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Abstract
Childhood environments matter for health: Greater risk exposure (e.g., living in poverty; experiencing maltreatment) predicts poor health throughout the lifespan. However, many individuals who grow up in risky environments remain healthy and free from chronic illness. Supportive relationships, particularly parent-child relationships, promote healthy development in risky contexts and buffer children and adults from experiencing negative physical and mental health outcomes. However, characteristics that constitute responsive and supportive parenting may differ depending on the environmental settings in which families are embedded. Previous research has shown that high parental vigilance, or parenting behaviors that seek to monitor, surveille, and even control children and adolescents, is associated with positive psychosocial adjustment outcomes for individuals in high-risk contexts. Conversely, among low-risk samples, high parental vigilance is related to negative outcomes, or unrelated to outcomes altogether. Therefore, the research presented in this dissertation seeks to expand upon the body of literature that examines the direct role of parental vigilance on health in risky contexts, and the moderating role of parental vigilance in the relation between childhood risk and health. Findings generally support the notion that the effects of parental vigilance are indeed context-dependent and suggest that efforts to promote high-quality parenting should consider families’ environmental setting.