Explaining the negative association between overparenting and parent-child relationship satisfaction: communication and attachment perspectives

Abstract

Research shows that overparented emerging adults experience low satisfaction with parents and the family. To investigate why overparenting relates to low parent-child relationship satisfaction, this study used the three-form design, a planned missing data design, and collected cross-sectional data from U.S. (n = 282) and Chinese emerging adults (n = 281). Structural equation modeling was used to examine the hypotheses. Results show that U.S. and Chinese parents engaged in comparable levels of overparenting, and parent-child communication and attachment anxiety explained why overparented emerging adults experienced low satisfaction in both cultures. The findings indicate that overparenting might be a cross-cultural phenomenon. Moreover, engaging in open and problem-free family communication has positive implications for promoting relational health during emerging adulthood.

In the past 15 years, overparenting, or helicopter parenting (the colloquial term for overparenting), has received increased attention from scholars across a range of academic disciplines (e.g., LeMoyne & Buchanan 2011; Leung et al., 2021; Padilla-Walker & Nelson, 2012). Overparenting is a distinct form of parenting that features a constellation of parenting behaviors that are intrusive and controlling during the offspring’s late adolescence and emerging adulthood (Cui et al., 2022; Padilla-Walker & Nelson, 2012; Segrin et al., 2012). In particular, these parenting behaviors include getting overly involved into the child’s life, taking excessive responsibilities for the child’s success and happiness, anticipating and solving problems for the child, intervening in the child’s close relationships, and so on, all of which are developmentally inappropriate during the offspring’s late adolescence and emerging adulthood (e.g., Rousseau & Scharf, 2018; Schiffrin et al., 2019; Segrin et al., 2012). As to why parents engage in overparenting, research shows that parental anxiety and regrets might be a major driver for overparenting in that parents may choose to hover over their children as a way to handle their own anxiety and regrets in various domains (e.g., education, career, family) (e.g., Gagnon, 2019; Segrin et al., 2013). Parents’ overinvolvement may also occur in conjunction with financial investments in their child, such as costs for educational purposes (Lowe et al., 2015). Besides, parents may also engage in overparenting due to their perfectionism mindset (Segrin et al., 2020) or their belief that failure is detrimental (Schiffrin et al., 2019). Similarly, they may get overinvolved if they have a prevention focus for the future, that is, being more concerned with losses over gains and thereafter avoiding losses and failure (Rousseau & Scharf, 2018).

Although overparenting may be motivated by benevolent intentions to ensure the child’s well-being and a small number of studies found positive or no effects of overparenting on child outcomes (e.g., Padilla-Walker & Nelson, 2012; Padilla-Walker et al., 2021), a much more predominant theme of the overparenting scholarship has shown a large variety of negative consequences among the offspring, such as undesirable personality and psychological traits (e.g., entitlement and narcissism; Segrin et al., 2012), inadequate competencies (e.g., lack of self-control; Cui, Allen et al., 2019), relationship problems (e.g., insecure attachment toward parents and romantic partners; Jiao & Segrin, 2022), and internalizing (e.g., anxiety and depression; Cui, Darling et al., 2019) and externalizing problems (e.g., substance use; Cook, 2020). Among the many undesirable consequences, perhaps what appears most ironic is that overparented offspring report lower relationship satisfaction with parents than those who are less overparented (e.g., Hesse et al., 2018). In other words, overzealous parenting desires and actions might harm parents’ relationships with their children. This phenomenon indeed adequately reveals the developmentally inappropriate nature of overparenting that even though these parents are putting additional or excessive efforts into their parenting practices, it works reversely that their children are not thinking positively about their unsolicited involvement. In a recent systematic review, Cui et al. (2022) observed that overparenting is negatively associated with the development of emerging adults in various domains (e.g., psychological, behavioral, social, academic, career), and that self-determination theory is the most commonly used theory to explain this association. In particular, overparenting frustrates emerging adults’ needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness, which in turn may negatively affect their development in various domains. Consistent with this approach, it may also be possible that overparented emerging adults are less satisfied with their parents because parental overinvolvement makes them feel as having restricted autonomy and being less capable in completing tasks and resolving problems. Notwithstanding that speculation, there is presently a significant gap in the research literature in that the exact mechanisms by which overparenting may corrode parent–child relationships are not well-understood. Accordingly, to further investigate why overparented offspring have relatively low satisfaction with parents, four potential mechanisms through which overparenting relates to low satisfaction were tested in the present study: parent–child communication, attachment anxiety, attachment avoidance, and relational closeness. Moreover, although a few scholars have studied overparenting outside the United States context (Cui, Janhonen-Abruquah et al., 2019; Jung et al., 2019; Leung et al., 2021; Segrin et al., 2022), the vast majority of overparenting research relied on American samples. Thus, taking a cross-cultural approach, the present study collected data from two cultures (i.e., China and the United States) to test the mediators.

