Poster #73 - Chinese Parents’ Sense of Responsibility to Children Mediates Urban-Rural Difference in Adolescent School Engagement

• In Event: 3-053 - Poster Session 10
  In Poster Session: PS 10 Section - Education, Schooling

Integrative Statement

Traditional Chinese culture conveys parents a strong sense of responsibility for children’s development (Ng, Pomerantz, & Deng, 2014). For example, Chinese (vs. American) parents are more likely to have their feelings of worth contingent on children’s performance. Although prior research provides insights into the differences at the country level, it is also important to examine variability in parents’ responsibility to children within China, as people in rural area of China tend to preserve more traditional beliefs and values in their life practice than their urban counterparts (Chen, Bian, Xin, Wang, & Silbereisen, 2010).

Past research comparing urban and rural areas in China reveals differences in parent-child relationships (Zhang, & Fuligni, 2006). For instance, rural adolescents usually have stronger sense of family related responsibilities, and this stronger sense of responsibility are predictive of higher academic motivation (Fuligni, & Zhang, 2004). However, it is unclear that whether parents’ sense of responsibility to their children would play a similar role in children’s academic adjustment. Since Chinese culture considers children’s accomplishments, particularly in school, a sign of optimal development (Ng et al., 2014), parents’ stronger sense of responsibility to their children may convey children the importance of school, and hence leads to children’s greater school engagement.

The sample consists of 396 Chinese parent-child dyads (238 dyads in rural area, 158 dyads in urban area) from a nationally-representative study, in which the children are in the period of early adolescence (mean age = 13.12 years, 46.7% girls). Parents reported their sense of responsibility to their children (e.g., parents should sacrifice material life if it is necessary to support child’s education) and their children’s school engagement (e.g., child checks homework several times after finishing it). Children reported their own school engagement using a similar set of questions (e.g., I check my homework several times to make sure it is correct before handing it in).

Results indicated significant differences in urban and rural parents’ sense of responsibility to children. Compared to parents in urban area, parents in rural area tended to have stronger sense of responsibility to their children, t = 3.01, p < .01 (Figure 1). Children in rural area also showed greater child-report and parent-report school engagement during adolescence than their urban counterparts, ts > 2.86, ps < .01.

We next examined whether difference in urban and rural parents’ sense of responsibility to children contributes to regional difference in adolescents’ school engagement. As shown in Figure 2, rural (vs. urban) Chinese children’s greater school engagement (both child-report and parent-report) was partially mediated by rural (vs. urban) Chinese parents’ greater sense of responsibility to children, Sobel test zs > 1.99, ps < .05. Controlling for other covariables (e.g., children’s gender and age) did not change the results. Taken together, the findings not only demonstrate regional differences in Chinese parents’ sense of responsibility to children, but also suggest that such differences may underline regional differences in children’s school engagement during adolescence.

Authors

• Beiming Yang, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
  Presenting Author

• Yang Qu, Northwestern University
  Non-Presenting Author