Changes in Parental Involvement and Parental Expectations During High School for Students With Emotional and Behavioral Difficulties

Abstract

Home-based parental involvement and parental expectations in school are strong predictors of academic outcomes for high school students. Given this, we explored whether changes in parental involvement and parental expectations during high school were correlated with academic functioning for students with emotional or behavioral difficulties ( N = 888) compared with their peers ( N = 4,148). We found that home-based parental involvement was stable during high school for both groups of students. There was a decrease in parental educational expectations during high school that was equivalent between both groups. Students with elevated emotional and behavioral difficulties had significant correlations between increases in home-based involvement and increases in both parental expectations and grade point average, whereas the peer group had significant, yet trivial correlations among the constructs.