Overparenting and parent-emerging adult child relationships

Emerging adulthood is a transitional period where individuals transition from adolescence to adulthood (Arnett, 2000). During this life stage, high-quality and satisfying relationships, including parent–child relationships, have positive implications for navigating challenges and smoothing the transition to adulthood (Lindell et al., 2017; Padilla-Walker et al., 2017). Moreover, parenting practices affect the extent to which the child is satisfied with the parent, family, and overall life (e.g., Augustijn et al., 2022; Petito & Cummins, 2000). For example, although a positive association was observed between parental support and relationship satisfaction when parental support is not excessive, emerging adults report low parent–child relationship satisfaction when they receive extremely high levels of support from parents (Wang, 2019).

With regard to overparenting, overparented emerging adults receive excessive levels of attention and affection from parents (Hesse et al., 2018). Meanwhile, they express lower levels of preference for parental overinvolvement (Darlow et al., 2017) and experience more problems with parents (Segrin et al., 2015). Further, they do not have a secure and positive relationship with parents (Jiao & Segrin, 2022). Consequently, overparented emerging adults tend to report lower satisfaction with parents, the family, and their overall life (Cui, Janhonen-Abruquah et al., 2019; Hesse et al., 2018; Segrin et al., 2012). Given the robust associations observed between overparenting and the aforementioned undesirable consequences among the offspring, the first hypothesis was advanced:

H1: Overparenting is negatively associated with parent–child relationship satisfaction.

Parent–child communication, attachment, and closeness

Among other plausible mechanisms, parent–child communication, attachment, and closeness might explain why overparented emerging adults experience relatively low satisfaction with parents. As a relational and interactive construct, parenting is naturally connected to how parents communicate with their child (Bornstein, 2012). For example, authoritative parents tend to engage in open communication with their child, while authoritarian parents value conformity in family interactions (Givertz & Segrin, 2014; Odenweller et al, 2014). Further, positive and healthy family communication can help improve parent–child relationships. For example, conversation-oriented family interactions and relational maintenance behaviors (e.g., openness, positivity) contribute to high levels of parent–child relationship satisfaction (Aloia, 2020; Schrodt et al., 2008; Zhang, 2007). During transition life stages, such as emerging adulthood, open and effective family communication facilitates the renegotiation of family relations to satisfy the developmental needs of members (Barnes & Olson, 1982; Olson et al., 2019).

Overparenting tends to occur in the context of frequent but poor family communication (e.g., Kelly et al., 2017; Segrin et al., 2012). In overparenting families, communication is less open and more problematic (Segrin et al., 2012) and emphasizes obedience and hierarchy (Odenweller et al, 2014), and family members are critical toward one another (Segrin et al., 2015). Moreover, these attendant undesirable communication habits are associated with low satisfaction with the family among overparented emerging adults (Segrin et al., 2012). Thus, it appears plausible that parent–child communication is one mechanism through which overparenting relates to low satisfaction. The second hypothesis was therefore advanced:

H2: Overparenting is negatively associated with parent–child relationship satisfaction through low-quality parent–child communication.

The offspring’s attachment toward their parents could also explain why overparented emerging adults experience low relationship satisfaction. Individuals’ attachment characteristics can be described along two dimensions, namely attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance (Brennan et al., 1998). Attachment anxiety concerns to what extent individuals worry about the availability and responsiveness of their attachment figures (Fraley & Shaver, 2000). Attachment avoidance represents whether or not individuals approach their attachment figures when their need for emotional bonding is salient (Fraley & Shaver, 2000). Both attachment anxiety and avoidance indicate attachment insecurity (Brennan et al., 1998).

