Korean mothers' proactive socialisation beliefs regarding preschoolers' social skills

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to examine the proactive socialisation beliefs (goals, attributions, strategies) of Korean mothers regarding preschoolers' social skills (sharing, controlling negative emotions, and helping others). Participants were 116 mothers in Seoul, Korea. The reasons that mothers provided for the importance of each skill, their causal attributions for the acquisition of those skills, and the socialisation strategies that would be most effective, were targeted. Korean mothers rated controlling negative emotions as less important than sharing and helping others, and were least likely to attribute the importance of social skills to social conventional reasons and provide different ratings and reasons, for the importance of children's skills depending on the sex of their child. Specifically, mothers posit more moral reasons for girls, but more developmental reasons for boys. Also, Korean mothers made more external causal attributions than internal attributions for being good at sharing and helping, whereas emotion regulation was thought to be equally a factor of external and internal reasons. In terms of socialisation strategies, Korean mothers endorsed a higher proportion of modelling than any other strategy for the socialisation of all three social skills, regardless of the sex of the child. In conclusion, Korean mothers' beliefs were related to both traditional and modern Korean ideologies and values in meaningful ways. This study highlights the significance of cultural ideologies regarding children and the family in the study of maternal beliefs regarding child socialisation. © 2005 The International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development.