Child - parent relationships and identity development

The purpose in a study of 114 university students at age 19-21 was to assess the sex differences in links between parent-child relationships and identity development in ideological (occupation, religion, politics, philosophical life style) and interpersonal (friendship, dating, sex roles, recreation) domains. Methods used where an identity status questionnaire Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status, the extended version EOMEIS-2 (Adams, Bennion, & Huh, 1989) and Relationship Closeness Inventory RCI (Berscheid, Snyder, & Omoto, 1989). The inventory measures different aspects of relationship closeness: frequency, diversity and strength. The result showed some differences among girls and boys. Closeness in parent - child relationships was linked to identity scores much more strong among male university students, then female students. There are no linkages between girl - father close relationships and identity. But girl - mother close relationships (frequency) positively correlated with girl ideological identity (r = 0.26; p < 0.05). Boy's mature status of ideological identity and close relationships (frequencies) with both parents are positively interconnected (r = 0.50; p < 0.05). However, there are no statistically significant linkages between boy's mature identity status in interpersonal domain and parent - boy close relationships