One of the core ideas of attachment theory is that parenting practices affect how the offspring perceive, evaluate, and regulate close relationships throughout the lifespan (Ainsworth, 1989; Bowlby, 1973). In Koehn and Kerns’ (2018) meta-analysis, they reported that responsive and autonomy-supportive parenting contributes to the offspring’s attachment security. Moreover, the offspring’s attachment security toward parents tends to facilitate high-quality parent–child relationships during emerging adulthood (Chopik et al., 2021; Fraley & Davis, 1997; La Valley & Guerrero, 2012). However, previous research has found that overparenting is associated with emerging adults’ attachment anxiety and avoidance toward their parents (Jiao & Segrin, 2022). This finding may appear contradictory to the propositions from attachment theory which posits that for infants and young children, they tend to develop attachment anxiety if their parents are inconsistently responsive and develop attachment avoidance if their parents are rejecting (Ainsworth et al., 1978). However, overparenting features the opposite of those parenting practices in that overparenting parents are excessively involved in their child’s life. Nevertheless, these two seemingly contradictory parental sources of attachment insecurity (i.e., parents being inconsistently responsive or neglecting and parents being overly involved) at different life stages of the offspring may indicate the developmental nature of parenting and child needs that what fosters the offspring’s attachment security might not be static, instead, it may vary as a function of the developmental needs of the child. In particular, during infancy and early childhood, if parents could satisfy the child’s needs for proximity and consistent care, the offspring may tend to become more securely attached to the parent. However, during late adolescence and emerging adulthood where individuals desire more autonomy and independence, parenting practices that satisfy these needs may better facilitate the offspring’s attachment security toward parents. Nevertheless, results from a recent dyadic study indicate that overparenting parents are not being responsive to their emerging adult children’s developmental needs and traits on autonomy (Jiao et al., 2024). Therefore, the following hypotheses were advanced:

H3: Overparenting is negatively associated with parent–child relationship satisfaction through emerging adult children’s attachment anxiety toward their parents.

H4: Overparenting is negatively associated with parent–child relationship satisfaction through emerging adult children’s attachment avoidance toward their parents.

Parent–child relational closeness might also mediate the negative association between overparenting and relational satisfaction. Relational closeness can be defined as to what extent individuals feel connected toward one another within the relationship (Aron et al., 1992). Parent–child relational closeness thus refers to how connected or close parents and children feel toward one another (Laursen & Collins, 2009). Research shows that parenting affects parent–child closeness. For example, authoritative parenting is found to positively relate to parent–child closeness (Rowen & Emery, 2019). Moreover, parent–child closeness tends to contribute to satisfying parent–child relationships (Hesse et al., 2018; Miller-Ott et al., 2014).

Aligning with the overall theme of the overparenting literature that connects it to negative consequences among emerging adults, Hesse et al. (2018) hypothesized that overparenting negatively relates to parent–child closeness. However, their data showed that under high levels of parent–child affection, overparenting positively relates to parent–child closeness. Considering the merit of replication (Zwaan et al., 2018) and that their finding contradicts the larger theme of the overparenting literature, we sought to re-examine the relationship between overparenting and parent–child closeness. Further, to examine if closeness explains the low satisfaction of overparented emerging adults, the following hypothesis was advanced:

H5: Overparenting is negatively associated with parent–child relationship satisfaction through low parent–child relational closeness.

Cultural (in)variations in parenting and its attendant outcomes

Parenting and its attendant consequences might vary as a function of the beliefs and behaviors associated with diverse cultural groups (Bornstein, 2012). As a result, parents from different cultures might engage in distinct parenting practices, and the offspring might interpret and be influenced by the same parenting practice in different ways. For example, compared to American parents, Chinese parents are found to be more controlling and less autonomy-granting (e.g., Chao & Tseng, 2002). Moreover, although authoritarian parenting tends to relate to negative child outcomes in North American cultures, it is found to relate to positive outcomes among Chinese children (e.g., better academic performance; Leung et al., 1998). It is argued that the differential impact of authoritarian parenting might be caused by traditional Chinese culture that values family connectedness and harmony (Markus & Kitayama, 1991) so that children associate parental demandingness with care and love as opposed to violating the self (Chao, 1994; Tobin et al., 1989).

According to Arnett’s theory of broad and narrow socialization, there are fundamental cultural differences in the goals of child socialization that dramatically influence parenting behaviors (Arnett, 1995). Broad socialization occurs in cultures that value individualism and self-expression. Narrow socialization occurs in cultures that value obedience and conformity to cultural norms and expectations. Incidentally, Arnett (1995) notes that attachment to others makes the force of broad and narrow cultural expectations stronger. On this point, many of the assumptions of attachment theory (e.g., excessively close parenting may have deleterious effects on child development) are grounded in Western, or as Arnett (1995) would label them—broad socialization—assumptions (Rothbaum et al., 2002). Because of differing cultural value systems, Rothbaum et al. (2002) argues that Asian parents “are expected to form extremely close, even symbiotic relations with their children; they value behavior that, by US standards, is overinvolved, intrusive, and overindulgent of dependency needs” (p. 341).

