice making. It is the foundation for their future career and anything that is likely to threaten their success is worth investigating.
Academic achievement is greatly influenced by the cognitive development and the learning environment of an individual (Onyechi and Okere, 2007). These factors are traceable to the home background, which has to do with the parenting style of the parents right from childhood. When proper parenting style is adopted by the family, the state of psychological moratorium is avoided. Psychological moratorium is a state of contradictory experience (Erikson, 1965). It is a state of confusion, when parents sometimes see the growth of the adolescent and regard him as an adult and yet he is not fully accepted into adult life. It leaves the adolescent with confusion as to whether he is still a child or now an adult and this results in conflict. When moratorium is avoided by proper child upbringing, the adolescent develops his self identity on time. This influences the adolescent’s recognition of his qualities and abilities (Chubuko, 2006). It does not only minimize conflict, but also has positive influences on academic achievements.
Conflict is a disagreement between two or more persons, it is generally disturbing to all those involved. Adolescent-parental conflict coupled with the developmental stage is stressful to the adolescent. He needs help and support, and since the parents are not in the position to render this help because of the conflict, the adolescent seeks counsel from the peer group. This is the foundation for maladjustment (Forehand et al, 1991), it is an opportunity to copy bad behaviours and wrong attitudes to life. If this maladjustment is not properly handled, it is capable of affecting the progress of the adolescent. Children from homes with marital conflict generally have poor academic achievement when the conflict affects the parent-child relationship. The reverse is the case when parent-child relationship is not affected (Miliotis Sesma and Masten, 1997). This suggests that parent-child relationship is important for proper adjustment of the child in school. Parents are also stressed and unhappy when relationship, with their children is not cordial. The level of adolescent-parental conflict and its influence vary from individual to individual, from family to family and from one society to another. In some cases, it is more between fathers and sons in other cases between mothers and daughters and vice versa. Adolescent parental conflict in some families are relatively infrequent short-lived and mild in intensity. While in some other families or societies, it is so severe that they may need the help of a counsellor (Allison, 2000).
Conflict could reach deep into an individual’s psychological being and threaten his self-image or self-esteem. In such situation, the individual could do anything, including violence, to protect the self-image. Delta State, the geographical area of this study, is part of Niger-Delta where there has been serious conflict between government and youths. This conflict has taken many lives. If youths are taught early how to handle conflicts from adolescence stage through counseling, violence will be avoided at this stage. It will therefore be necessary to look into conflict resolution so as to avoid more youths graduating from adolescent-parental conflict to youth/societal conflict. If there is any relationship between adolescent-parental conflict and academic achievement, its influence will also be minimized.
Conflict resolution is a process of resolving a disagreement between two or more persons. The resolution of the adolescent-parental conflict is very necessary as it will help bring peace to the individuals involved, the family and society at large. This will also help parents provide needed help academically and otherwise for their adolescents. This conflict resolution could be done by counsellors through persuasion and dialogue on both parties. To do this, the input of the parents and the adolescents who are directly involved in the conflict will be helpful in minimizing the conflict, hence the research is necessary.
Furthermore, it was also necessary to investigate the causes of adolescent-parental conflict and its influence on academic achievement of adolescents in Delta State. This will help to get both parents and adolescents to understand the significance of this problem, the strategies, the willingness and the benefits of resolving the problem. This was the crux of this study.
Statement of the Problem
At this stressful developmental stage of the adolescent, he has numerous problems to cope with and many questions to ask about himself, his changing environment and his career. This is also the period of working hard, making vocational choice suitable both for his ability and interest, if he must experience job satisfaction in future. The adolescent needs the guardian of the parents now more than ever, which the adolescent-parental conflict does not permit. If this support and counsel from the parents are not there, the adolescent then turns to his peer group for counsel. Both the peer group counsel and the adolescent’s personal vocational decision without the parents’ input might be difficult and detrimental to the adolescent’s future career.
Also, the youths involved in the conflict in Niger-Delta, part of which is the geographical area of this study are mainly males and school drop outs. This youth-governmental conflict that looks like an aggravated problem from home (adolescent-parental conflict) has taken many lives of important personalities within and outside this country. The fact that many of these Niger-Delta militants could not complete their education, gives the researcher a sense of concern about the academic achievement of these adolescents in conflict with their parents. The question is if the conflict at home is responsible for their dropping out of school, then it is bad enough, but why only males? Are females not affected by the conflict? Coupled with the researchers concern, Crosnoe and Elder (2004) have shown that poor adolescent-parental relationship remains a significant risk factor for academic difficulties. The researcher wants to confirm whether findings in Delta State will be similar to that of Crosnoe and Elder. It is on this background that this study asks: what is the degree of influence of the conflict between parents and adolescents on academic achievement of the adolescent in Delta State?
