Cultural differences in child rearing practices

Throughout the development of the world, child rearing has been one of the most

argumentative topics that childhood professionals have dedicated their lives to. As time has gone

on, more factors such as socioeconomics, culture, and past parenting has effected child rearing

practices today. Each region of the world argues who raises their children better and provides

evidence of this by showing off academic excellence, low crime rates, and/or their dedicated

work forces. While these do show the success of countries, it is important to take into

consideration that some countries are more prosperous than others, which includes third world

countries. But is one cultures children any less successful, obedient, or independent than any

other. I will be breaking down how each region of the world raises their children from infancy in

hopes to enlighten others about practices that may be unknown and possibly more successful

than others.

As stated by American Mental Health, there are four different parenting styles. Indulgent

parents are those who choose to avoid confrontation and refrain from being demanding.

Authoritarian parents are those who demand to be obeyed, without offering an explanation as to

why they should be respected. Uninvolved parents are the undemanding and unresponsive ones.

Lastly, authoritative parents are assertive without being restrictive. They know how to support

their children and encourage independence, but they also expect their instructions to be

respected. This is most often the way parents choose to raise their children in America. Some

countries, such as China and Guyana, argue that the authoritarian parenting style is the best to

produce children who are more focused on academics and succeeding in life. While they are
focused on school, there is less of a chance for there to be teen pregnancy, high adolescent crime

rates, and more of a chance for well-rounded students.

Not only are there several types of parenting styles, there is also different family

members who influence childrens development such as: fathers, grandparents, siblings, and

friends who are like family. In certain cultures, there is a likely chance that fathers are less

involved with their child. This could be due to discord with the mother or the lack of initiative

whatever the case may be fathers still play an important role in childrens development. Their

involvement in the lives in children at age 7 has been found to predict their sons and daughters

mental health and competence at age 33 (Flouri & Buchanan, 2003). This study also went to

conclude that quality of father son/daughter interactions show how well they do in school. The

reason behind that is that fathers interact differently with children than mothers do. They are

more in tuned with a childs playful, creative side. Fathers are also less involved in the nurturing

part of child rearing and more into engaging physical play.

Children from some traditionally underrepresented groups are more likely to live in

mother-headed families such as African American and Puerto Rican. Grandparents in

underrepresented groups are more likely to be directly involved in child-rearing duties. For

example, African American grandmothers have been found to be significantly more active in

their relationships with their grandchildren than Euro-American grandparents (Minkler & Fuller-

Thomson, 2005). This would be because of different family situations and types. Having a

grandmother living in the house seems to be beneficial for young children- particularly those in

single-parent families. Single mothers can work multiple jobs or go back to school to earn more

money to raise their children.

African American children who live with their single mothers and grandmothers
have been found to be emotionally and socially better adjusted than children who lived only with

their single mom and show the same positive development as those raised in traditional mother-

father homes (Ruiz & Silverstein, 2007). Regardless of sex, they have the support system to keep

them in check and focused on family priorities. This also gives children the chance to grow up as

they should and take the responsibility of raising siblings away from them.

Families from many traditionally underrepresented groups in the United States include

larger numbers of children than Euro-American families (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2012). Not

surprisingly, then, young children of these families are more often played with and cared for by

older siblings. In many Puerto Rican, Mexican American, and African American households, for

example, older siblings are assigned specific child-rearing responsibilities (Hale & Franklin,

2001). These responsibilities are giving to older siblings because parents either do not want to

pay for child care or extended family is not able to help. This also occurs within cultures outside

the United States as well. Whiting and Edwards report that children living in India, Okinawa, the

Philippines, Mexico, and Kenya are more likely to be cared for by older siblings than are

children living in suburban America. Children of historically underrepresented groups more often

have primary caregivers who are nonfamily members. Nonrelated

adults of the same culture and community are often invited to join families and to share child

care responsibilities. In times of economic hardship, informal adoptions may occur in which

friends assume roles identical to those of birth parents. For instance, in African American and

Native American communities, a system of informal adoption has sometimes evolved in which

neighbors or friends care for children outside their own family (Stewart, 2006). Because of

differences in child-rearing beliefs, parents adopt several ways of interacting with their children.

Interactions vary across cultural groups in four major ways: communication, responses to crying,
teaching, carrying, and holding. Various attributes of communication with children are universal.

For example, parents in all cultures use exaggerated intonations (the rise and fall of the voice in

speaking) and unique words and sentences when speaking to their sons and daughters (Augustyn

& Zuckerman, 2007; Bornstein et al., 2002). Parents do this to either make their children laugh

or introduce them to their language. Parents of all cultures also use multiple nouns and comment

on concrete objects when talking to their infants. They do this because babies, toddlers, and

preschoolers are more attentive and smile more frequently when they are spoken to in these

specific ways. However, there are still many cultural differences in adult-to-child communication

and one instance of this is the frequency of verbalization. Talkativeness and silence mean

different things in various cultural groups. Quietness within cultural groups also does not mean

there is no communication. In addition, silence is viewed as a sign of respect in some cultures,

and quiet interchanges with children may be an early attempt to impart this concept (Basso,

2009). English-speaking Euro-American parents often use lots of language with children as well

as Cuban and Puerto Rican families. In contrast, some Mexican American, African American,

and Native American parents have been found to be less talkative with children. Again, this is

either out of respect or they communicate with their children in other ways such as play.

