Perceptions of Parents Scale (POPS)
The Perceptions of Parents Scale is a branch of the large base of research done by Edward L. Deci and Richard M. Ryan on Self-Determination Theory (SDT). Self-Determination Theory is a theory of human motivation that is focused on the way people have intrinsic and natural motivation to behave in healthy and competent ways.
Self-Determination Theory centers around the idea that intrinsically motivated people will be happier, more competent, and more successful than people who work or pursue goals for extrinsic motivation. The three key elements of SDT are competence, relatedness and autonomy. This idea in Self-Determination Theory translates to parenting styles in a very straightforward theory of ideal parenting practices. The theory argues that children are much better off with parents who are autonomy-supportive, intrinsically motivating, and provide warm, nurturing care.
The Perceptions of Parents Scale is divided into two separate tests. The first scale can be applied to children as young as 8 years old up until they reach late adolescence. The second scale is for participants in their late adolescence or older. I will be primarily focusing on the College Student Scale while discussing the details of this test. The Perceptions of Parents Scale is made up of 42 questions, 21 for the mother and 21 for the father. The central idea behind POPS is to measures two facets of parenting on the Child Scale, Mother and Father involvement, and Mother and Father autonomy-support. The third measure, that only appears on the College Student Scale, is Mother and Father Warmth. On the College Student Scale each question is scored on a 7 point Likert scale ranging from “not at all true” to “very true”. Both scales are meant to be independently completed by children, to describe their mothers and/or fathers.
The original design for this questionnaire was created by Robert J. Robbins as a part of his doctoral dissertation “An assessment of perceptions of parental autonomy support and control: Child and parent correlates”, under the supervision of Dr. Richard M. Ryan.
Studies based on the Perceptions of Parents Scale have linked autonomy-supportive parenting to children who become autonomous and independent, as well as children who are more likely to have high self-esteem, self-regulation and better mental health. Research based on this scale had also shown that children who perceive their parents as autonomy-supportive are more likely to show self-actualization and stronger vitality. The reverse is also true for children who perceive their parents as low autonomy-supportive. They are more likely to have difficulties with separation and individuation. A recent longitudinal study has helped to provide further reliability and validity to the scales. Research has also shown that child perception of autonomy-support have a strong correlation with fathers self-reported scales of self-esteem and mental health.
Overall, I found the College Student Scale to be very interesting, easy to take/administer, and, as long as the results are valid and reliable, to be a strong construct to predict certain aspects of children’s motivational traits, including self-esteem and self-regulation. My biggest complaint about my experience taking the test, would be that the authors did not provide an average score or range for the three measures. I was able to properly calculate my scores but had no idea where they fell in relation to the average score, or whether my parents were particularly autonomy-supportive, involved, or warm. I believe the construct and theory as a whole are very interesting and help to bring to light how the parenting environment can shape child trait outcomes.
