Parenting plays a multifaceted role in adolescent development. In this article, we review studies based on an observational assessment of affective parenting behaviors collected as part of the longitudinal Orygen Adolescent Development Study and explore three ways that parenting may predict adolescent‐onset depression. Specifically, we review findings that observed affective parental behaviors prospectively predict depressive symptoms and the onset of depressive disorder, predict adolescent depression indirectly via emotion regulation, and interact with brain development to predict adolescent depression. Parents who express higher frequencies of aggression or lower frequencies of positivity, or who are more likely to respond negatively to their adolescents’ positive and aggressive behaviors, tend to have adolescents at greater risk for depression and suboptimal brain development. Accounting for the direct, indirect, and moderating effects of parenting may enable us to characterize more accurately the trajectories of adolescent development, which can inform prevention and early intervention efforts.