Cultural values can be considered as important factors that impact parents’ social cognitions and parenting practices. However, few studies compare specific cultural values of parents and the relationships between cultural values and parenting processes in eastern and western contexts. This study examined the ethnicity differences in mothers’ cultural values, parental social cognitions (child-rearing ideologies and goals), and parenting practices between Mainland Chinese and European American contexts. Predictors of parenting goals and parenting practices were also investigated. Mothers of 4–6 years old children from the western United States (N = 78) and Shanghai/China (N = 96) participated in this study. The results suggested that mothers from Shanghai/China were both more collectivistic and individualistic than mothers from the western United States. Chinese mothers more strongly endorsed training and collectivistic parenting goals, while European American mothers more strongly endorsed individualistic parenting goals for their children. However, no significant difference was found in parenting practices for both groups of mothers. For both ethnic groups, in general, mothers’ cultural values have small but significant impact on their parenting processes. The prediction of cultural values and parenting goals on parenting practices were also different for both ethnicity groups. Although Chinese mothers were higher on both individualism and collectivism, their collectivistic values were more important in predicting parental social cognitions.

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Background: In the context of the high turnover rate of preschool nursery teachers, the preschool nursery teacher program in secondary vocational schools has been an important channel for sending qualified nursery teachers to early education institutions, and fostering students’ professional identity, which is key to their future career construction and development; therefore, this study aims to investigate the mechanism of social support on professional identity, with a chain mediating effect of psychological adjustment and school belonging. Methods: 377 third-year students from secondary vocational schools majoring in nursery and preschool teaching were surveyed with the Social Support Scale, Professional Identity Scale, School Belonging Scale, Well-being Scale, Discrimination Perception Scale and Self-Identity Scale. Results: (1) Correlation analysis showed that social support, professional identity, school belonging, and psychological adjustment (well-being, self-identity) were significantly and positively correlated with each other. A significant negative correlation was found between discrimination perception and other variables. (2) School belonging played a partially mediating role between social support and professional identity, and psychological adjustment and school belonging showed chain mediating effects between social support and professional identity. Conclusions: Social support not only directly influences professional identity, but also indirectly affects professional identity through the chain mediating effect of psychological adjustment and school belonging.