Parenting Approaches: East vs. West

Abstract

Education is a must for every people in the world. The process of education begins at the early stage of child’s life. However, there are lots of differences about the approaches of the parents of different regions. Some parents are too callous about their child’s performance, whereas others are extra cautious. Indeed, cautiousness is good and it has a positive effect over the children. For instance, Eastern parents are too strict with their children’s achievement. If their child fails to achieve good mark, scolding is a must for the child. This happens in the Eastern part of the world. Especially, Eastern parents are much concerned on the child’s success. On the contrary, the Western parents are somewhat relaxed concerning their child. They never rebuke their child when their kid got poor mark in the examination. This attitude makes a clear difference between Western and Eastern parents about the educational approaches to their children.

Introduction

There are lots of differences between the Eastern and Western approaches to child education. Unlike Eastern mothers, Western parents are calm, enduring, and liberal towards their children. It is rather unimaginable for a Western mother to become ruthless to her child when the one fails to achieve marks or grade that the one’s parents anticipated. While comparing two educative schools, an unequal and slightly ridiculous scenario comes into view. An Eastern mother believes that it is a must for a child to achieve a first place reward whether it is educational, social or sports competition. On the other hand, a Western mother keeps patience if her child gets a poor mark in academic level or lower position in functional or athletic competition. The higher intensity of stress of Chinese mothers proves how far they are serious of the educational achievement of their child. It is a matter of surprise for the most people how Chinese mothers produce such kind, well-shaped and successful children. Conversely enough, Western mothers provide much freedom to their children in practicing or studying their respective subject matter. Hence, the strict approach produces “stereotypically successful kids,” whereas a noninterventionist and tolerant attitude produces children who have the freedom of thinking freely of themselves and the world around.

Literature Review

Parenting process is one of the most significant topics that have been studied widely for the improvement of the society and human being. It is a precondition for children of the Eastern parents to become obedient to their parents. Indeed, an Eastern parenting method is somewhat authoritarian. Totalitarian parenting approach recommends that children are thought to be obedient to their parent’s wants and requirements, while parents are supposed to be stern, undeviating, and expressively apart. Unlike authoritarian parenting, permissive parenting approach has less parental restrictions on the child.

Apart from that, proper parenting style is an important determinant of various aspects of child’s result. This concept is related to children educational success, confidence, assurance, enthusiasm, and concentration problems. Proper parenting method means a psychological approach that represents a standard way parents employ in dealing with their children. The Eastern parents seem to turn out the children who have the ability of quality academic and professional achievement.

What is more, there are hundreds of scientific differences between Eastern parenting and Western parenting method. To illustrate, a study says that 70% of the Western mothers oppose stressing to achieve academic success (Chua, 2011). In other words, Western parents think that learning should be fun. According to Amy Chua (2011), “Studies indicate that, compared to Western parents, Chinese parents spend approximately 10 times as long every day drilling academic activities with their children.” Conversely, the Western children are fond of taking participation in sports. On the other hand, Chinese mothers opine that nothing is fun until the subject matter is captured properly by the learner. To achieve the highest mark or the best place, the learner has to work hard. There is no other alternative available. Drawing upon the Eastern view,  a student never wants to learn with one’s own accord. Hence, the Chinese mother keeps stressing to make her child achieve success in any type of competition whether it is educational or social program.

Following McGrath and Repetti (2000), children, “who place a higher value on academic success, perceive themselves to be more academically competent, regardless of their actual performance in school” (p. 8). The stress of the Western parents is exceptionally high about their children. They stay in a constant worry about their children’s feelings. The parents believe that if their children fail to achieve something that directly impacts the emotions of their parents. As a result, they often assure their kids about how excellent they are despite a bad score on a particular test that often proves to be good for their child’s career. To summarize, Western parents are much worried about their kids’ psyches whereas Eastern parents do not care much about it.

Analysis

It is a sacred duty of the parents to foster their child and make an effective environment through the child can be successful. However, every parent desires from the core of their heart that their child may get the highest rank or become the most successful person in the world. Kordi and Baharuddin (2010) have considered “parental involvement as an important ingredient which accounted for many problems in education” (p. 219). In any case, there is nothing problematic in this expectation.

