Susanna Pallini
University of Rome Tre, Rome, Italy
Emma Baumgartner
Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
Angela Guarino
Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
Roberto Baiocco
Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
Abstract
The primary aim of this research was to provide evidence about how adoles-
cents’ self-reported parent/peer attachment and time perspective relate to their
satisfaction with life. A sample of 1211 adolescents completed self-report meas-
ures assessing life satisfaction, time perspective, and the perceived quality of
parent and peer attachment. Results showed statistically significant relationships
among these variables. Boys resulted higher scored than girls in parent trust and
satisfaction with life. Girls resulted higher scored than boys in parent alienation,
peer communication, and negative past. Parent and peer attachment predicted
satisfaction with life, although the variance explained by peer attachment was
low. Negative Past, Hedonistic Present, and Future were signiEcantly associated
Corresponding author:
Fiorenzo Laghi, Department of Developmental and Social Psychology, Faculty of Medicine and
Psychology, Sapienza, University of Rome, Via dei Marsi, 78, 00185 Roma, Italy.
Email: fiorenzo.laghi@uniroma1.it
Laghi et al. 25
with satisfaction with life in the expected directions. The present study has
important implications for future empirical investigation and for clinical
intervention.
Keywords
Satisfaction with life, time perspective, parent attachment, peer attachment,
adolescence
LS (Boniwell et al., 2010; Drake et al., 2008). Also, future TP was positively
related to LS (Lessing, 1972). Lastly, according to Zhang et al. (2013) a
balanced TP was related to increased satisfaction with life.
Third, empirical evidence about gender differences is not consistent.
They differ depending on the specifications or samples considered.
Regarding LS in U.S.A., in early adolescence and adolescence, different
authors (Jiang et al., 2013; Ma and Huebner, 1998; Nickerson and Nagle,
2004) found that girls scored higher than boys; otherwise, in Spain,
Bendayan et al. (2013) found no gender differences in LS. In Italian context,
Caprara and Steca (2005) found that young adults males scores higher
positive thinking than female, while Caprara and Steca (2006) found that
adults males scored significantly higher than women in satisfaction with life.
Several researches have enhanced the relations between satisfaction and
adolescent adjustment (Caprara and Steca, 2005, 2006; Diener and Diener,
1995), or between satisfaction and psychopathological disease (Lewinsohn
et al., 2003), although the role of both time perceptive and attachment
relationships has received less attention.
Method
Participants
The sample consisted of 1211 students (489 boys and 722 girls). The average
age of the students was 17.31 (SD ¼ 1.09; range 16–19). Participation was
preceded by an informed-consent procedure that required active consent
from both students and parents. The questionnaires were administered in
the classroom during a regular class period and took approximately 30 min
to complete. Instructions stated that the questionnaires were voluntary
and that responses were anonymous and confidential. All students
responded to the same questionnaire packet, with measures administered
in counterbalanced order to each group of subjects. The study followed the
norms for ethical research approved by the Italian Psychology Association.
Measures
The Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS; Diener et al., 1985) is composed of
five items used to measure one’s global satisfaction with life. Each item is
rated on a seven-point scale (1¼strongly disagree to 7¼strongly agree).
Laghi et al. 29
The results of the five items are summed to produce an overall score (sample
item, ‘‘If could live my life over, I would change almost nothing’’). The
SWLS reflects the cognitive components of one’s satisfaction with life and is
well suited for use with different age groups. In the current study, internal
reliability of SWLS was 0.89.
Attachment to parents
The Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA; Armsden and
Greenberg, 1987) was used to measure the quality of parent attachment in ado-
lescence and the affective–cognitive dimension of attachment. It evaluates
the security in the relationship with specific attachment figures and the
adolescent’s trust in the availability and sensitivity of an attachment figure
(sample item, ‘‘My parents respect my feelings’’; a ¼ .78 in the present study),
the quality of communication, which promotes comfort in the relationship
with an attachment figure (sample item, ‘‘When my parents knows that some-
thing is bothering me, they ask me about it’’; a ¼ .81 in the present study) and
the extent of anger, alienation resulting from an unresponsive or inconsist-
ently responsive attachment figure (sample item, ‘‘I don’t get much attention
from my parents’’; a ¼ .84 in the present study). The three scales were rated
on a five-point scale ranging from ‘‘completely untrue’’ to ‘‘completely true’’
and were used to measure the quality of parent attachment in adolescence.
