3-035 - Parental Love and Loving Parent-Child Relationships: Cultural and Ethnic Similarities and Differences

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Major theories of parenting, such as Bowlby’s attachment theory, Baumrind’s parenting style theory, and Rohner’s parental acceptance-rejection theory (PARTheory), emphasize the central role of a warm, loving parent-child relationship in healthy child adjustment. Specific behaviors have been implicitly or explicitly deemed universally loving – and thus, universally beneficial to children’s wellbeing. However, recent work illuminates that “loving” behaviors sometimes vary across cultural groups, as does the impact of such behaviors.

This symposium builds on recent work by examining cultural similarities and differences in how parents express love, and by which warm, loving, relationships can develop. Cultural comparisons are also made of the impact of parenting presumed to be loving. The first paper explores culturally-derived perceptions and practices of maternal warmth among Chinese immigrant and European American mothers of preschoolers. The second paper investigates beliefs about the most important ways to express love to adolescents among European American, African American, and Latino mothers. The third paper examines values as predictors of relationship satisfaction in Latino mother-teen dyads. The final paper compares the association between mothers’ and fathers’ positive, “loving”, parenting and pre-adolescent child adjustment across nine countries. Together, the papers highlight cross-cultural and ethnic similarities and differences in parents’ beliefs about and expressions of love or warmth, as well as predictors and consequences of “loving” behavior. Differences are consistent with culturally-based values and experiences such as personal autonomy or relatedness. The papers draw on qualitative and quantitative data, and address parenting across multiple cultural groups and multiple developmental periods.

Sub Unit

• Family Context & Processes

Chair

• Christy M. Buchanan, Wake Forest Univ

Individual Presentations

• Understanding Chinese Immigrant and European American Mothers’ Expressions of Warmth - Presenting Author: Charissa Siew Lyng Cheah, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Jin Li, Brown Univ; Nan Zhou, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Yoko Yamamoto, Brown University; Christy YuetYu Leung, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

• Mothers’ Beliefs about Expressing Love to Adolescents: Cultural Similarities and Differences - Presenting Author: Christy M. Buchanan, Wake Forest Univ; Terese Glatz, Wake Forest University; Lisa Kiang, Wake Forest University

• Relationship Satisfaction and Cultural Value Endorsement in Latino Adolescent-Mother Dyads - Presenting Author: Gabriela Stein, University of North Carolina, Greensboro; Nadia Huq, University of North Carolina Greensboro; Andrew Supple, University of North Carolina, Greensboro

• Positive Parenting and Child Adjustment in Nine Countries - Presenting Author: Ann T. Skinner, Duke University; Anna Gassman-Pines, Duke University; Jennifer E Lansford, Duke University; Liane Peña Alampay, Ateneo de Manila University; Suha Al-Hassan, Emirates College for Advanced Education; Dario Bacchini, Second University of Naples; Anna Silvia Bombi, Sviluppo e Socializzazione; Marc H Bornstein, National Institutes of Health; Lei Chang, Chinese Univ of Hong Kong; Kirby Deater-Deckard, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Laura Di Giunta, Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza"; Patrick S Malone, Duke University; Paul Oburu, University Maseno; Concetta Pastorelli, Universita di Roma; Emma Sorbring, University West; Sombat Tapanya, Chiang Mai University; Liliana Maria Uribe Tirado, Universidad San Buenaventura; Arnaldo Zelli, University of Rome