Focusing on Korean Americans, this study examined the overall pattern of adolescents' perceptions of their parents and its effects on adolescent problem behaviors. Analyses of survey data from 218 Korean American adolescents indicated that these adolescents perceived their parents as "authoritarian yet warm," and that this parenting style had an adverse effect on adolescents' internalizing problems but not on externalizing problems. These findings are partly explained as a function of the Korean American culture and ethnic context. Since these findings differ from European American norms, the study points to the need to consider implications of culture as well as the ethnic experiences in understanding the dynamics of parent-child relationships in Asian American families. It also suggests the need for culturally sensitive indices for Asian American parenting research. (Contains 65 references.) (Author/SLD)