Cultures, such as China, Japan, and South Korea are generally understood as collectivist, and follow Arnett’s narrow approach to socialization. The U.S. and other Western and European cultures, by contrast, follow a broad approach to socialization in which autonomy, self-construal, and separation from others are prioritized. According to this theory, what might be competent broad socialization of children in Western cultures, would not be seen as competent and would not produce favorable child outcomes in Asian countries in which narrow socialization is prescribed by values of relatedness, obedience, loyalty, and belonging (Erdem & Safi, 2018). Overparenting or helicopter parenting may reflect a more narrow approach to child socialization and therefore be more acceptable and even culturally prescribed in collectivist Asian cultures.

Meanwhile, despite cultural variations in beliefs and behaviors, many parenting practices and their attendant outcomes might be similar across cultures (Bornstein, 2012). For example, it appears a universal phenomenon that nearly all parents strive to rear healthy and happy children, and some psychological needs are so fundamental as to apply to all children (Bornstein, 2012). In particular, self-determination theory argues that satisfying fundamental psychological needs (i.e., needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness) facilitates human well-being and flourishing across cultures (Deci & Ryan, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2017). Thus, despite cultural variations in the extent to which independence and connectedness are emphasized, the harmful effects to well-being that result from thwarting fundamental needs may indeed be universal (Chen et al., 2015). For example, autonomy-supportive parenting is positively associated with enhanced psychological well-being among the offspring in both Chinese and American samples (e.g., Cheung et al., 2016; Wang et al., 2007). In contrast, controlling parenting has a reciprocal and negative association with children’s emotional and behavioral adjustment over time in both cultures (Xiong et al., 2022).

Thus, considering cultural (in)variations in parenting and its attendant outcomes, the present study sought to collect data from emerging adults in two countries, the United States, a prototypical culture that emphasizes individualism and independence (broad socialization), and China, a prototypical culture that emphasizes collectivism and connectedness (narrow socialization), and examine the aforementioned hypotheses in these two cultures.

Method

Participants and procedure

Data included in this study were part of a larger project investigating parent–child relationships during emerging adulthood in the U.S. and China. Upon IRB approval, U.S. participants (n = 282) were recruited from Communication courses at a large public university (with over 40,000 undergraduate enrollment) in the Southwest U.S. in exchange of course credit. Chinese participants (n = 281) were recruited from Journalism and Communication courses at a large public university (with over 10,000 undergraduate enrollment) in Beijing, China, and each participant was compensated with the equivalent of $1.50 cash and was entered into a drawing for five $15.00 cash bonuses. Both universities are located in the urban area of the country, and the data were collected in the years of 2019–2021. Table 1 shows the demographic characteristics of the participants.

Table 1 Demographic Characteristics of U.S. and Chinese Participants.

In the larger cross-cultural project, both U.S. and Chinese participants completed an online questionnaire in English. To reduce participant burden, the larger project used the three-form design (Graham et al., 1996; 2006), a planned missing data design, where three forms of the questionnaire were created, and each participant completed one of the three forms (see Table 2). In this design, items were separated into four blocks, X, A, B, and C, and each form included the common X block and two of the other three blocks. The three-form design has proven a useful method to reduce participant burden and increase data quality (e.g., Little & Rhemtulla, 2013).

Table 2 Three-Form Design.

In the present study, the items associated with the central construct (i.e., overparenting) and demographic questions were included in block X as recommended (Graham et al., 2006; Rhemtulla et al., 2016), the parent–child communication and satisfaction items were included in block A, and the attachment and closeness items were included in block C. No items from block B were included in the present study.

Measures

Overparenting

The 10-item Consolidated Helicopter Parenting Scale (Schiffrin et al., 2019; α = 90 for both U.S. and Chinese samples; e.g., “My parents are too controlling of me and my life”) was used to assess overparenting. Participants indicated their level of dis/agreement with the items on a 7-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). A higher score on each item indicates a greater level of overparenting.

Parent–child relationship satisfaction

Five semantic differential items on a 7-point scale (i.e., dissatisfying-satisfying, disappointing-fulfilling, negative-positive, punishing-rewarding, and bad-good; Beatty & Dobos, 1992; α = 0.97 for both U.S. and Chinese samples) were used to assess the extent to which participants were dis/satisfied with their relationship with parents. A higher score on each item indicates a higher level of satisfaction.

