Influence of parental messages on the aggressiveness of teenagers
Influence of parental messages on the aggressiveness of teenagers

Summary/Abstract: Aim. The aim of the study is to find what Parental Messages (PM) modern Bulgarian teenagers receive in the process of important social and cultural changes in the post-totalitarian society and which ones are ‘responsible’ for the growing aggression in and outside schools. The Parental Messages are statements made by parents towards the younger generation that are transmitted in the socio-psychic and the sociocultural space as undisputable rules, pieces of wisdom and values, i.e. they form both the content of the Parent Ego state and the sociocultural Parent governing the behaviour and the attitude of the people. Methods. We chose 64 statements commonly known in the Bulgarian sociocultural space were presented to 284 teenagers aged 14-18 to find out what messages the contemporary teenagers receive from their parents. Then we chose 40 of the teenagers and in addition we tested them with the Buss-Durkee inventory. The Parental Messages received by the aggressive and the non-aggressive teenagers were compared. Results. The study found significant differences in the Parental Messages received by the two groups which is a premise for different content of the Parent Ego state and different behavior of the two groups. Conclusions. The results obtained so far lead to the conclusion that the Parental Messages the aggressive adolescents were given from their parents in childhood and continue to be given during adolescence take the form of the content of the Parent Ego state and in this case a Parent who is able to directly realise itself in aggressive behaviour because this is the behaviour which is ‘allowed’ by the parents (mainly by the fathers). Parents teach their children to be aggressive, though they are not likely to fully realise that. Originality. A study with the author’s own methodology (questionnaire about the Parental Messages) was conducted among teenagers and the results were compared to the results from the Buss-Durkey inventory.

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