Parental psychological maltreatment, negative cognitive style and psychological distress among Pakistani adolescents

Negative perceptions within parent-child relationship has become a focus of research in recent psychological literature. Keeping this in view, the current paper aims to study how parental psychological maltreatment and negative cognitive style connect with psychological distress among Pakistani adolescents? Three hundred and seventy adolescents including 200 boys and 170 girls took part in the study. The mean age was 16.11 (SD = 1.54). Participants from different educational institutes filled in Psychological Maltreatment Experience Scale, Adolescent Cognitive Style Questionnaire - Short Form (Adapted version) and Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale. Findings of the study indicated that both parental psychological maltreatment and negative cognitive styles have strong association with psychological distress. The results emphasize the role of negative cognition in parent-child relationship and importance of reducing the hostile effects of parental maltreatment on youth's mental health.