Impact of Parental Involvement and Gender on Self-esteem and Emotional Abuse among Adolescents

The purpose of the current study was to compare and examine the impact of the level of parental involvement and gender on self-esteem and emotional abuse among adolescents. The study was conducted on a sample of 600 adolescents (300 males and 300 females) aged between 15 to 18 years, selected by using random sampling from various private schools. The questionnaire on parental involvement, self-esteem, and emotional abuse was used. With the help of a two-way ANOVA, in case of self-esteem, parental involvement has significant effects (F=5.750, p=.000) whereas gender has no significant effect (F=0.723, p=.395). The interaction between parental involvement and gender was not significant (F=1.333, p=.256), suggesting that parental involvement had no impact on self-esteem. Now, when it comes to emotional abuse, there was significant effect of parental involvement (F=9.370, p=.000) and gender (F=15.958, p=.000). The interaction between parental involvement and gender was not significant (F=1.804, p=.126). Adolescents with very high parental involvement showed the lowest emotional abuse (females = 83.7647; males = 85.5217) and higher self-esteem (females = 89.5588; males = 94.1739), whereas those with very low parental involvement showed the highest emotional abuse (females = 99.5938; males = 114.8750) and low self-esteem (females = 82.4125). This suggests that higher parental involvement is linked to lower Emotional abuse and higher Self-esteem. The study contributes to understanding the protective effects of parental involvement on adolescent emotional well-being, suggesting that supportive parenting can reduce emotional abuse and promote self-esteem, which helps to increase confidence and emotional resilience, decision-making and overall well-being of adolescents.