Youth Development in Chinese Context: Family-Based Perspective
Yi Huang


Ecological System Framework (Bronfenbrenner, 1979)
ecological theor.png
Micro-system:
Family
School
Peer relationships

•Meso system: the interactions between elements in micro system.
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•Eg. The communications between parents and teachers in school regarding children’s academic
achievement, problematic behaviors etc.
•Eg. Parents’ monitoring of children’s social behaviors in peer relationships.
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•Exosystem: Mirco- and meso- systems are nested in exosystem.
•Eg. A city where your family, school and friends settle.
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•Macrosystem: eg. Politics, religion belief, shared value and belief in a cultural context.
•Chronosystem: history event. It is easy to image that the context of generation of World War II is
different from the generation of internet.
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Micro- : Parents/Family
•Parenting Belief: China vs US
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•         Family relationship
•         Chinese families emphasize the importance of family closeness and harmony because of
Confucianism(Ho, 1986; Uba, 1994). In Confucian’s theory, the basic unit of society is the
interpersonal relationship, instead of an individual.
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•         Empirically, in the comparison of US families, perceived parental warmth, and conflict
with parents were associated in the expected direction with depressive symptoms more strongly in
China (Greenberger et. al., 2020).
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Micro- : Parents/Family
•Parenting Style: China vs US
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•         Chinese Parental Belief: two-dimension structure (Chao, 1994)
•         A. Parent-child relationship
•         B. Ideologies on children’s development and learning
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•         Chinese Parenting (Chao, 1994; Xu, et. al., 2005; Chan, Bowes, Wyver, 2009)
•         A. Authoritative
•         B. Authoritarian
•         C. Permissive
•         D. Neglectful
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Micro- : Parents/Family
• In the western context, there’re four typical types of parenting styles and usually, you can
clarify which type describes a western parent. However, it is possible to find Chinese parents can
get high scores in both authoritative and authoritarian parenting behaviors.
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•Explanation:
• (1) underscoring family relationship ---> authoritative parenting
• (2) having ideologies or plan for children’s future ---> authoritarian parenting

Meso- : Parents/Family + School + Peer relationships
•         A. High emphasis on academic achievement (The interaction between family setting and
school setting) :
•         Thus, in China, grade in school has a stronger influence on adolescents’ mental health
(Greenberger et. al., 2020).
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•         B.  The interaction between family setting and peer relationships:
•         Chinese parents are inclined to compare their children’s behaviors with those of
adolescents in their native countries or with their own experiences growing up (Qin, 2006).
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Macro- : How culture or policy influences Chinese parents
•         A. Gender equality
•         Decades of centralized political and ideological efforts directed toward
•         eliminating gender inequalities might be expressed in a smaller, or even nonexistent,
•         the gender gap in depressive symptoms in this Chinese cultural setting.
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Empirically, compared to the USA, the gender difference in depression is smaller in China
(Greenberger et. al., 2020)
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•         B. One-child policy
•         In urban area of China, only-children experienced significantly lower love awareness from
family, higher neurotic and social depression, trait anxiety, perceived stressors, and
interpersonal dependency than did urban non-only children (Liu et.al., 2005).
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•References:
•Greenberger, E., Chen, C., Tally, S. R., & Dong, Q. (2000). Family, peer, and individual
correlates of depressive symptomatology among US and Chinese adolescents. Journal of consulting and
clinical psychology, 68(2), 209.
•Chao, R. K. (1994). Beyond parental control and authoritarian parenting style: Understanding
Chinese parenting through the cultural notion of training. Child development, 65(4), 1111-1119.
•Xu, Y., Farver, J. A., Zhang, Z., Zeng, Q., Yu, L., & Cai, B. (2005). Mainland Chinese parenting
styles and parent-child interaction. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 29(6),
524-531.
•Chan, S. M., Bowes, J., & Wyver, S. (2009). Chinese parenting in Hong Kong: Links among goals,
beliefs and styles. Early Child Development and Care, 179(7), 849-862.
•Qin DB. “Our child doesn’t talk to us anymore”: alienation in immigrant Chinese families.
Anthropol Educ Q. 2006;37:162–79.
•Liu, C., Munakata, T., & Onuoha, F. N. (2005). Mental health condition of the only-child: a study
of urban and rural high school students in China. Adolescence, 40(160).
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