Evelyn I. Orji & Dr Bernard A. Oko
Abstract
The study sought to determine the influence of parental control on problem tendencies among children of basic education in Southern Cross River State, Nigeria. Ex-post facto research design was adopted. To achieve the purpose of the study, a null hypothesis was tested. Out of the population of 8,226, a sample of 612 students was chosen using stratified random sampling technique. An instrument designed by the researchers named “Student Opinion Questionnaire” (SOQ) was validated and found valid for use for data collection. One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) statistics was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 alpha level. The result shows that parental control had significant influence on the overall problem tendencies of the respondents. The study found that certain trait related problem tendencies were more influenced than the other. For example, high parental control significantly influenced problem tendencies associated with intellectual and social traits but do not influence problem tendencies associated with physical and social traits. The study recommended that parents should be moderate in control over their children to reduce vulnerability to intellectual and social trait related problem tendencies. Parents and teachers should be responsive to students behaviour hence through their control help them develop desirable behaviour tendencies.