Family, material and worldview values and the process of intergenerational transmission

Abstract

The aim of the research was to analyze the relationships between family and material values and the worldview of parents and their adult children. 68 parents (34 women and 34 men) and their 51 adult children (33 women and 18 men) participated in the study. Parents were in middle and late adulthood (41-67 years), while their children were in early adulthood (18-30 years). The following psychological questionnaires were used: the Material Values Scale (MVS_PL) in the Polish adaptation of Górnik-Durose (2016), the Scale of World Assumptions Scale in the Polish adaptation of Załuski and Gajdosz (2012), the Familism Scale in the Polish study by Walęcka-Matyja (2020) and a questionnaire. The obtained research results indicate a significant stabilization in the parental transmission of family values and beliefs about the world. Intergenerational differentiation was observed in terms of materialistic values.

Intergenerational transmission of parenting as a value

“…Connected to familism, meaning the cultural value of positive feelings towards one's family (Campos et al, 2014;Walęcka-Matyja, 2022), parenting shares with familism its prioritisation of collectivist kinship roles over one's own individualistic value orientations. Particularly in the female, matrilinear line, familism strongly overlaps with family-centric value-orientations.…”

“…These "private" and "public" realms are intertwined, with significant interdependencies between socially desirable values promoted by institutions and those passed down from generation to generation (Roest et al, 2010;Vedder et al, 2009). Denoting the scope of continued similarity within attitudes, beliefs, and behavioural patterns observed between members of the same family across generations (Bertaux & Thompson, 1993;Min et al, 2012;Walęcka-Matyja, 2022), intergenerational transmission in families reflects -to different degrees -the axiomatic value-system (Rohan & Zanna, 1996) and Zeitgeist (Vedder et al, 2009) of the society in which the families operate. Moreover, value transfers rarely happen through explicit measures, instead occurring through parents' everyday actions, during shared meals, when telling ancestral stories, as well as through disciplining and rewards (Bertaux & Thompson, 1993;Schönpflug, 2001).…”

“…According to this premise, it would be more challenging to intergenerationally foster reproductive ambivalence than to communicate the validity of a traditional transitional path towards marriage and having children (cf. Perales et al, 2021;Schönpflug, 2001;Walęcka-Matyja, 2022).…”

“…More specifically, the older generation (i.e., the young adults' parents) tended to subscribe to collectivism and familism (cf. Campos et al, 2014;Walęcka-Matyja, 2022;Farnicka, 2016). As such, they were similar to older interviewees' generation from the first type, underlining that being a parent was their most important life role.…”

“…The process of intergenerational transmission refers to the extent to which similarities in attitudes, beliefs and behavioural patterns observed between members of the same family persist across generations (Bertaux & Thompson, 1993;Kajta & Pustułka, 2023;Maccoby, 2007;Min et al, 2012;Schönpflug, 2001;Walęcka-Matyja, 2022). In essence, scholars are interested in how the norms and values of parents and children (and their children) compare over time, mainly, because questions about whether fundamentals remain intergenerationally congruent or begin to diverge are significant for sociological understandings of social change, and useful for effective formulation of family policy (see: Belsky, 1984;Chen & Kaplan, 2001).…”