Nevertheless, the problem is that most of the time either extra concern or a hyper cautious approach of the parents often hinders child’s normal psychophysical development. An Eastern mother wants to keep stressing over her child because a child does not want to concentrate on one’s study willingly and things become tougher in the beginning. It is a stern belief of the Eastern education that practice is a prerequisite and plays vital role to become successful. Chua (2011) has emphasized, “Once a child starts to excel at something – whether it is math, piano, pitching or ballet – he or she gets praise, admiration and satisfaction.” To be more precise, the system is obliging in building self-confidence and in making study pleasant. This method assists a child to study more and more. Furthermore, it is a study-based notion that parental involvement has an advantageous effect on child’s academic accomplishments. It is also intuitively interesting to the guiding principle-makers, teachers, parents, and students. Harris and Goodall (2007) have asserted that, “the empirical evidence shows that parental involvement is one of the key factors in securing higher student achievement and sustained school performance” (p. 20).

However, the issue arises regarding that some activity of the Eastern parents seems to be incredible and legally actionable to the Westerners and vice versa. The former are confident that it is their legal right to command their children and compel them to proceed according to their parents’ will. There is no sign of child freedom to the Eastern parents. They are always in commanding mood over their offspring and they are not accustomed to watching someone’s child is getting ahead of their child. Alternatively, Western parents often fall in dilemma and struggle with their conflicted approach about success, and they assure their child that they are happy about one’s performance. The Easterners believe in the strength instead of fragility. Consequently, the followers of the two educational schools behave very differently. For instance, if a child gets A-minus in an examination, a Western parent will act softly and will surely praise the child’s performance, whereas an Eastern (e.g. Chinese) mother will fall on the son or daughter. Similarly, a child with B will also get praise from Western parents, while an Eastern mother must express her disapproval due to a poor result. The latter are sure that their child has the ability to achieve the highest grade; therefore, they demand such an outcome. They deploy the toughest workload over their children so that they should achieve good grade. Nonetheless, parents should be careful whether their workload is making any hindrance or not towards the child’s progression.

Further Suggestions

Taking care of children is praiseworthy and necessary for the welfare of the children. It is much needed to get a successful child. Proper parenting has a great deal of influence in making confident, talented, well-mannered and gentle personality. In this regard, Brooks (2013) has stated that, “in the Western understanding, students come to school with levels of innate intelligence and curiosity. Teachers try to further arouse that curiosity in specific subjects.” On the other hand, the Eastern concept provides less importance on inherent curiosity. The supporters of this educational theory believe in the value and primary significance of learning process and consider it as a crucial matter. This idea is perfect because the learning process or design plays vital role in building child flawlessly. In any case, educators should be careful about the learning process of a child. To make one wise, morally strong, confident, and sincere, the parents have to employ proper learning method. In order to make the child fully concentrated on one’s studying, parents have to apply the aforementioned method. The child should be introduced with some characteristics as industry, determination, attentiveness, and admiration for teachers. In particular, Chinese are often compared to the robots since they memorize things without understanding the main fact. Similarly, the American children are spoiled because of their excess attraction to the TV programs or other media. Both of the scenarios are harmful for the children. Undoubtedly, if a student wants to achieve success must work hard. Otherwise, he or she will not obtain success.

Additionally, parents must monitor their children for the welfare of their kids. Researchers find clear evidence that there is a link between parents’ involvement and child success. Thus, parents’ role is essential in shaping one’s career in future. However, parents should be careful about the thing that both of callousness or hyper cautiousness is harmful to child’s enhancement. Therefore, every parent should maintain a moderate monitoring attitude to child. They ought to never rebuke due to the poor achievement and never praise much over their success which is a praiseworthy act and helpful to child’s psychophysical development. Besides this attitude, a child may be derailed or may fail to concentrate into his/her studying properly. If this happens, the child consequently will be burden for the family and the society. Thus, proper parenting is necessary for a highly educated and mentally strong nation.

Conclusion

From the above discussion, it is clear that there are lots of differences between the Eastern and Western parents about their approaches towards education. There is harshness in the attitude of the Eastern parents, whereas Western ones possess a soft and gentle manner when they deal with their child. It is a challenge to the Eastern mother to make the child get the first position in any competition. If it does not happen, one may become angry much to the child. The Eastern mothers are incredibly strict in this respect. They do not want compromise in any case about the educational performance of their child. As compared to the Western mothers, Eastern parents do not possess the quality attitude. Therefore, the children of the Eastern mother may suffer in the long run. However, one thing they should keep in mind is that Western people also achieve success though their parents are not too anxious about their child. Moreover, they are gentle, intelligent, and industrious, and they contribute to the development of their country and nation in this way.