Parent–child communication

The 20-item Parent-Adolescent Communication Scale (Barnes & Olson, 1982; α = 0.92 for U.S. and α = 0.87 for Chinese samples; e.g., “I find it easy to discuss problems with my parents”) was used to assess the extent to which parents and children engage in open and problem-free family communication. Participants indicated their level of dis/agreement with the items on a 7-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). After reversing scores for applicable items, a higher score on each item indicates more open and problem-free parent–child communication.

Child attachment toward parent

The nine-item Experiences in Close Relationships-Relationship Structures Questionnaire (Fraley et al., 2011) was used to assess emerging adult participants’ attachment anxiety (α = 0.87 for U.S. and α = 0.75 for Chinese samples; e.g., “I often worry that my parents don’t really care for me”) and avoidance (α = 0.86 for U.S. and α = 0.79 for Chinese samples; e.g., “I don’t feel comfortable opening up to my parents”) toward their parents. Participants indicated their level of dis/agreement with the items on a 7-point scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). After reversing scores for applicable items, a higher score on each item indicates greater attachment anxiety or avoidance.

Relational closeness

The single-item pictorial Inclusion of Other in the Self scale (Aron et al., 1992) was used to assess parent–child relational closeness. Participants were presented with seven numbered pictures of two circles (i.e., one circle indicates the self and the other indicates their parents), varying in the degree of integration of the two circles, ranging from complete separation to almost overlapping. A higher level of overlapping indicates greater closeness.

Results

Descriptive statistics

The free statistical software R 4.0.3 (R Core Team, 2022) and the lavaan package (Rosseel, 2012) were used to evaluate the measurement and structural models with maximum likelihood estimation. Multiple imputation was used to handle data missingness resulted from the three-form design (e.g., Little & Rhemtulla, 2013), and the mice package (van Buuren & Groothuis-Oudshoorn, 2011) was used to impute 20 datasets. To enhance imputation accuracy, the imputations were conducted with respect to the full data set of the larger project as opposed to being constrained to only the variables included in the current study. Rubin’s (1987) multiple imputation rules were used to pool parameter estimates from the 20 imputed datasets, and to calculate degrees of freedom for each parameter’s t test and confidence interval (CI). With the degrees of freedom in the unconstrained model (df = 206) and power of 0.80, a sample size of n = 83 would be required for the test of close fit and n = 118 for the test of not-close fit (MacCallum et al., 1996). With the degrees of freedom in the constrained model (df = 218) and power of 0.80, a sample size of n = 80 would be required for the test of close fit and n = 115 for the test of not-close fit (MacCallum et al., 1996). The actual sample size (n = 563) exceeds all of these minimum Ns for adequate power and meets the requirement for using the three-form design (Enders, 2010; Jia et al., 2014).

Table 3 shows the means, standard deviations, and independent samples t-test results of the observed variables for U.S. and Chinese participants. On average, compared to Chinese participants, U.S. participants reported more open and less problematic parent–child communication, were more securely attached to their parents (i.e., lower levels of attachment anxiety and avoidance), and felt closer and more satisfied with their parents. The two samples did not differ on overparenting.

Table 3 Descriptive and Comparison Statistics for Observed Variables.

Measurement model

Prior to testing the mediation model, a measurement model with five latent variables (i.e., overparenting, parent–child communication, attachment anxiety, attachment avoidance, and relational satisfaction) was evaluated for its fit to the data with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). To reduce the potential for error caused by over-identification of the latent variables, three parcels were created to represent each of the latent variables as recommended by Little et al. (2013). In particular, the three parcels for each variable were created based on the rule of balancing (i.e., items distributed evenly across the parcels as a function of the strength of their factor loadings; Little, 2013). In this CFA model, the scales for the five latent variables were set by constraining their latent variances to 1.0 and means to 0.0 (Brown, 2006). All factor loadings were freely estimated. Multiple indices were used to assess model fit, including χ²/df < 5.0, comparative fit index (CFI) > 0.95, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) < 0.06, and standardized root-mean-square residual (SRMR) < .08 as recommended by West et al. (2012). Table 4 shows the bivariate correlations between the five latent variables and one manifest variable (i.e., closeness).

Table 4 Bivariate Correlations Between Study Variables.

To evaluate the fit of the measurement model and the statistical comparability of the model across the two samples, a series of single-group and nested multiple-group CFA models was examined. In particular, the measurement model was first examined separately for the U.S. and Chinese samples. The results showed that both models fitted the data adequately (see the baseline models on the top of Table 5). Next, the factorial invariance of the measurement model across the two samples was examined. As showed at the bottom of Table 5, configural invariance (i.e., equivalence of factor structures) was supported given the adequate fit of the configural model. Metric (i.e., equivalence of factor loadings) and scalar invariance (i.e., equivalence of factor loadings and item intercepts) was also supported given the changes in CFI between adjacent models (i.e., subtracting the CFI of the less constrained model from that of the more constrained model) were both greater than -0.01 (Cheung & Rensvold, 2002). Thus, the measurement models with five latent variables were equivalent between the U.S. and Chinese samples.

