Patterns of individuation in Slovenian adolescents and their relationship with adolescents’ perceptions of parents, friends and teachers

Previous research about individuation in adolescence mainly focused on analyzing single scales of separation-individuation. The main goals of the present study were (1) to identify groups of adolescents with different profiles of individuation in relation to parents and (2) to find out how these different groups perceive their relationships in three social contexts. N= 546 early, middle and late adolescents participated in the study. They completed questionnaires on developmentally normative aspects of separation-individuation as well as on emotional support, behavioral regulation and autonomy support/psychological control experienced in relationships with parents, friends and teachers. A cluster analysis that was computed for the seven individuation scales showed four distinctive groups of individuation: connected relationship with parents with non-threatened autonomy, individuated relationship with parents with non-threatened autonomy, ambivalent relationship with parents with threatened autonomy, and avoidant relationship with parents with threatened autonomy. The most distinctive differences appeared between the “connected” and the “avoidant” group of adolescents. The latter experience less favorable socialization conditions in all three social contexts and may thus be prone to less adaptive psychosocial outcomes.