Relations of Perceived Maternal Parenting Style to Academic Competence - Annotated Bibliography Example

Cheung, Cecilia S., & Chang, C. (2008). Relations of Perceived Maternal Parenting Style, Practices, and Learning Motivation to Academic Competence in Chinese Children. Merill-Palmer Quarterly. 54, 1-22. Purpose and Hypotheses of the Study It is well known that Chinese children lean towards above average academic abilities. Previous studies regarding the area have given several factors including cultural beliefs, parenting, and socialization as contributors to the perceived success of Chinese children in the field of academics, but it not yet clear whether maternal parenting style is indeed related to the academic motivation of Chinese children. The objective of the present study is to find out whether maternal parenting style contributes to academic motivation of Chinese children. Sample To conduct the study, the authors obtained a sample of 91 fifth grade Chinese students from Hong Kong primary schools. The average age of the students were between 11-12 years old. Socioeconomic status of the samples varied, but the majority were from middle class families. For the sexual distribution of the samples, the number of male samples outnumbered the female samples with 49 boys, and 42 girls respectively. Methods and Procedures Before the participants were formally tested, the authors interviewed teachers and parents regarding common parental practices. The information from the interviews were then gathered and analyzed until they were narrowed down to 40 statements. The statements were then presented to the children, until only 25 of the statements were left. To conduct the study proper, the samples were subjected to a series of scales regarding the parental practices obtained from the interviews, and official examination records were obtained from school records. In conducting the study, several factors were considered. The factors were: 1) support and engagement, 2) achievement and demands, 3) general surveillance. The Maternal Treatment Scale of the Parental Image Differential was used to determine the perception of children of their mother's parenting style. On the other hand, the learning motivation was determined by utilizing two self rated measures of academic motivation. Result and Discussion The results of the study showed that there were no gender discrepancies obtained except for the sub scales of support and encouragement. The values obtained for the sub scales showed that boys had higher levels of perception regarding supportive practice than girls. After correlation analysis of the variables of interest, it was revealed that the three clusters of maternal academic practices were correlated positively. Regarding motivation, it was found out in the study that ego and mastery learning were highly intercorrelated. It was also noted by the authors that perception of children regrading the four subjects were correlated to a high degree, and that children who rated themselves high in one area also rated themselves high in the other areas. The study showed that concern and restrictiveness, although independent could coexist with each other. The study has shown that motivation regarding academics related to support and encouragement, while competence in Chinese children was explained by mastery motivation. Lastly, maternal demands regarding achievement and restrictive style contributed to the actual school grades. The study also revealed that academic practices were consistent, and this finding suggests that mothers do not employ a single form of parental practice but involve various practices in training their children. Limitations cited by the authors It was noted by the authors in the study that because of the nature of the study, it is not possible to make a clear conclusion regarding the constructs observed. Although maternal support may contribute to a child's learning motivation, there is a high probability that children with higher motivation may perceive their mothers the same way. Other issues The only other issue perceived in the study is that the authors chose to study the maternal practices relation to academic motivation in Chinese children. This is an issue because of China's Confucian society wherein the structure of the family is patriarchal, with the father as the head of the house. The authors should have looked at the study in this context because the father also plays an important, if not bigger role in the motivation of the child especially in Chinese culture. Suchman, N., McMahon, T., DeCoste, C., Castiglioni, C., & Luthar, S. (2008). Ego Development, Psychopathology, and Parenting Problems in Substance Abusing Mothers. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry. 78, 20-28. Purpose and Hypotheses of the Study Past research have shown for the last 20 years that although a small population of substance abusing mothers are able to raise children without sacrificing their children's development, there is still a significant risk involved. It has also been observed in previous studies that there is a link between poor discipline skills, and substance abuse in parent-child relationships. The objective of the study conducted by Suchman et al(2008),was to observe whether substance abusing mothers with highly developed egos were prone to depression, and anxiety compared to those mothers with less developed egos. Another objective of the study is to evaluate whether maternal intelligence is linked to maternal ego development. Sample To obtain the samples for the study, the authors recruited mothers who were addicted to opium, and who were interested in joining a parenting group. Requirements for a mother to be allowed as a sample are as follows:,1) Must have a child that is less than 16 years old, 2) problems with parenting, all in all a final total of 182 participants were obtained by the authors for the study. Of the 182 participants, the mean ages were 36.26 years. The average number of children per mother is 1.45, while the average age of children was 9.59 years old. It was also noted in the study that half of the children were male. Methods and Procedures To evaluate the maternal ego development of the mothers, the Washington University Sentence Completion Test was used. Subjects were asked to complete 18 sentences, and the responses were coded by a rater for later use.Meanwhile, to evaluate maternal intelligence, the Kaufmann Brief Intelligence was used, which involved the screening of verbal and non verbal intelligence. Results were then rate with scores ranging from 70 to 160 depending on the scores achieved in the test. On the other hand, to assess maternal psychopathology, the Brief Symptom Inventory test was used. In the the test, the participants were subjected to self report on 9 symptoms of psychopathology on 53 items involving: somatization, depression, anxiety, and interpersonal sensitivity.Lastly, to evaluate maternal parenting, the Parental Acceptance-Rejection Questionnaire was used. the participants were asked to partake in in a 60 item self report test rated on 4 points. In the study preliminary analysis of the data gathered from the various tests employed the Pearson's Product Moment Correlation Coefficient, to evaluate covariation between maternal verbal intelligence, and maternal ego development. Results and Discussions Analysis of the data obtained from the tests showed