Adolescents’ Attitude Toward Their Rights, Perceived Parenting Styles, and Predictors of Their Rights in a South Indian Urban Context

Abstract

Adolescent rights refer to moral or legal entitlements that are reasonable, justifiable, and include provision (care), protection (safety), and participation (self-expression), which can be categorized as nurturance rights and self-determination rights. Studies from the global north have established links between the rights of children/adolescents and parenting practices, with endorsement of self-determination rights. However, with a changing sociocultural landscape, this concept has received little attention in the Indian context. Hence, this preliminary study was conducted with the objectives of exploring adolescents’ attitude toward their rights, their relationship with the perceived parenting style, and identifying the predictors of their overall rights in a South Indian metropolitan city. The sample consisted of 186 adolescents (100 women and 86 men) between 14 and 19 years (median age = 17 years). Modified Child Rights Attitude Questionnaire and Parental Authority Questionnaire – Mother and Father Form were used in the study. The data were analyzed using Wilcoxon’s Test, Kendall’s Tau, and multiple linear regression. The findings indicated that the adolescents expressed a positive attitude toward nurturance rights over self-determination rights. A significant correlation was found between adolescents’ attitude toward overall rights and the perceived parenting styles: fathers’ permissive, authoritarian, and authoritative-flexible parenting styles and mothers’ authoritarian and authoritative-flexible parenting styles. Gender, academic performance, birth order, and time spent with parents emerged as significant predictors of adolescents’ overall attitude toward their rights. The study highlighted the endorsement of nurturance rights by adolescent participants which has potential implications for understanding the rights of adolescents in the contexts of self and family, autonomy, education, and the need for awareness and acknowledgment of rights.