3-125 - Parenting Goals and Behaviors Across Cultural Contexts: Implications for Children’s Social, Academic and Psychological Adjustment

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

The socio-cultural context plays a significant role in shaping parenting goals and behaviors, which are a primary socialization force in children’s social and behavioral development. Thus, the functional significance of parenting for child development needs to be examined from a cultural-contextual perspective. This symposium is concerned with how important aspects of parenting are associated with child adjustment in different sociocultural contexts. The first paper compares the mediation roles of Chinese and U.S. mothers’ responses to children’s performance in the relations between parenting goals and children’s emotional distress. Relative to U.S. mothers, Chinese mothers value more self-improvement that fosters a higher focus on children’s failures, which ultimately contributes to their heightened emotional distress. The second paper examines whether the mediated associations between Korean American preschoolers’ fearful temperament and school difficulties through maternal use of praise depend on maternal acculturation to American culture. More acculturated mothers respond to their children’s fearfulness with more praise, which leads to fewer socioemotional/behavioral problems. The third paper is about how different parenting goals are associated with practices and ultimately children’s academic achievement in Malaysian families. Filial piety goals directly predict poor achievement, whereas child-centered goals positively contribute to achievement through positive parenting practices. The final paper investigates whether and how the associations between parenting behaviors and child development differ in rural-to-urban migrant and non-migrant urban families in China, who undergo different cultural experiences. The results show the effects of the exposure to different social and cultural circumstances on the functions of parenting behaviors in child development.

Sub Unit

• Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Chairs

• Xinyin Chen, Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania, USA

• Rui Fu, University of Pennsylvania

Individual Presentations

• “You Can Do Better”: The Role of Mothers' Goals and Responses to Performance in Chinese and American Children's Emotional Distress - Presenting Author: Janice Ng, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Eva Pomerantz, University of Illinois; Yang Qu, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Cecilia Cheung, The University of California, Riverside; Meifang Wang, Shandong Normal University

• Predicting Korean-American Children’s Difficulties from Child Temperamental Fearfulness, and Maternal Praise and Acculturation. - Presenting Author: You Jung Seo, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Charissa S. L. Cheah, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Craig H. Hart, Brigham Young University

• Do Positive Parenting Practices Mediate the Effects of Parental Goals on Malaysian Children’s Academic Achievement? - Presenting Author: Jo-Pei Tan, Manchester Metropolitan University; Su-Wan Gan, University Putra Malaysia; Charissa S. L. Cheah, University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Siti Nor Yaacob, University Putra Malaysia; Mansor Abu Talib, University Putra Malaysia

• Parenting Behaviors and Adjustment of Migrant and Non-Migrant Children in Urban China - Presenting Author: Rui Fu, University of Pennsylvania; Xinyin Chen, Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania, USA; Dan Li, Shanghai Normal University; Junsheng Liu, Shanghai Normal University