Mothers’ Experience of Social Change and Individualistic Parenting Goals Over Two Generations in Urban China

Abstract

During the past four decades, China has gone through rapid urbanization and modernization. As people adapt to dramatic sociodemographic shifts from rural communities to urban centers and as economic level rises, individualistic cultural values in China have increased. Meanwhile, parent and child behavior in early childhood has also evolved accordingly to match a more individualistic society. This mixed-method study investigated how social change in China may have impacted parenting goals and child development in middle childhood, as seen through the eyes of the current generation of mothers. Thirty mothers of fifth-grade elementary school students from Shenzhen, China were recruited and took part in semi-structured interviews. Participants answered questions and provided examples about their children’s life, their own childhood, and the perceived differences between the two generations. Participating mothers were also asked to rate which generation, themselves or their parents, cared more about the childrearing goals of academic competitiveness and socioemotional well-being. Using both qualitative and quantitative analysis, we expected and found an intergenerational increase in the perceived value mothers placed on individualistic traits: current mothers care more about their children’s academic competitiveness, personal happiness, and social adjustment, compared to their experience of their own mothers’ attitudes during their childhood a generation earlier. They also experience conflict between their children’s academic competitiveness and socioemotional well-being. As a function of both urbanization and increased economic means, children’s collectivistic family responsibilities for essential household chores have declined as the importance of schoolwork has increased.

Self-Overestimation in Early Childhood and Beyond

“…One possibility is that the tendency for children to overestimate themselves is widespread and relatively independent of cultural variation, which would be consistent with the view of selfoverestimation as a functional adaptation that benefits young children's learning and growth (Bjorklund & Beer, 2016;Shin et al, 2007). At the same time, it is also possible that individualistic trends have permeated modern-day China (and perhaps especially the urban areas where we conducted our research) to such an extent, that the Chinese children we tested have been exposed to quite similar norms and socialization messages as their Dutch counterparts-more than we anticipated at the outset of the research (Bian et al, 2022;Chen et al, 2005;Santos et al, 2017). Thus, while we consider our cross-cultural findings to be valuable, caution is needed in interpreting these findings.…”

Perceptions and desires of Chinese senior outbound tourists receiving travel support from adult children: a qualitative study

“…Other studies also reported that modernization fosters individualism (Han et al, 2020). Individualism has risen in urban Chinese society with the increase in urban residence, education level, divorce rate, and decrease in family size (Bian et al, 2022;Sun and Ryder, 2016). The impact of individualism is changing in different generations.…”

“…, 2020). Individualism has risen in urban Chinese society with the increase in urban residence, education level, divorce rate, and decrease in family size (Bian et al. , 2022; Sun and Ryder, 2016).…”

“…Specifically, the Chinese millennials put individualism as the central point in their attitude and they oppose collectivist spirits (Moore, 2005). Nonetheless, researchers demonstrated that while individualism is increasing rapidly, collectivism in China is not absent (Bian et al, 2022) and China is still considered as a collectivist country (Michailova and Hutchings, 2006;Steele and Lynch, 2013). The collectivistic cultural impact is not only present for Chinese people in the mainland China, but also for Chinese people all over the world.…”

Why do many parents expect more help from their children during COVID-19? A qualitative follow-up to quantitative survey data

“…( Bian et al, 2022 , English version (Cognitive aspects of informal education), 1982 , Greenfield et al, 2003 , Greenfield et al, 2019 , Rothstein-Fish, 2003 )…”