Huey-Ya Lin
Department of Psychology Soochow University
His study consists two aims. These aims are (1) to describe the characteristics of mothers’ child-rearing behaviors during mother–child interactions, and (2) to describe the characteristics of mothers’ child-rearing behaviors in the sequences of mother–child interactions.
Based on observational records of interactions between 13 pairs of children aged 5 or 6 and their mothers, we analyze the natures of interacting events, mothers’ child-rearing behaviors, children’s behaviors and results of interactions. The results are shown in the followings. First of all, mothers seem to play the role of socializing agent actively during the interactions between mothers and children. In addition, mothers play the role of socializing agent in terms of directors or educators, which means that mothers more often initiate controlled–events than children do to modify or maintain children’s behaviors. Moreover, mothers usually deal with children’s behaviors by means of instruction or prohibition, or even punishment.
Secondly, mothers’ child-rearing behaviors are significantly interacted with the natures of interacting events and children’s behaviors, but not with mothers themselves. Finally, when the immediate sequential interactions between mothers’ child-rearing behaviors and children’s reactions are examined, the features are: positive actions in return for positive actions, and negative actions in return for negative actions, as well as children’s ignorance in return for mothers’ repeated instruction or prohibition.
Keywords: child-rearing behaviors, mother-child interaction