What most Americans consider good parenting has roots in middle class European-American behavior. The different behaviors that most American parents hold dear include displays of closeness and warmth with considerable balances of control and monitoring (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). However, in the recent decades, literature has emerged describing differences between the parenting approaches across cultures and the likely influences on the behavior of children (Yunus, 2005). For example, compared to the US context, Asian parents have been found to display lower levels of warmth towards their children while exercising higher levels of control, yet it is found that Asian children perform equally with European ones. It is notable, therefore, that the parenting approaches of Asian and American parents could be a reflection of their perceptions of control and warmth as described by their respective cultures. The differences noted are a suggestion that the extant ideas concerning parenting styles may not be generalizable for all children and their families across cultures. As this study suggests, investigations of Asian American families necessitate the development of new parenting dimensions, which would be significant for all families.
A Comparison of Asian and American Cultures on Parenting Styles
What is the proposed approach of understanding the approaches to parenting and childcare that promote the well-being of children and that, which causes adverse outcomes? Mainstream perspectives of parent-children relationships and parenting primarily lean on Western cultural assumptions concerning parenting and familial ties. The images and beliefs inform us concerning what it implies to be parents and what the relationships between parents and their children should look like. In addition, the extant scientific research reflects the dominant Western ideologies of parents and children. For example, most of such studies have been done in America and they primarily focus on White families, yet they attempt to convey the message that the meaning of parenting is constant across cultures.
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The extant literature reports that for White American culture, authoritative parenting approach has the highest significance for the psychological well-being of children (LeVine, 2008). The latter literature highlights that studies conducted on these families emphasize two primary behaviors (1) control—defining clear parental expectations of their children and moderate limits and (2) support—praising and hugging children. Importantly, most Western cultures believe that the two behaviors are manifest of the fact that parents are accepting of and warm towards their children. A further review of the same literature suggests that children whose parents apply the authoritative approach to parenting appear to be better off in terms of coping with challenges, perform well academically, and experience lower levels of delinquency and depression (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). Consequently, most parents in this culture would wish to be authoritative.
The authoritarian parenting approach, according to Western culture, is identified with high parental control (tight child monitoring) and low support (tendency to be very strict). According to Shigaki (2013), the two beliefs appear to have damaging effects on the wellbeing of children. However, it is important to understanding that while authoritative parenting could be beneficial to other ethnic groups, it can be identified in the latter literature that, for instance, first-generation Chinese children who live in authoritarian homes perform equally in academics as those from authoritative backgrounds.
Similarities in Childcare and Child Rearing Practices
While there is only so much in literature describing similarities in the parenting approaches of Asian and American parents, a concise comparison can be generated in studying the reported similarities between authoritative and authoritarian styles. The assumption in this case is that authoritative approaches represent the US culture while authoritarian styles mirror the culture of Asian parents—at least according to the reviewed studies. In this case, it can be found that both cultures value strictness and the need for parents to place high expectations on their children. Parents in both cultures, therefore, understand that they have a role to play in shaping the behavior of their children. The two cultures place parenting responsibilities on parents, especially in guiding the children towards learning what is good and distinguishing the good from bad. Parental expectations serve as the checkpoints for performance from children since deviations are always likely to attract attention from parents (Shigaki, 2013). Overall, in Asian culture, as in the American one, parents dictate what they wish from their children, and they strive to model behavior through their positions of power in the family.
Differences in Childcare and Child Rearing Practices
While only little evidence can be drawn from the extant studies indicating the similarities between American and Asian parenting styles, the existing differences are widely researched. American parents tend to be pragmatic and issue-oriented instead of being driven by external, absolute standards. According LeVine (2008), these parents, in the expression of authoritative parenting, appear to adjust their expectations according to the needs of their children. Often, parents keenly listen to the arguments of their children even though at times, they may never change their minds. These parents also persuade and give explanations in addition to punishment. Most importantly, American parents attempt to strike a balance between the responsibilities of their children to live according to the demands and needs of others with the children’s rights to command respect and push for the satisfaction of their own needs.
A further appraisal of studies suggests that American parents—authoritative in this sense—guide and teach their children with the objective of socializing them to value and accept what the parents hold dear. The hope of the parents in the American context is that their children internalize their goals. There is nothing in literature suggesting that American parents are coercive towards the need for children to conform to specific rules. Instead, the focus of the parents is to instill and nurture critical thinking among children concerning each of the rules that their parents set.
