Abstract
Parenting behaviors, including autonomy support and psychological control, have been shown to significantly influence adolescent non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI). However, the underlying mechanisms linking heterogeneous parenting behavior profiles to adolescent NSSI remain unclear. This two-wave longitudinal study (with a one-year interval) of 742 Chinese adolescents (52.7% girls; Mage at Time 1 = 13.40 years) identified four distinct parenting profiles using latent profile analysis (LPA): Supportive (43.6% of the sample), Controlling (17.4%), Moderate Mixed Parenting (33.1%) and High Mixed Parenting (5.9%). Multicategorical serial mediation analysis revealed that adolescent emotion regulation difficulties and depressive symptoms serially mediated the relationship between parenting profiles and NSSI for adolescents in the Controlling, Moderate Mixed Parenting and High Mixed Parenting Profiles. Notably, these mediating effects were significant only for girls. These findings underscore the importance of adopting person-centered and sex-sensitive intervention strategies to mitigate the adverse effects of detrimental parenting behaviors on adolescent NSSI.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Child Psychiatry and Human Development |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 19 Jan 2026 |
Bibliographical note
We wish to thank for the assistance of schools and students who participated in this study.Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2026.
Funding
Open Access Publishing Support Fund provided by Lingnan University. This work was supported by the National Education Science Planning Project of China [grant numbers: CBA210235].
Keywords
- Depressive symptoms
- Emotion regulation difficulties
- Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI)
- Parenting behavior profiles
- Sex differences