Attachment to peer
Twenty-five item versions of the subscales trust, communication, and alien-
ation of the IPPA (Armsden and Greenberg, 1987) were used to measure
the quality of peer attachment in adolescence. The trust scale measures
the extent to which an adolescent trusts peer to respect and accept his or
her feelings (sample item, ‘‘My friends respect my feelings’’; a ¼ .77 in the
present study). The communication scale measures the extent to which an
adolescent experiences having high quality of communication with peer
(sample item, ‘‘When my friends know that something is bothering me,
they ask me about it’’; a ¼ .80 in the present study). The alienation scale
measures the degree to which an adolescent experiences negative feelings
toward peer (sample item, ‘‘I don’t get much attention from my friends’’;
a ¼ .81 in the present study). Several reviews of attachment instruments
have found the IPPA to be a valid and reliable measure. The Italian version
of the scale has been used in a number of studies, and its reliability and
validity have been shown to be satisfactory (Laghi et al., 2009; Pace et al.,
2011; Tambelli et al., 2012).
30 Time & Society 25(1)
TP
The TP was measured using the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory
(ZTPI; Zimbardo and Boyd, 1999) in its Italian validated version for ado-
lescents (Laghi et al., 2013). This instrument consists of 25-item Likert-type
scale, on which each item has five possible responses (from ‘‘strongly agree’’
to ‘‘strongly disagree’’). The ZTPI is a multidimensional scale which meas-
ures TP in three temporal frames: the past, present, and future, and the
attitude related to each of them. It contains the following five subscales:
Positive Past (sample item ‘‘Familiar childhood sights, sounds, smells often
bring back a flood of wonderful memories’’; a ¼ .80 in the present study),
Negative Past (sample item, ‘‘The past has too many unpleasant memories
that I prefer not to think’’; a ¼ .79 in the present study), Hedonistic Present
(sample item, ‘‘It’s important to put excitement in my life’’; a ¼ .70 in the
present study), Fatalistic Present (sample item, ‘‘Fate determines much in
my life’’; a ¼ .78 in the present study), and Future (sample item, ‘‘I’m able
to resist temptations when I know that there is a work to be done’’; a ¼ .76
in the present study). The Italian short version of the scale has good psy-
chometric properties (internal reliability of the ZTPI ranges from 0.70 to
0.80) and a convergent validity with different measures of attachment secur-
ity and well-being (Laghi et al., 2013).
Results
Preliminary analyses: Gender and age differences
For comparative purposes the sample was divided into two age groups:
16–17 years (N ¼ 700; M ¼ 282; F ¼ 418), 18–19 years (N ¼ 511; M ¼ 207;
F ¼ 304).
Analysis of variance of sex and age as between-subjects factors was con-
ducted for the satisfaction with life scores. The ANOVA only revealed an
effect for sex (F(1, 1209) ¼ 14.07, p < .001, Z2 ¼ .01). There were neither
effects of age, F(1,1209) ¼ 1.17, p ¼ .29, nor significant interactions between
the variables, F(1, 1209) ¼ .24, p ¼ .61. Males obtained higher scores
(M ¼ 23.84; SD ¼ 6.84) than females (M ¼ 22.30; SD ¼ 6.73).
Regarding Parent Attachment, MANOVA analysis revealed main effect
only for sex, ¼ .98, F(3,1.205) ¼ 4.65, p < .001, Zp2 ¼ .01, and not for age,
¼ .99, F(3,1.205) ¼ 4.65, p ¼ .06. There was no effect of interaction
between the variables, ¼ 1, F(3,1.205)¼ .04, p ¼ .99. Results from the
univariate tests revealed that groups differed on the subscale of Trust,
F(1,1209)¼8.47, p < .001, Zp2 ¼ .04, where males showed a higher mean
score (M ¼ 38.01; SD ¼ 7.62) than females (M ¼ 36.68; SD ¼ 7.59), and
Laghi et al. 31
Table 1. Zero order correlation between the attachment, time perspective, and sat-
isfaction with life measures.
