Adolescent Adjustment During COVID-19: The Role of Close Relationships and COVID-19-related Stress

• Main Authors: Campione-Barr, N. (Author), Killoren, S.E (Author), Rose, A.J (Author), Rote, W. (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: John Wiley and Sons Inc 2021
• Subjects: adolescent; Adolescent; adult; Adult; child; Child; COVID-19; female; Female; friend; Friends; human; Humans; pandemic; Pandemics; SARS-CoV-2; sibling; Siblings; young adult; Young Adult
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher

 During the COVID-19 pandemic, adolescents’ typical social support systems have been disrupted. The present study examined adolescent adjustment during the pandemic (summer, 2020) while controlling for pre-pandemic adjustment (2017–2018) in 170 youth (ages 12–20) from Missouri and Florida. We also examined whether positive and negative relationship qualities with four close others (i.e., mothers, fathers, siblings, and best friends) interacted with COVID-related stress to impact adolescent adjustment. In general, we found that close relationships impacted adolescent adjustment in expected directions (i.e., positive relationships better for adjustment, negative relationships more detrimental), but while mothers and fathers impacted adolescent adjustment in largely similar ways to pre-pandemic studies, influences of relationships with best friends and sibling were more impacted by COVID-related stress. © 2021 Society for Research on Adolescence.