Asian parents, based on the proposition that they are authoritarian, perceive that naturally, children are self-indulgent and strong-willed. Such parents value obedience from their children to higher authority since it is one of the family virtues. As opposed to US parents, Asian ones are committed to describing the need for conformity to parental authority (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). The latter author argues that willfulness is considered the foundation for bad behavior, unhappiness, and sin, which is why loving parents, according to the Asian culture, are those who attempt breaking the will of children. Children in this context have little chance to challenge the rules that their parents set because communication is uni-directional and they are only allowed to follow blindly. Asian parents, as the latter literature argues, impose stringent psychological controls over their children with the belief that they, as authorities, are always right (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). The worry of the parents concerns the need to control their children. The parents in this cultural context depend on their children’s sense of fear towards authority to exercise their control over the children.
Perceptions of Warmth and Control in the Asian and American Cultures
An understanding the differences in the reported parenting styles on children lies in comprehending the underlying cultural perceptions of warmth and affection towards children. According to LeVine (2008), compared to Americans, Asian parents tend to be stricter and less depicting of warmth. The strictness lies in the parental beliefs control in the Asian context is both necessary and a parental role. The same study argues that parents understand that they should be strict to protect their children, and not to inhibit them. Consequently, one notes that warmth and control have different definitions among parents with Asian origins, which is why the description of authoritarianism should be understood in the cultural contexts.
Fundamentally, the US society is founded on individualistic principles, which promote autonomy among children. Therefore, parents who seek to regulate their children and limit their free choice are likely to fail in such a society. However, important lessons can be drawn from the Asian context, which is largely collectivist. Contextualizing the Chinese culture, for example, it can be found that the Confucian philosophy is predominant. According to literature, the ideology promotes the importance of education, emotional restraint, devotion to parents, and respect for authority (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). The same source indicates that Chinese practices of child rearing have roots in the chiao shun and guan concepts, which respectively mean to train and to love and govern. Parents seeking to train their children find themselves deeply involved in the lives of such children and displaying high levels of concern. Strong religious and racial backgrounds of the Catholic Church and Spanish influence define the Pilipino parenting culture (another Asian culture). Consequently Pilipino parents appear to emphasize equality at the expense of hierarchy since family cultures promote closeness and affection with parents acting as protectors of their children, especially daughters (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). Everyone in the family understands the value of the utang ng loob concept that indebts family members to one another as a way of showing gratitude, the latter study reports.
In the cultural contexts, it is understood that Chinese parents place high expectations on their children. Precisely, according to the Confucian ideology, adolescents are supposed to remain responsible for different familial functions, which include caring for the rest of the family members, cooking meals, and cleaning their homes (Shigaki, 2013). In the association, therefore, children have the duty of accepting family norms. One of the most important findings in studies is the fact that Chinese parents, as opposed to previously reported ideas, are not always motivated to regulate their children, but they have the obligation, which drives them to teach children about harmonious living with others. According to the Confucian principles, emotional expressions are considered disastrous to the relationships and health of an individual, which is why children are encouraged to refrain from the practice. The practice is one of the most essential and emphasized according to the Confucian concept of ‘face’ which calls on people to avoid shame through depicting high levels of conformity to the societal values. The culture of the Philippines cultivates feelings in children to develop a strong obligation to offer the required familial support to the rest of the members. For this reason, it is notable that Pilipino children offer daily help in the maintenance of households and care for siblings while both wives and husbands share financial decision-making responsibilities (Vafaeenejad et al., 2010). As it is the case with the Chinese culture, Pilipino parents teach concepts of hiya and pakikisama which are similar to the Chinese ideology of face—the need to always conform to specific family norms and standards.
The individualistic nature of the American society, on the other hand, contrasts most of the ideals of warmth and control that the Asian cultures depict. For example, while Asian parents perceive warmth in terms of the ability of children to help their family members and regulation according to the need to conform to familial principles, American parents value independence and autonomy. For this reason, it is likely that parents from the two cultural background may conflict in the essentials of good parenting.