Crying is the way infants and young

children communicate needs, and parents responses to crying will influence their childrens

emotional and intellectual development. Parents of different cultures respond in different ways to

their childrens upset. Euro-American mothers vary considerably in how quickly they respond

when their babies cry; some wait for quite some time while others immediately respond. African,

African-American, and Cuban American mothers, in contrast, have been found to adopt a wait-

and-see response to crying (Zeskind, 2008). Their response times are delayed so they can fully
get perspective on why their child is crying. An overriding concern among these parents are that

if they give their child too much attention they will become spoiled or neglected, so they want to

give the right amount of attention.

African American parents prefer using a pacifier or physical stimulation in

response to crying, while European mothers often use physical touch, holding, and breastfeeding.

Cuban mothers were found to use a combination of a pacifier and cuddling to soothe crying

(Zeskind, 2008). There is a variation in how each culture soothes and reacts to crying because it

is viewed as a distress signal and an expression of need. While others take this time to nurture

attachment and feelings of security, other parents are more concerned to seeing what the concern

is and taking care of the issue so the infant will be content once again.

Cultural diversity in methods of holding babies has inspired many misconceptions

and stereotypes. For example, carrying practices such as swaddling and bounding have been

viewed as detrimental to childrens development, and parents using these methods are portrayed

as misguided or neglectful. Likewise, parents who seldom carry their babies are sometimes

viewed as negligent. Swaddling is technique that some parents use because it is somewhat

similar to the condition the infant was in when the baby was in the womb. It can keep your baby

from being disturbed by their own startle reflex, and it can help them stay warm and toasty for

the first few days of life until their internal thermostat kicks in. It may even help to calm your

baby. In fact, carrying and holding methods are a function of a cultural norms, the

practical demands of work and family life, and the temperament of infants themselves. In

America, babies of many cultures are carried in parents arms. Backpacks and slings are

sometimes used for short periods to travel from one place to another. Commonly infants are

cradled or held in a parents arms close to the chest, balanced on one hip, or bounced or rocked
on a knee or lap (Fotus, Roopnarine, Lamb, & Evans, 2012). African American babies are held

more often during the day and are carried until later in life than Euro-American infant. On the

contrary, Mexican American parents tend to pick up babies less often than other cultural groups

do (Hale-Benson, 1986). Parents do this, in theory, to promote independency to their children

without coming off as neglectful.

With the ability of holding a baby, comes the ability of gaining

trust from that infant and with trust comes an attachment formation. A critical part of achieving

trust, is the ability of babies to know and bond with caregivers. Forming an emotional bond with

others in infancy is called attachment. Babies perform social behaviors- smiling, making eye

contact, and cooing- that capture adults attention and elicit strong feelings of care and concern.

Caregivers respond to these behaviors with warmth and social contact. Thus, babies and

significant adults become attached to one another. A traditional view has been that infants only

form attachments with their mothers. However, an extensive cross-cultural research observation

has shown that this is not the case. Babies often form attachments to multiple caregivers.

In most two-parent families, babies become

attached to both father and mother at the same time. In cultures in which grandparents, uncles,

aunts, or other relatives live in the house, infants form attachments at the same time they do with

their mother (Lamb, 2005). This is because these people are around as much as their parents and

are also taking part in the raising of the infant. Infants also form different types of attachments

depending on the situation their caregiver puts them in. There are three types of attachment:

secure, insecure/avoidant, and insecure/ambivalent. Secure means the infant will play happily

while their parent is there and gets upset when they leave, but the infant will greet their parent

joyously when they return to the room. Insecure/avoidant attachment come from children who
may or may not cry when their parents leave and ignore or even avoid the parent when they

come back. Insecure/ambivalent attachment comes from infants who show great upset when

parents leave and continue to be inconsolable when the parent returns. They also alternate

between desperately clingy or angry towards the parent.

Babies of many cultural groups around the

world fall into secure or insecure categories of attachment at approximately the same rate as

American infants: 70% are securely attached, 20-25% are insecure/avoidant, and 5-10% are

insecure/ambivalent (Bakermans-Kranenburg & van Ijezendoorn, 2006). Factors behind these

numbers could be that parents do not have time for their children, cultural differences in how to

respond to crying which has an effect on the infant, or the basic nature of the infants; they are

going to cry. In studies of Japanese, Chinese, and Korean, more than 40% showed

insecure/ambivalent attachment (S.Chen, 1996). The reason behind this is because these specific

babies spend far less time away from their mothers than other babies in different cultures do.

There are also high

rates of insecure/avoidant attachment in German communities because of the cultural values and

socialization practices. Northern German mothers are found to engage in independence training

in which children are encouraged to separate from their families at an early age (Grossmann et

al., 1985). Closeness and dependence are discouraged. These values cause babies in German

cultural groups to ignore mothers during reunions. It is important to understand that cultural

differences in how children are attached to parents cause them to be in their relationships as they

grow and mature. The Asian children are going to become more dependent on their parents and

look to them for guidance and advice. The German children are going to grow up looking

forward to independency and will not depend on their parents for guidance and advice as much.
 In the world,

there are so many ways children are raised, viewed, and taken care of. Some families are able to

stay together and raise their children all by themselves, while others require the village to put in

extra effort and insure that their children are raised just as well as the basic nuclear family. As

research was collected for this paper it has become clear that as long as the infant has a strong,

supportive family that they will grow up just as well as any other child in the world.
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