Paternal coparenting and prosocial behavior among Tibetan adolescents: Mediating effects of father-child attachment and moderating effects of emotional stability

Across cultural contexts, fathers tend to be less directly involved in daily caregiving than mothers, yet the quality of interparental coordination in child-rearing, known as coparenting, may constitute a critical pathway through which paternal influence is associated with adolescent development. This study examined the associations between paternal coparenting and prosocial behavior among Tibetan adolescents, with father-child attachment as a mediator and emotional stability as a moderator. Using multi-stage stratified random sampling, we recruited 591 Tibetan adolescents (Mage = 13.87 years, 52.79% female) from Shigatse City, Tibet Autonomous Region. Participants completed self-report measures assessing paternal coparenting, father-child attachment, prosocial behavior, and emotional stability. Mediation analyses indicated that father-child attachment statistically mediated the association between supportive paternal coparenting and prosocial behavior, with the direct association rendered non-significant, while partially mediating the corresponding link for undermining coparenting. Moderated mediation analyses demonstrated that emotional stability significantly moderated the association between father-child attachment and prosocial behavior, with this association being strongest among adolescents with lower emotional stability and non-significant among those with higher emotional stability. This compensatory pattern suggests that emotionally stable adolescents may possess internal regulatory resources that support prosocial development with substantially reduced reliance on attachment quality, whereas among emotionally reactive adolescents, prosocial behavior showed a stronger association with secure father-child relationships. These findings extend the bioecological model and attachment theory to Tibetan adolescents within a context of Buddhist values and collectivist family structures. They highlight that individual temperamental differences critically moderate family-based developmental associations and may inform the design of differentiated interventions.

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