Evaluating the Impact of Cross-Cultural Parenting Approaches on Emotional Resilience Outcomes in Individuals

Abstract

Recently, more awareness has been raised to promote parenting practices grounded in warmth, effective communication, emotional support, consistency, and active involvement. Yet punitive, authoritarian, or dismissive parenting approaches are still prominent globally, especially in families of low Socioeconomic Status (SES). While many cultures over the last century have increased their average income and reached first-world status, some still need to catch up. Thus, most of this population may be stuck in a persistent cycle of trying to escape poverty. With this mentality, the capacity to employ healthy parenting methods that foster secure attachments between parent and child and promote robust social and emotional development might be limited; this can be attributed to a sustained deficit in their basic needs of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Corporal punishment, over-critical parents, and child neglect can be unfortunate consequences of a parent’s desperation to push their child to achieve more financial success and help the family. Even after being in an ideal financial position to pursue higher needs on Maslow’s pyramid and, therefore, enhance one’s emotional capacity, maladaptive parenting can continue to manifest itself due to generational trauma. As part of this literature, a hypothetical experimental scale is conceptualized to evaluate and compare two different cultural cohorts, the parenting methods they were raised in, and their hostile attribution bias. Four pre-existing validated scales are combined to make this measure (CVScale, CCNES + PARQ, SIP-AEQ Hostility Questionnaire). The findings of this scale can help identify specific parenting behaviors that can be adjusted to more effectively foster positive parent-child dynamics that contribute to children's emotional regulation and resilience.