Is parental monitoring just a way to acquire knowledge? Re‐evaluating a Re‐conceptualization

From the 1950s-1990s, parental monitoring was conceptualized and studied as a "socializing mechanism," driving changes in youth adjustment via several channels. In the past 2 decades, parental monitoring has become re-conceptualized in many papers as simply one of several ways to obtain parental knowledge, with knowledge replacing monitoring as the construct of central interest. This paper reviews literature showing that this re-conceptualization is not supported by the extant empirical evidence and is strongly contradicted by theory, because parental monitoring may impact youth adjustment in several plausible ways that do not involve acquiring knowledge. As a result, we recommend the field change how it conceptualizes parental monitoring vis-a-vis parental knowledge. Just as we realized parental knowledge doesn't come <i>only</i> from parental monitoring, now we should realize that parental monitoring is not <i>only</i> a way to get parental knowledge. More evidence is needed to determine exactly how much of the effect of monitoring flows through increased knowledge and what other channels are in play.