Table 5 Multigroup CFA Results across Countries.

Parallel mediation model

Upon establishing factorial invariance of the measurement model, a parallel mediation model was evaluated for its fit to the data, specifying the effects from overparenting on parent–child relationship satisfaction through four mediators: parent–child communication, attachment anxiety, attachment avoidance, and relational closeness (see Fig. 1). This structural model initially included five covariates (i.e., age, gender [female = 0, non-female = 1], school year [first year = 0, other = 1], living arrangement [live with parents = 0, not live with parents = 1]), and communication frequency). For the sake of model parsimony, the final model retained the only one covariate (i.e., communication frequency) that showed significant associations with the endogenous variables. To examine if the regression coefficients were equivalent across the two samples, a χ² difference test was used to determine if the unconstrained model (i.e., regression coefficients freely estimated for the samples; χ²/df = 150.463/206 = 0.730, CFI = 1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, 90% CI [0.000, 0.000], SRMR = 0.070) demonstrated a better fit to the data than did the constrained model (i.e., regression coefficients constrained to be equal across the samples; χ²/df = 165.371/218 = 0.759, CFI = 1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, 90% CI [0.000, 0.000], SRMR = 0.087). A difference χ² (12) = 14.908, ns, indicated the regression coefficients were equivalent across the two samples.

Fig. 1: Parallel Mediation Model for U.S. and Chinese Participants’ Overparenting, Parent-Child Communication, Attachment, Closeness, and Relationship Satisfaction.

Notes. Values are standardized regression coefficients. For the sake of presentation parsimony, covariances between mediators and the significant associations between the control variable (i.e., communication frequency) and the three mediators (i.e., parent-child communication, β = .22, p < .001, attachment avoidance, β = -.24, p < .001, closeness, β = .22, p < .001) were not shown. * p < .05., ** p < .01., *** p < .001. Dashed lines are non-significant paths.

As shown in Fig. 1, overparenting was negatively associated with parent–child communication and positively associated with attachment anxiety and avoidance. In turn, parent-child communication positively and attachment anxiety negatively predicted relationship satisfaction. Table 6 shows a summary of the indirect, direct, and total effects from overparenting on parent–child relationship satisfaction through the four mediators. Both parent–child communication, β = -0.37, p < 0.001, and attachment anxiety, β = -0.05, p < 0.05, mediated the negative association between overparenting and relationship satisfaction. No indirect effect was observed for parent–child attachment avoidance, β = 0.01, ns, or closeness, β = -0.00, ns. Thus, hypotheses 1–3 were supported and 4–5 were not supported in both U.S. and Chinese samples.

Table 6 Indirect, Direct, and Total Effects for Mediation Model.

Discussion

The primary purpose of this study was to examine the mechanisms through which overparenting may harm parent–child relationship satisfaction. Informed by the literature, four mediators were examined: parent–child communication, attachment anxiety, attachment avoidance, and relational closeness. Data from American and Chinese emerging adults showed that overparenting was significantly associated with three of the four potential mediators, whereas only parent–child communication and attachment anxiety explained the negative association between overparenting and relational satisfaction.

Consistent with the overarching theme of the overparenting literature that shows associations between overparenting and undesirable feelings and traits among the offspring (e.g., depression, narcissism; Hong & Cui, 2020; Segrin et al., 2013), results from this study revealed a significant and negative association between emerging adults’ reports of overparenting and parent–child relationship satisfaction. In particular, this finding is consistent with previous research demonstrating negative associations between overparenting and emerging adults’ satisfaction with parents, the family, and overall life (e.g., Cui, Janhonen-Abruquah et al., 2019; Hesse et al., 2018; Segrin et al., 2012). Altogether, these findings indicate that although overparenting parents may have a strong desire to ensure the happiness of their child, their overinvolvement is associated with an opposite state of affairs in that their child reported being relatively unhappy and dissatisfied with parents, the family, and overall life.

