The mediational effect of emotional security on the relationship between the self-efficacy and marital conflict, peer relationship and parental attitude in early adolescence

Objective: In this study, the effect of parenting attitudes, marital conflict and peer relationship on self-efficacy was assessed by the mediating effect of the emotional security. Method: A total of 390 early adolescents (202 females, 188 males) were included in the study who were between the ages 10-13 and studying secondary school level in İstanbul and Balıkesir. A Socio-Demographic Form, Rosenberg Self Esteem Scale, Emotional Security Scale, Children's Perceptions of Interparental Conflict Scale, The Parenting Style Scale and Peer Relationship Scale were conducted to the all participants. To apply all scales, necessary permissions were taken from MEB and from adolescents' parents. At the end of the study, descriptive analyses to determine socio-demographic variables, t-test and ANOVA analyses to examine the effects of the socio-demographic variables on emotional security, correlation and multiple regression analyses to test hypotheses were conducted by SPSS Statistics. Result: As a result of the analyses, significant differences between gender, cities, threat and self-blaming on emotional insecurity were found. Emotional insecurity of adolescents were positively predicted by threat and self-blaming. On the other hand, adolescents's gender (male) and city (Balıkesir) negatively predicted the levels of emotional insecurity. In addition, emotional insecurity had a full mediating role on the relationship between the threat and self-efficacy, whereas had a partial mediating role for the link between the self-blaming and self-efficacy. Results of this study indicated that interparental conflict perception of early adolescents had a crucial role to determine emotional insecurity level and the development of self-efficacy. Conclusion:The importance of the early adolescence period on development of self-efficacy was well-known. In this period, individuals who have high emotional security level, also have high self-efficacy. The findings of the present study will contribute to the understanding of emotional security, and the factors that effect emotional security level and self-efficacy. Keywords:Emotional Security, Self-Efficacy, Parenting Attitudes, Marital Conflict, Peer relationship.