Parental evaluations and their agreement: Relationship with children's self-concepts

The relationships between parents’ evaluations of their children, and agreement between parental evaluations and children’s self-evaluations in 4 self-concept domains (academic, physical, social and general) were examined in the present study. A sample of 974 families, each consisting of a father, a mother, and a child aged 8-13, were included. Significant correlations were found between parental (especially maternal) evaluations and children’s self-concepts. There was a significant relationship between parent-parent agreement and children’s self-concepts. Children with parents who disagreed tended to have lower self-concepts than those with parents who agreed positively. They tended also to be more influenced by maternal evaluations. Across sex and grade, academic self-concept was the domain in which parental evaluation impact was the greatest.