that the self awareness stage(E5) composed a majority of the ego development level at 35.7 SD, followed by the the conformist(E4) and self protective(E3) stages at 30.2 and 28.0 SD respectively.It was noted by the authors, regarding maternal ego and development that there was a correlation between maternal ego development and parental neglect and warmth, but not aggression. Although past studies involving substance abuse in adults show that the majority of ego development fell on the self protective stage(E3), it was revealed by the authors in this study that the modal level of ego development fell on the self awareness(E5) stage. Regarding maternal ego development and psychopathology, it was noted by the authors that results were inconclusive when it came to association between ego development and psychopathology. In the area of maternal ego development and parenting, the study showed that mothers who were less developed regarding ego development were prone to aggression and neglect towards their children. Previous studies regarding the subject showed that relation between maternal intelligence and ego development did not substitute for relation between ego development and psychopathology. Limitations cited by the authors It was noted by the authors in the study that although the findings confirm that there is a relationship between maternal ego development and other factors, it is possible that some of the data obtained from the test may have been altered when the mothers entered treatment. Also, it was revealed that the data obtained from the mothers were based on self report and not through objective observations, and thus may have been biased. Other issues It may have been better if the study was not only limited to substance abusing mothers, but also to the fathers as well. Also, the samples were only limited to opium using mothers, and not to other substances which may have different effects other than those observed from opium abuse. Anthony, J., Williams, J., McDonald, R., & Francis, D. (2007). Phonological Processing and Emergent Literacy in Younger and Older Preschool Children. Annals of Dyslexia, 57, 113-137. Purpose and Hypothesis of the Study Decades of research on literacy have revealed that problems involving the processing of phonological information is one of the primary contributors for children to have difficulty in reading. The objective of this study is to expand the work of previous researchers to English speaking children. First, it is important to evaluate the PPA of preschool children, second, to identify association between the English PPA of younger and older children by utilizing a wide variety of emergent literacy skills. In making the study the researchers made 4 research hypothesis:1) General cognitive ability can be identified from phonological processing ability, 2) different phonological processing abilities can be identified from each other, 3) there is a difference in the phonological processing abilities of younger and older preschool children, 4) at some point in the literacy development of children, phonological processing abilities may show varying relations with emergent literacy skills. Sample The participants in the present study were children who previously participated in a project conducted by the first author. In obtaining the samples, two methods of sampling were utilized, both random sampling methods. In the 1st year, the samples were obtained from 236 children from classrooms that employed English as a medium of instruction. In the 2nd year, a stratified sampling method was used, and 44 of 74 classrooms were chosen to partake in the study. After the classrooms were chosen, 4 monolingual English speaking students were chosen from each classroom for a total of 153 samples. The breakdown of the samples are as follows: 51% Hispanic American, 47% African American, 1% European American, 1% Asian American, and lastly 1% other. It was also noted by the authors that more than half of the samples were male. The average age of the participants ranged from 43 to 67 months, with a median of 55, and a standard deviation of 7. Methods and Procedures To evaluate the children's phonological awareness,phonological memory, phonological access, print awareness, and letter knowledge, the Preschool Comprehensive Test of Phonological and Print Processing was employed. Evaluation of phonological awareness employed three measures, they were: elision, blending, and initial sound matching. The measures required the participating children to identify pictures as a response to a stimulus. On the other hand, to evaluate phonological memory measures from the PCTOPPP, and Woodcock Johnson Revised were employed. For the assessment of phonological access the Rapid Object Naming card was used, and for the evaluation of letter knowledge the Print Awareness subtest was utilized. Lastly for the evaluation of word reading abilities, a 25 item test involving one syllable 2-4 letter words were used. The timescale for the study was two years and the children were tested at the start of the school year. In conducting the research, examiners trained in Dial -3 tested children individually for 30 minutes. Results and Discussion After the analysis of exploratory factors, sub tests employing the least squares extraction produced two components. The components had eigen values greater than 1.0. On the other hand, the nonverbal ability factor contributed to the variance of those tests employing visual spatial, and visual motor integration abilities. The present study examined the innate phonological processing abilities of preschool children, and the relation between these abilities with emergent literacy. After analysis of the data, the researchers obtained five important findings: 1) phonological processing abilities can be identified from cognitive ability, 2) that PPA are a separate but correlated abilities, 3) the relation among PPA in both younger and older children are the same, 4) phonological abilities were related to emergent literacy skills, and lastly, 5) there is an indirect influence on emergent literacy in children from their general cognitive ability. Like other researchers, the authors found out that the phonological processing abilities of children were related to their general cognitive ability. Another significant finding obtained by the researchers was that the performance of preschool children regarding phonological processing tests were by the conceptualization of phonological processing. It was noted by the authors in the study that the present study differed from Wagner et al. The final significant finding obtained from the study, which was not in the researchers original hypothesis was that emergent literacy skills are not predicted by general cognitive ability. Limitations cited by the author In the study, the authors noted that the present study did not, or was not able to rather, provide a thorough examination of early phonological processing abilities, because the study utilized a single shot study design. Also noted by the authors is that the relations among phonological processing abilities and emergent literature regarding directionality and causality were not addressed. Other issues The only limitation in the study is that the findings were limited to native English speakers. It would have been better if the researchers also involved non native English speakers in the study. Read More