Cultural Conflict on Parenting Styles
As hinted, conflicts on the efficient styles of parenting exist in the context of the two cultures. Two primary reasons can be cited in literature to suggest the source of such conflicts. First, according to Yunus (2005), the two cultures vary in the manner in which they perceive control and support. For this case, the Westernized American culture interprets parental support to the children to understand their roles in the family as a type of unnecessary control on the children, which limits their ability to develop autonomy and independence. On the other hand, parents from the Asian cultural group may consider the types of interactions—the autonomy in the US culture—as unideal, especially in instilling specific cultural and familial values among children. The second factor concerns the parental role in ensuring that their children grow and attain specific standards. In this case, cross-cultural variations can be established in literature. According to Shigaki (2013), parental sacrifice and support mean the same thing in Asian cultures—the obligation of the parents to ensure that their children have all the necessary material for their development. While the concept may be slightly similar in the American scenario, US parents strive to support their children to live independently, including developing a sense of self-identity within the competitive society. Therefore, children from either culture are likely to struggle when they are transferred across cultures.
On Whether One Community Does Better than the Other
Westernized perceptions of the effects of parenting styles suggest that the approach of parents to raising their children influences their development both as children and later as adults. After established, at least in the context of this essay, that authoritative parents nurture the best in their children in terms of responsibility and the expression of their opinions, emotional and psychological development, and economic development (Van Campen & Russell, 2010). On the contrary, authoritarian parents, the case of Asian culture for this paper, cause their children to experience issues with self-esteem in the future because they will always feel that their opinions are worthless, the same literature reports. Such children are likely to become aggressive and hostile, and in some cases, they may become liars in the hope that such character would lead them into avoiding punishment.
Several studies challenge the reported findings on the effects of styles of parenting on the development of children. Researchers, such as LeVine (2008) find no differences in the measured scores of happiness, success in life, and academic scores for children raised in both the US and Asian backgrounds. The primary modifying factors are determined by other factors in the socio-cultural sphere of life, which includes the overall performance of economy, the available opportunities for self-advancement, and other relevant factors, which may not necessarily belong to the continuum of styles of parenting.
Psychological Impact of the Topic on the Asian and American Cultures
A body of literature exists connecting psychological effects factors that contribute to the choice of parenting styles across different cultures. However, the studies are not specific to any of the cultures, but they provide a generalized perspective of such factors. According to Vafaeenejad et al. (2019), the mental health status of parents, parental stress, childhood trauma, personality traits, marital satisfaction, substance abuse, perfectionism, self-efficacy, and parental attachment styles could all have different effects on the choice of parenting styles. The same study identifies related factors on the children side, which could influence their parents into adopting specific approaches to parenting, including child temperament, anxiety, and mental health condition.
Techniques for Teaching Parenting and Child Rearing
Not so much exists in the few reviewed studies likely to recommend a specific approach to teaching families across different cultures on the approaches to raising their children, especially because the extant methods could be culturally biased and not responsive of the specific needs of families.
Limitations of the Research
The present study may be informative as it is concerning the cross-cultural perspectives of parenting, yet it suffers from two major limitations. First, empirical evidence is concentrated on the Western culture at the expense of the Asian culture because most publications and scholarly sources address the US and the rest of the West. Therefore, the findings of this study could be significantly biased, especially when the paper attempts to describe the Asian context—Westernized perspectives appear to be predominant. Consequently generalizing the findings of the research is implausible. Conducting a primary research on the topic could be one of the ways of dealing with the biased information that has already been published.
Summary of Individual Opinion
This review of literature seems to support the idea that childcare, childrearing practices differ according to cultures, and that no researcher has the authority to recommend alien practices to parents in different cultures. It should be understood that trying to force foreign principles on a people could backfire and result in cultural hatred between communities. The conflict would result primarily because different cultures have different ways in which they understand specific elements within the continuum of parenting styles. It is the role of every parent, therefore, to ensure that their children understands the tenets of their culture and that they grow up respective the cultural viewpoints of others for a harmonious existence.
References
LeVine, R. A. (2008). Anthropology and child development: A cross-cultural reader . Blackwell Pub..
Shigaki, I. S. (2013). Child care practices in Japan and the United States: How do they reflect cultural values in young children?. Young Children , 13-24.
Vafaeenejad, Z., Elyasi, F., Moosazadeh, M., & Shahhosseini, Z. (2019). Psychological factors contributing to parenting styles: A systematic review. F1000Research , 7 .
Van Campen, K. S., & Russell, S. T. (2010). Cultural differences in parenting practices: What Asian American families can teach us. Frances McClelland Institute for Children, Youth, and Families ResearchLink , 2 (1), 1-4.
Yunus, S. A. M. (2005). Childcare practices in three Asian countries. International Journal of Early Childhood , 37 , 39-56.
