Multiple sources of adolescents' conservative values: A multilevel study

In a sample of 677 adolescents, extracted from 39 classes in 15 different high schools in Trento, Italy, a multilevel analysis was performed to analyze the relations between adolescents' conservative values, their perceptions of the conservative values their mothers would like to transmit to them (i.e., maternal socialization values) and the conservative values prevalent in their class context (i.e., classmates' and teachers' values). Perceived mothers' conservative values positively predicted adolescents' conservatism, while the mean class conservatism and teachers' conservatism did not. Also the cross-level interaction between mothers' and classmates' conservative values significantly predicted adolescents' conservative values. In particular, the relation between perceived mothers' conservatism and children's conservatism was stronger when adolescents perceived an alignment between their classmates' conservative values and their mothers' expectations of those values. Conversely, the interaction between mothers' and teachers' conservatism did not predict the criterion variable. Implications of this research and its possible developments are discussed.