Associations Between Maladaptive Personality Traits and Parenting Styles Among Chinese Adolescents: A Latent Profile and Response Surface Analysis.

Abstract

Background: Maladaptive personality traits are closely associated with psychological pathology. Adolescence represents a critical period in personality development, making it important to identify these traits and their contextual correlates.

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted in November 2025. Participants were adolescents recruited through convenience sampling from five secondary schools in Jiangxi Province, China. A total of 1,027 students completed online questionnaires. Maladaptive personality traits were assessed using the Brief Version of the Dimensional Personality Symptom Item Pool (DIPSI-B), and parenting styles were measured using the Chinese revision of the short-form Egna Minnen av Barndoms Uppfostran (s-EMBU-C). Latent profile analysis was conducted in Mplus 8.3 to identify personality trait configurations, and response surface analysis in SPSS 26.0 and an Excel macro examined the effects of parenting styles and parental (in)congruence.

Results: Five profiles were identified: flexible adaptation, general adaptation, maladaptation with internalizing problems, maladaptation with externalizing problems, and severe maladaptation. Multinomial logistic regression showed that maternal rejection was consistently associated with all maladaptive profiles, whereas paternal rejection was primarily associated with the severe maladaptation profile. Age and gender also showed significant associations with profile membership. Response surface analysis further revealed that congruent high rejection and overprotection were linearly associated with higher maladaptive personality traits, while congruent high emotional warmth was associated with lower trait levels. Discrepancies in emotional warmth and overprotection, regardless of direction, were linked to elevated maladaptive personality traits, whereas discrepancies in rejection were not significant beyond overall rejection levels.

Conclusion: Distinct latent subtypes of maladaptive personality traits exist among adolescents. Parenting styles and parental (in)congruence showed meaningful associations with maladaptive personality traits. These findings highlight adolescent trait heterogeneity and the relevance of both parenting styles and parental (in)congruence when understanding adolescent personality development, and provide implications for targeted prevention and intervention efforts.