Childrearing Values in Greece, Taiwan, and the United States

Objective. The purpose of this investigation was to compare childrearing values in mothers of preschoolers from Greece, Taiwan and the United States. Design. Seventy-two middle-class mothers of 3- to 4-year-old children (24 per country) were interviewed about the values they wish to instill in their children using open-ended probes and an ordering task of values. Four broad categories of values were identified based on a modification of Harwood, Miller, and Irizarry's (1995) taxonomy: (1) Decency, referring to values emphasizing character, (2) Proper Demeanor, referring to values emphasizing appropriate relatedness and behaviors, (3) Self-maximization, referring to values emphasizing the development of self potential and individuality, and (4) Sociability/lovingness, referring to values emphasizing affective and social dimensions of relatedness. Results. Mothers from the three countries emphasized similar values in both tasks. However, cultural differences in value categories were evident, echoing the unique cultural frameworks of the three societies. Conclusions. Cultural ideologies are reflected in the values parents seek to instill in their young children, and different methodological approaches highlight cultural similarities and differences. © 2002, Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

Intervention in lower-class Surinam-Dutch families: Effects on mothers and infants

Contains fulltext : 28063.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Thirty-seven Surinam-Dutch lower-class families with a one-year-old child participated in "Instapje", a parent-focused home-based intervention programme. The intervention was devised to improve quality of parental support to the child on four behavioural dimensions: supportive presence, respect for the child's autonomy, structure and limit setting, and quality of instruction. The programme was presented to the parents in 16 weekly home-visits, starting when the child was 13 months old. When the children were 18 months of age, intervention group parents were indeed significantly more supportive of their children than parents in a comparable control group of 38 Surinam-Dutch families. Moreover, intervention group children scored significantly higher on the Bayley Mental Scale of Infant Development than children in the control group. No intervention effects were found on quality of the parent-child relationship and on parents' sense of competence in child rearing