Cross-Cultural Study Of Mother-Child Interactions And Child’s Intelligence

Abstract

The article presents the results of a cross-cultural analysis of the structure of the relationship between primary school age children’s perception of maternal attitude and children’s intelligence on the Russian and Kyrgyz samples. These countries are characterized, on the one hand, by similarities in the organization of the national education system, and, on the other hand, differences in socioeconomic status and effectiveness of public education. The sample comprised 1334 early school age children: 690 students (52.5% boys) from Russian Federation (Moscow District), and 644 students (45.5% boys) from Kyrgyz Republic (Bishkek city). The age of Russian participants ranges from 6.8 to 11.7 years (M=9.3, SD=1.03); the age range of Kyrgyz participants is from 6.8 to 11.8 years (M=9.2, SD=1.16). The perceived maternal attitude was assessed with The Children’s Report of Parental Behavior Inventory, mother version. A statistically significant effect of the country was observed for intelligence and three aspects of the maternal attitude – Acceptance, Positive involvement and Hostile detachment. On average, Kyrgyz children perceive mothers' attitude as more emotionally accepting and less rejective, compared to Russian peers. Regression analysis revealed predictors of intelligence: on the Russian sample – children's perception of the maternal attitude as emotionally rejecting; on the Kyrgyz sample – the degree of maternal hostile detachment. It was shown that the contribution of these perceived aspects of the maternal attitude to child’s intelligence depends on the complexity of the intelligence test items.

Keywords: Child perception of the parental attitudeEmotional acceptanceThe nature of involvement in child activitiesIntelligenceCross-cultural analysisPrimary school age

Introduction

The modern studies of family environment are concerned primarily with finding the environmental factors, which contribute to the development of individual differences in cognitive abilities and personality. The regular candidates are such family factors as, for example, social economic status (Roksa, Potter, 2011), parents' socio-cultural attitudes toward the value of education (Sy, Schulenberg, 2005), parental divorce and new marriages (Hetherington, Bridges, Insabella, 1998), parents' and children’ personality traits (Hines, & Holcomb-McCoy, 2013; Malykh, Tikhomirova, 2015).

However, the importance of studies of parental attitudes to children is emphasized in the context of the individual differences in cognitive abilities (Tikhomirova, Malykh, 2017; Pougnet et al., 2011; Cheung, Pomerantz, 2011; Harold, Aitken, Shelton, 2007). In this case, the parental attitude to a child is understood as a set of characteristic, non situation-specific ways of emotional relating and treating the specific child by the specific parent. According to the social psychological literature, two aspects represent the parental attitude to a child most accurately: 1) the degree of emotional acceptance of the child, and 2) the character of the participation in the child’s activities (e.g. Kagitcibasi, 2005).

Most studies on the links between different aspects of parenting and children’s cognitive achievements are focused on the investigation of the role of emotional acceptance (warmth) and control in academic achievement. In particular, it is shown that the low level of emotional acceptance by a parent is associated with low scores on academic tests (Kordi, Bahamdin, 2010; Harold, Aitken, Shelton, 2007), while high levels of parental control are associated with high academic achievement in adolescents (Pong, Hao, Gardner, 2005). As studies also report, positive participation of parents is positively related to adolescents' success in learning different subjects (Kordi, Baharudin, 2010; Xitao, Michael, 2001; Kaisa, Hakan, Jari-erik, 2000).

In addition, such studies emphasize mothers’ relationships with children. For example, the association between maternal attitude to a child in infancy and academic achievement in school is often reported (Cassidy, Berlin, 1994). It is also underscored that the maternal attitude to children is not static, but is subject to change during different time periods in a child’s life. For instance, as demonstrated in a longitudinal study of the dynamics of parent-child relationships, the parental attitude to a child is changed with school admission – the control strengthens and the demands increase (Luzhetskaya, Pavlova, 2003).

It should be particularly noted that the aspects of parental attitude are studied mostly from the parents’ point of view – mothers and/or fathers fill out various questionnaires. In accordance with the results of psychological and behavior genetic studies, the factors of family environment should be analyzed as factors of non-shared environment – environmental influences, which do not contribute to the resemblance between children who are raised in formally equal conditions (Malykh, Tikhomirova, Kovas, 2012; Plomin et al., 2012). Indeed, on the one hand, parents can treat their children differently; on the other hand, children from the same family might perceive their parents differently through the prism of their personality (Tikhomirova, Malykh, 2017; Harris, Morgan, 1991).

Beyond that, the results from different studies of family environment suggest that there is low agreement between the answers of mothers and children, who completed the same research questionnaire – the reported correlation coefficients range from 0.11 to 0.41 for younger adolescents (Tsaousis, Mascha, Giovazolias, 2012) and from 0.31 to 0.41 for young adults (Schwarz, Barton-Hanry, Pruzinsky, 1985). Such results could be explained by genetic differences and unique experiences, which could project through the child’s perception of parenting.

The studies of children’s perceptions of parental treatment are generally developing in the direction of the interrelations between parenting and individual differences in academically relevant traits (e.g., Cheung, McBride-Chang, 2008). In particular, it is reported that the perceived parental emotional support contributes to the individual differences in motivation and academic achievement in children (Tikhomirova et al., 2015; Pougnet et al., 2011; Roy, Kwon, 2007).