Replicating the findings reported by Segrin et al. (2012), overparenting was negatively associated with parent–child communication. Overparented emerging adults described their family communication as less open and more problematic. For example, they reported their parents as not trying to understand their point of view, and found it difficult to discuss their beliefs, feelings, and problems with parents. This finding is consistent with the literature showing that families in which overparenting occurs tend to engage in poor family communication, such as being conformity oriented (Odenweller et al, 2014) and critical toward one another (Segrin et al., 2015). Moreover, parent–child communication mediated the negative association between overparenting and parent–child relational satisfaction. This finding is consistent with Segrin et al. (2012) who documented the mediating role of parent–child communication in the negative association between overparenting and American emerging adults’ overall satisfaction with the family. Altogether, these findings indicate that although overparenting parents may have been trying to help their child out, regardless how necessary or reasonable it was, they were not communicating their willingness and readiness to help in a way that is positive and healthy. Rather, they tended to nag their emerging adult child and were poor listeners. Indeed, engaging in less open and problem-free family communication is consistent with one of the central elements of overparenting, that is, being controlling (e.g., Padilla-Walker & Nelson, 2012; Moilanen et al., 2019). In contrast to open and problem-free communication, engaging in constrained and problematic family communication might be one way through which parents communicatively exerted their control toward the offspring. These undesirable communication habits significantly explained why overparented emerging adults reported low satisfaction with parents.

This indirect effect of overparenting on relationship satisfaction with the parent, through parent–child communication is new to the overparenting literature and has important implications for further theory development. In both cultures, overparenting appeared to go hand in hand with less, not more, open parent–child communication. This raises obvious questions about whether the extremely close and almost intrusive parenting that constitutes overparenting is actually an expression of narrow socialization where belongingness and harmony are valued relational attributes. Rather, it may reflect a more negative view of the child by which the parent feels the need to perform tasks on the child’s behalf, perhaps driven by the belief that they will otherwise never get completed, and without even articulating these beliefs or concerns to the child.

Overparenting was associated with emerging adults’ attachment insecurity toward parents (i.e., high attachment anxiety and avoidance). These results replicated the negative association between overparenting and emerging adults’ insecure attachment toward parents in an American sample reported by Jiao and Segrin (2022), and extended it cross-culturally. These findings show that overparented emerging adults worried about the availability and responsiveness of their parents, and did not feel comfortable turning to or opening up to their parents when in need. It seems plausible that overparented emerging adults behaved as they did because of the disruptions caused by overparenting when they were trying to individuate themselves from the family and become independent and self-reliant adults (Lapsley & Edgerton, 2002). In particular, as emerging adults strive to have more autonomy and independence from the family, overparenting may work as a barrier for such developmental tendencies. Consequently, overparented emerging adults may perceive their parents as being ingenuine or insensitive to their developmental needs and feel insecure about their relationship with parents. Stated differently, these emerging adults may question if their parents truly care about them when parents are unresponsive to their needs and keep providing what they do not need or desire.

Together with the overparenting literature that shows negative associations between overparenting and emerging adults general and domain-specific (e.g., interpersonal, coping) competencies (e.g., Love et al., 2020; Moilanen et al., 2019; Segrin et al., 2015), it becomes clear that overparented emerging adults are less capable in navigating life challenges and managing relationships, including their relationship with parents. Emerging adults’ attachment anxiety toward parents also mediated the negative association between overparenting and relational satisfaction. Meanwhile, attachment avoidance was not a significant mediator. This finding is also new to the literature and adds to existing theorizing on overparenting. This finding shows that overparented emerging adults felt less satisfied with parents, in part, because they mentally worried about the availability and responsiveness of their parents (i.e., attachment anxiety), and not because how they behaviorally regulated the relationship with parents (i.e., attachment avoidance). It is possible that children’s observations of overparenting, coupled with restricted parent–child communication, fuel attachment anxiety by which children question their own worth and the general availability of their parent, which further makes them feel unhappy with their parents.

Overparenting was not significantly associated with parent–child closeness. Hesse et al. (2018) proposed the same hypothesis that overparenting relates to low closeness in line with their grand hypothesis that overparenting relates to poor relational health among emerging adults. However, their data showed that under high levels of parent–child affection, overparenting was positively related to closeness. In contrast, results from the present study show that although parents with overparenting tended to get overinvolved in their children’s lives, these overparented emerging adults were not feeling closer to their parents compared to those who received less overparenting. This finding indicates that parents’ excessive parenting efforts during emerging adulthood may not lead to the effect they possibly desired, such as having a closer relationship with their child. Further, relational closeness did not explain why overparented emerging adults reported low satisfaction with parents.

