The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships among parent-child conflicts, empathy, forgiveness, and psychological maladjustment(depression, anxiety, and anger) and to identify the effect of parent-child conflicts and empathy on forg...
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships among parent-child conflicts, empathy, forgiveness, and psychological maladjustment(depression, anxiety, and anger) and to identify the effect of parent-child conflicts and empathy on forgiveness and psychological maladjustment. For this study, 419 undergraduate students who are attending university in Kyonggi-do were asked to complete Questionnaire of Parent-Child Conflicts, Empathy, Forgiveness(TRIM), Depression(CES-D), Anxiety(Spielberger State Anxiety Inventory), and Anger(Spielberger State Anger Inventory).
The results of this study are summarized as follows:
(a) Parent-child conflicts had significant relationship with all variables. Empathy was significantly related with forgiveness, but not with depression, anxiety, and anger.
(b) Manova analysis showed that the effects of parent-child conflicts and empathy on forgiveness and psychological maladjustment were significant. First, parent-child conflicts had main effects on forgiveness, depression, anxiety, and anger. That is, the students who had more conflicts with their parents were not likely to forgive parents and had difficulties with psychological adjustment. Second, empathy mainly affects on forgiveness, depression, and anxiety. That is, the students who empathized with their parents were likely to forgive their parents, but had more depression and anxiety. Lastly, the effects of interaction of parent-child conflicts and empathy on forgiveness and anger were significant. Even if they had profound parent-child conflicts, high empathy were likely to forgive their parents and less anger. Accordingly, at parent-child conflicts, empathy promotes forgiveness and reduces anger, but does not influence on depression and anger.
In the conclusion, the significance and limits of the study and implication of the counseling were discussed.