In the studies on the links between parenting and children’s cognitive abilities, the family environment is traditionally analyzed through child’s perceptions of family stability/chaos (Dumas et al., 2005). As an example, the interrelationship between the perceived home instability and low levels of child intelligence is reported (Dumas et al., 2005), as well as high level of behavioral disorders (Petrill et al., 2004). As reported in a longitudinal study of the direction of effects of family environment and child intelligence, the perceived family environment instability influences low intelligence in children (Deater-Deckard et al., 2009).

Specialists in parent-child relationships report stable cross-cultural differences in the degree of emotional acceptance and the style of parental involvement in child’s activities, as well as in the differences of child’s perceptions of parenting. As demonstrated by research, Asian parents more actively participate in educating their children than European parents (Zhou et al., 2006; Lim, Lim, 2004; Huntsinger, Jose, Larson, 1998). This fact underlies the explanation of the cross-cultural supremacy of the school children from China, Singapore, and Korea in mathematics and STEM disciplines (PISA, www.pisa.oecd.org). The cross-cultural studies of the parental assessment of their children’s intellectual abilities are of interest (Furnham, Rakow, Mak, 2002; Furnham, Mkhize, Mndaweni, 2004, etc.). As demonstrated by Furnham & Fukumoto (2008), Japanese parents generally rate their children lower in cognitive abilities, than parents from USA and European countries. Cross-cultural differences in parental ratings of intelligence are usually explained by the socially desired behavioral and personality traits in different cultural communities, for example, modesty in Japan (Furnham, Hosoe et al., 2002; Furnham, Fukumoto, 2008).

Problem Statement

To conclude, the theoretical analysis revealed some principal moments in research on the links of parenting and child cognitive abilities.

First, it is necessary to focus the research on the studying of child perceptions of mother’s attitude, that is, the levels of emotional acceptance and the style of participation in child’s activities. In particular, the level of acceptance can vary depending on emotional rejection of a child by a mother, and the style of mother’s participation can vary from hostile detachment to positive involvement.

Second, it seems highly relevant to study the link between different aspects of children’s perception of parental attitude and the intelligence test scores in children. In addition, it is necessary to interpret the causal relationships in accordance with the study design and the results.

  Third, it is possible that the sample of primary school age children would be the most informative. At this age, on the one hand, the orientation towards importance of parenting still persists; and on the other hand, the reflexive abilities of children aged 8-10 years allow to assess the parental attitude adequately with the questionnaire tests.

Fourth, the structure of the interrelationships parental attitude perception and children intelligence will be examined from the point of cross-cultural resemblance and difference: the participants from Russian Federation and Kyrgyz Republic took part in the study representing the European and Asian models of family relationships.

Research Questions

In the cross-cultural comparative study we analyze the similarities and the differences for the measures of children’s perceptions of maternal attitude and the level of intelligence at primary school age, and the structure of the associations.

Purpose of the Study

The aim of current study is the cross-cultural analysis of the interrelationships of children’s perceptions of maternal attitude and their intellectual abilities on the Russian and Kyrgyz samples.

Research Methods

Findings

All measures of the perceptions of maternal attitude and children intelligence were factor analyzed for the check of structural equivalence of the data from Russian and Kyrgyz samples. The factor analysis proved the invariant data structure: two factors emerged from the Russian and Kyrgyz samples, explaining 67.9% and 64.7% of the variance, respectively. Consequently, the results of factor analysis support the structural equivalence of data, allowing for the interpretation of the quantitative measures in the cross-cultural context.

Conclusion

To conclude, the current study allowed to refine the structure of the inter-relationships of primary school age children’s perceptions of mother’s attitude with the intelligence test scores of children on the samples from Russian Federation and Kyrgyzstan. In particular, it was demonstrated that the Kyrgyz children perceive their mothers’ attitude as more emotionally accepting and less rejecting, in comparison with the Russian peers. At the same time, the results of Russian school children on solving cognitive problems are on average higher than of Kyrgyz school children. The predictors of intelligence scores were found: the child perceptions of maternal attitude as emotionally rejecting on the Russian sample; the mother’s level of hostile detachment on the Kyrgyz sample, as assessed by children. The results of the regression analysis conducted on both samples support the contribution of the negative aspects of perceived maternal attitude to children’s intelligence scores: the higher children rate their mothers as emotionally rejecting, the lower intelligence scores the children have. Interestingly, the contribution of these perceived aspects of maternal attitude to children’s intelligence scores depends on the intelligence test tasks complexity.

Along with that, it seems necessary to ask a question on the directions of the associations between the children’s perceptions of maternal attitude and children’s intelligence scores. For example, there is a possibility that the aspects of children’s perceptions of parenting affect the intelligence test scores. However, it is possible to hypothesize that the level of child cognitive development influences the differences in children’s perceptions of parenting. However, the scientific answer to this question could be yielded only from the longitudinal analysis of the structure of associations, which would include the samples from different age and social-cultural groups.

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the grant from the Russian Science Foundation №17-78-30028

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