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.
1. Sex –
2. IPPA-Parents .06 –
3. IPPA-Peer .01 .29**
4. Positive Past .04 .33** .21** –
5. Negative Past .06 .42** .27** .24**
6. Fatalistic Present .01 .21** .16** .03 .28**
7. Hedonistic Present .01 .21** .21** .18* .02 .13** –
8. Future .05 .31** .10** .29** .03 .07 .11* –
9. Satisfaction with Life .11** .52** .27** .23** .34** .16** .21** .25** –
Note: * p < .05, ** p < .01.
32 Time & Society 25(1)
Future. Satisfaction with Life was negatively related to Negative Past and
Fatalistic Present.
Table 2. Hierarchical regression analyses for parent and peer attachment predicting
satisfaction with life.
B SE B B R R2 R2
Discussion
Overall, this study first evidenced gender differences in most variables con-
sidered; second, the role played by parent and peer attachment in satisfac-
tion with life; finally, the contribution of both TP and attachment
representations to satisfaction with life.
Regarding gender differences our results showed that girls seem to have
better peer communication than boys, which is in line with other studies
(e.g. Gorrese and Ruggieri, 2012; Gullone and Robinson, 2005; Nada Raja
et al., 1992; Ruijten et al., 2011). On the other hand, based on the data, girls
appear to be more pessimistic than boys; in effect, they scored higher
than boys in Negative Past and Parents’ Alienation, and scored lower
than boys in Parents’ Trust and Communication, and Satisfaction with life.
Such gender differences are very peculiar and difficult to explain because
of the limitations presented by convenience sampling strategy. Future
research should extend the recruitment to a stratified sample (e.g. stratified
Socioeconomic status (SES), provenience, and culture). In such a way, it
would be possible to check if the gender differences identified are depending
on the samples considered, or it is possible to extend results to the actual
Italian context. However, our results are consistent with Caprara and Steca
studies: Caprara and Steca (2005) found that male young adults in Italy
scored higher in positive thinking than their female counterparts; addition-
ally, Caprara and Steca (2006) found that adult men scored significantly
higher than women in satisfaction with life.
A possible explanation of this phenomenon is that Italian girls
would perceive parents more demanding than boys because of the several
cultural requests addressed to women. In other countries, the family
work conflict could be present in women and men, but in Italy it is
almost exclusively a feminine problem (e.g. Marshall and Tracy, 2009).
Regarding the relationship between parent/peer attachment and satisfac-
tion with life (LS), the results evidenced a strong relationship between parent
attachment and LS, and a moderate relationship between peer attachment
and LS. In adolescence, according to theoretical and empirical literature, the
attachment bond with parents changes and the importance of peer relation-
ships grows (Allen, 2008). Nevertheless, parents do not lose their importance
in representing a secure base for the construction of new interpersonal bonds
(Allen, 2008). Representations of parents influence the other interpersonal
relationships, as well as social adjustment (Bowlby, 1980, 1982; Thompson,
2008). The results of this study are congruent with both the theoretical
34 Time & Society 25(1)
upon the satisfaction with life played by TP (Boniwell et al., 2010; Drake
et al., 2008; Lessing, 1972; Zhang et al., 2013; Zimbardo and Boyd, 1999)
and by attachment representations (Armsden and Greenberg, 1987;
Bendayan et al., 2013; Jiang et al., 2013; Ma and Huebner, 2008;
Nickerson and Nagle, 2004), the present study has highlighted how attach-
ment representations and TP are deeply interrelated, and both contribute to
the satisfaction with life.
Some useful clinical implications can be obtained from the present study.
An understanding of how adolescents perceive their present and future may
provide a basis for developing effective strategies for protecting them from
high-risk behaviors (Andretta et al., 2013; Laghi et al., 2013; Mckay et al.,
2015; Worrell et al., 2013). Furthermore, considering that the parent and
per attachment relationships, and a balanced TP are significant protective
factors, the current results could be useful for programs concerned with
promoting positive youth development.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or
publication of this article.
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