Psychosocial antecedents of political beliefs in adolescence

The study examined the relation between adolescents‟ interparental conflict perceptions and their political efficacy regarding local issues. Longitudinal data (age 15 and 17) from 444 adolescents wereanalyzed using structural equation modeling. Results showed that young people experiencing frequentinterparental conflict reported an increase in depressive mood during late adolescence, which wasassociated with lower level of political efficacy. Moreover, adolescents who felt more efficacious when dealing with fighting parents felt more efficacious in local politics, even when controlling forpersonality traits and depressive mood. One possible explanation is that family perceptions generalizeto politics because both contexts share certain similar features. Our results underscore that alsoseemingly nonpolitical experiences can matter in adolescents‟ civic and political development.