Authoritarian Parenting Style in Asian Societies: A Cluster- Analytic Investigation*

Authors: Ang, Rebecca1; Goh, Dion

Source: Contemporary Family Therapy, Volume 28, Number 1, March 2006 , pp. 131-151(21)

Publisher: Springer

Abstract:

While the beneficial effects of authoritative parenting style have consistently been demonstrated for Caucasian samples, these effects have not always been found for Asians. It appears that adolescents who perceived their parents' style of parenting as authoritarian are not one homogeneous group. Cluster analyses performed for adolescents' perceived mothers' and fathers' authoritarian parenting style using adolescents' self-report scores on personal adjustment and social variables as the clustering variables found similar two-cluster solutions (maladjusted and well-adjusted). External validation evidence revealed that adolescents in the maladjusted cluster had poorer attitudes towards school and teachers compared to adolescents in the well-adjusted cluster for both samples. These findings suggest that authoritarian parenting style could possibly have a different cultural meaning for Asians.

Keywords: adjustment; Asian parenting; authoritarian parenting style; cluster analysis

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1007/s10591-006-9699-y

Affiliations: 1: Email: rpang@ntu.edu.sg

Links for this article