A Dynamical Systems Investigation of the Co-regulation between Perceived Daily Parental Warmth and Adolescent Attention-deficit/hyperactivity Disorder Symptoms

Longitudinal research demonstrates that child ADHD symptoms and behaviors exhibit reciprocalassociations with parenting behaviors over time. However, minimal research has investigatedthese associations and their dynamic links at the daily level. Intensive longitudinal data candisentangle stable between-person differences from within-person fluctuations and revealnuanced short-term family dynamics on a micro timescale. Using 30-day daily diary data from acommunity sample of 86 adolescents (Mage = 14.5, 55% female, 56% White, 22% Asian) andlatent differential equation modeling, this study examined the links between perceived dailyparental warmth and ADHD symptoms as coupled dynamical systems. The results show that themagnitude of fluctuations in perceived daily parental warmth generally remains stable, whileelevated ADHD symptoms return to their normal level over time. Perceived parental warmth issensitive to change in ADHD symptoms such that adolescents feel that their parents will fine-tune their warmth with gradual changes when adolescents demonstrate heightened symptoms.There are substantial between-family differences in these regulating system dynamics. Amongfamilies with more baseline parental non-harsh discipline, both perceived parental warmth andADHD symptoms tend to be more stable and fluctuate less often. Intensive longitudinal data anddynamical systems approaches offer a new lens to uncover short-term family dynamics andadolescent adjustment at a refined micro level. Future research should explore antecedents andconsequences of between-family differences in these short-term family dynamics on multipletimescales.