Longitudinal, reciprocal relationships between family management and antisocial peer associations

Introduction: Poor family management and antisocial peer associations are related risk factors for negative outcomes such as adolescent substance misuse and conduct disorders. The relationship between family management and antisocial peer associations is complex. The purpose of this study was to test the reciprocal relationships between youth-reports of poor family management and antisocial peer associations over multiple time-points. Methods: We used four data points (5th-11th grade) from the Australian arm of the longitudinal International Youth Development Study (IYDS) to test a random-intercepts cross-lagged path model (N = 922). Results: The model fit the data well with path estimates showing that poor family management predicted greater antisocial peer associations at the next wave but not the reverse. A second model included a third autoregressive path to control for youth's own antisocial behavior; the direction of the relationships between poor family management and antisocial peer associations did not change. Conclusions: These results indicate that across adolescence poor family management predicts greater antisocial peer association, which provides evidence that family-focused interventions are an important prevention strategy even in adolescence.