DOI:10.6129/CJP.202209_64(3).0003
Chinese Journal of Psychology 2022, Vol.64, No.3, 311-340

Chinese Mothers’ Belief Systems about Learning and Shared-Reading Behaviors: The Pragmatic View of Effort vs. the Incremental View of Intelligence

Keng-Ling Lay(Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University), Kai-Chieh Lin(Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University), Shu-Chuan Wu(Department of Pediatrics, Lotung Poh-Ai Hospital), Yi-Miau Tsai(Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan), Thai-Tsuan Chang(Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University), Su-Ying Huang(Department of Clinical Psychology, Fu Jen Catholic University), Che Cheng(Department of Psychology, National Taiwan University)

Abstract

Culture is transmitted both symbolically and behaviorally. The way parents teach and interact with young children may reflect the mindset about learning embedded in them by their particular culture. This study chose to test this through shared picture book reading, as it can be considered an activity either just for fun, or to develop reading capacity. We compared whether and how each of the two types of learning beliefs—the incremental view of intelligence documented in Western research versus the pragmatic view of effort rooted in the learning philosophy of Chinese culture—are manifested in Chinese mothers’ shared-reading behaviors. We were especially interested in, above and beyond the variance of the incremental view of intelligence, the unique predictability of the pragmatic view of effort, which subscribes to the belief that effort never fails to improve performance even when one has already reached peak levels of performance. We also investigated the moderating effect of mothers’ impression of their child’s temperament on the relation between mothers’ learning beliefs and parenting behaviors. Fifty dyads of 4- to 5-year- old preschoolers and their mothers participated in a ten-minute shared-reading session. The mothers’ Child-Centered, Parent-Centered, and Traditional Chinese Teaching Behaviors were coded using the time-sampling method. Mothers also filled out questionnaires assessing their incremental view of intelligence and pragmatic view of effort. They also reported their child's temperament using the Children’s Behavior Questionnaire-Very Short Form. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that, after controlling for child sex and maternal educational level, neither the main effects of mothers’ incremental view of intelligence and children’s temperament nor their interaction predicted any of the three types of mothers’ shared-reading behaviors. Conversely, when mothers perceived a lower level of inhibitory control in their child’s temperament, mothers’ pragmatic view of effort positively predicted their Traditional Chinese Teaching Behaviors. When mothers perceived their child’s activity level to be high, their pragmatic view of effort predicted less Child-Centered Behaviors; this effect stayed significant even when the variance of mothers’ incremental view of intelligence was statistically controlled. This research suggests that culturally rooted learning beliefs and pedagogies are interwoven with parental perceptions of their child’s learning propensities, even before children start school. The dispositional, parental, and cultural factors altogether lead to a learning milieu that situates Chinese children in a culture-bound socioemotional context of learning.

Keywords: incremental view of intelligence, pragmatic view of effort, preschooler, shared reading, temperament