Late-adolescent females (N = 39) and their parents were studied, relating
the quality of conflict negotiation in the family to their ego development and their
dyadic communication patterns. Family communication was evaluated by the
Constraining and Enabling Coding System (CECS; Hauser et al., 1985) from discussions
in a revealed difference task. Each statement given by a person directed at another
was coded and scores were aggregated. Quality of negotiation for the family as a
unit was assessed from the discussions in molar codings guided by
Stierlin’s (1974) model of individuated relationships and developed for
this study. Ego development was measured by Loevinger’s Washington
University Sentence Completion Test. Analyses showed that the
adolescents’, but not the parents’, ego level predicted family
negotiation scores. The results also suggested that the quality of family
negotiations was enhanced by different patterns of dyadic communication between
adolescent daughters and their parents. Negotiating skill was high when there was
cognitive complementarity between parents and daughters such that the
father was cognitively enabling toward the daughter (and she was not) and the
daughter was cognitively enabling toward the mother (whereas this was not predictive
of the mother), and there was affective symmetry between parents and
daughters (both facilitative). Daughters contributed to negotiation skill in the
family by being more attentive to the mother than to the father. Regression analyses
indicated that affective factors were more predictive of the negotiation climate in
the family than cognitive factors.
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