Perhaps a more significant contribution of this study is the aforementioned findings were observed among both U.S. and Chinese emerging adults. In particular, although U.S. and Chinese participants differed significantly on all the other study variables (i.e., parent–child communication, attachment anxiety and avoidance, relational closeness and satisfaction), they reported comparable levels of overparenting. Moreover, parent–child communication and attachment anxiety explained the negative association between overparenting and relationship satisfaction in both cultures. This finding provides a challenge to the theory of broad and narrow cultural socialization (Arnett, 1995). This theory would predict that in collectivist cultures that prescribe narrow socialization, extensive parental involvement in a child’s life would be normative and generally associated with positive outcomes. Alternatively, in individualist cultures that prescribe broad socialization, these same parenting practices would be seen negatively and would be expected to predict negative child outcomes. Although there are clearly differences in broad versus narrow socialization across cultures, it is also evident that there is substantial variability in harmony, belonging, and conformity within the so-called collectivist cultures (Erdem & Safi, 2018). The finding of comparable associations between overparenting and attachment, communication, relational satisfaction, and relational closeness in the U.S. and Chinese samples may reveal limits on assumptions that can be made about cultural differences in interpersonal processes based on traditional cultural value systems.

These findings indicate that overparenting might be a cross-cultural phenomenon in its associations with maladaptive outcomes and can be explained from several perspectives. First, as nearly all parents strive to rear healthy and happy children, overparenting might reflect some inherent attributes of parenting as parents struggle with granting levels of autonomy that are developmentally appropriate during the offspring’s emerging adulthood (Aquilino, 2006; Bornstein, 2012). Second, the cultural comparability might be a by-product of globalization such that parents from different cultures parent their offspring in similar ways (Bornstein, 2012). Third and relatedly it might be possible that, influenced by globalization, emerging adults from diverse cultures behave in similar manners, which leads their parents to engage in comparable patterns of parenting. Moreover, the replication of the findings in the Chinese culture might reflect the cultural transformations that have been occurring in China from traditional Chinese culture that emphasizes collectivism, family connectedness, and parent centeredness, to a culture that involves more individualism, independence, and child centeredness (Shek, 2006).

Several limitations should be considered when interpreting the findings from this study. First, neither of the two samples constituted a random sample, limiting the generalizability of the findings to the general emerging adult population. In particular, the samples were recruited from just one university in the U.S. and one university in China. Moreover, emerging adults in the U.S. sample were largely from middle-to-upper class families, and we recruited the Chinese sample from one of the top universities in China to ensure participants’ accurate understanding of the English questionnaire. Moreover, we did not gather data on participants’ sexual orientation or disabilities, and we encourage future research to add these important demographic questions in their design and include a more diverse sample. Second, the cross-sectional design did not allow for causal inferences between the variables, and this issue became more concerning with respect to the mediation analyses we conducted. For example, although we hypothesized overparenting and attachment variables to have an effect on relational satisfaction, it could also be that emerging adults who had insecure attachment and poor relationships with parents reported their parents as more negative and overinvolved. Future longitudinal or experimental studies could provide more valid evaluations of the causal relations between the variables examined in this study. Third, the single informant design and its attendant and plausible common method biases further amplified this study’s inability to infer causal relations. Future studies that rely on more diverse methods (e.g., observations) and sources (e.g., parents) to collect data are needed to verify the validity of the findings from this study. Fourth and relatedly, considering the value of understanding children’s overall relationship with parents, participants in this study reported on their parents as a group as opposed to on different parental figures separately. Nevertheless, considering the substantial heterogeneity in some families on variables, such as overparenting and closeness, we encourage scholars interested in the differences between maternal and paternal parenting and other nuances in parent–child relations to gather and analyze data from each parental figure. Fifth, not to depreciate semantic differential scales, some of the items (e.g., punishing–rewarding) in the relationship satisfaction scale might be unclear to participants. Relatedly, although the single-item pictorial measure for relational closeness is widely used in relationship research, it might not be able to capture the richness involved in this construct. Future research should consider using alternative instruments to measure these constructs.

In conclusion, results from this study showed that, in both U.S. and Chinese samples, overparented emerging adults experienced low satisfaction with parents. Further, parent–child communication and attachment anxiety provided explanations as to why they were relatively dissatisfied. In overparenting families, less open and problem-free family communication might not only be the means through which parents exert their overzealous parenting efforts, it could also work as one of the central mechanisms through which parent–child relationships are harmed in overparenting families. These findings indicate that, by positively regulating the way that parents communicate with their emerging adult children to be more open and problem-free, there arises some possibility of relaxing overparenting practices that are developmentally inappropriate.