Child Development I (ECDV 110): Parenting Styles in Canada & China

This essay, written for a Child Development course, delves into the varied landscape of parenting styles, with a particular focus on contrasting approaches in Canada and China. The paper begins by highlighting the legal frameworks and societal values influencing child-rearing in both countries, including Canada's adherence to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the evolving attitudes towards discipline. The core of the essay explores and contrasts four key parenting styles: authoritarian, authoritative, permissive, and neglectful. It examines how these styles manifest differently in Canadian and Chinese cultures, considering factors such as the emphasis on individual autonomy versus family collectivism, the use of discipline, and the level of emotional expressiveness. The essay draws on research to illustrate how cultural values shape parenting practices, ultimately providing a comparative analysis of the impact of these different approaches on child development. The paper also touches on the non-existence of neglectful/uninvolved parenting style in both countries due to the negative impact associated with it. The essay concludes by summarizing how different principles guide parents in both countries and how parenting style is employed to maintain variations in parent’s attempts of managing, shaping and socializing with their kids simultaneously.

Running Head: CHILD DEVELOPMENT 1
Child Development 1
Name
Institution

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Child Development 1
Introduction
Every parent wants to raise healthy, as well as happy children. Since children rely on
adults for care and love, they are given special recognition under the law. Canada is among the
countries around the world that is signatory to the United Nations Conventions on the Rights of
the Child, that establishes the rights to safeguard the child’s fundamental rights and freedoms
(Rathus & Rinaldi, 2015). In addition, Canada has created its own specific laws to protect
children and give them certain rights. Attitudes toward discipline and punishment are shifting in
Canada. The Canadian society acknowledges that parents all have their own set of distinctive
values along with beliefs towards rearing their children. In the last two decades, researchers have
surveyed different parenting styles along with practices in Chinese and North American parents
(In Chuang & In Costigan, 2018). It has been found that Chinese parents are more authoritarian
than the North American counterparts while rearing their children. In addition, the parents from
China tend to employ coercive plus high-power parenting and stress child conformity. The paper
will examine the difference in parenting styles between Chinese and Canadian parents.
Differences between Parenting Styles in Canada and China
Authoritarian/ Disciplinarian Parenting Style
Authoritarian parenting style is a style that attempts to create, guide as well as scrutinize
the behaviour plus attitude of the child relying on the set of normal personality. In this style of
parenting, children live under control of the parent, and are denied autonomy to do things their
style, where nearly all decisions plus actions performed by kids are selected by their parents. In

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Canada, children are allowed to build up a “sense of self”, where the ability of the child to
expand autonomy, courage, as well as expression of him/herself at a tender age is emphasized.
The kids are not forced to do things, but allowed to embrace freedom and encourage expression
of oneself. Parents in Canada present their children with daily options to inspire them to exercise
with the goal of claiming themselves (Zhou, Sandler, Millsap, Wolchik & Dawson-McClure,
2008). In addition, parents in Canada do not consider in reminding their kids about the precedent
makes because it may hurt their esteem or make them humiliated rather. On the other hand,
Chinese parents are more authoritative that is designed to make children develop strong
relationship with family members and humanity. The individual independence is not stressed by
the parents in China, where they stress on respect, dependability, appropriate behaviour and
group accomplishment. Additionally, parents in China are more than Canadian parents to employ
physical compulsion, as well as vocal aggression in parent-kid relationship (Liu & Guo, 2010).
Authoritative Parenting Style
Authoritative parents try to guide kid’s actions in a rational and issue-oriented way.
These parents reason with their kids, promote vocal give and take, as well as encourage their kids
to reason autonomously plus to react in prosocial ways. In addition, parents who are authoritative
are efficiently responsive by being affectionate, caring and cheering kid’s personal concerns. The
three elements that the style builds upon include regulation, autonomy, and connection. The
Chinese mother could see themselves as appealing their kids in less self-sufficiency yielding
(that is democratic involvement) plus more restricting setting than it is the case of mothers in
Canada (Rathus & Rinaldi, 2015). The Chinese parents have been found to be less candidly
emotionally expressive of their love as compared to Canadian parents. In addition, Chinese

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parents are less affectionate in their exhibits of connectedness than the Canadian parents. The
Chinese parent set high expectations that their children should meet regarding societal and
family goals while the Canadian parents set high expectations in regarding to attaining high
standards, for instance, in academic attainment (Camras, Kolmodin & Chen, 2008).
Permissive/Indulgent Parenting Style
This style of parenting allows children to regulate their activities as several times as
practical. The kids receive support to practice their own autonomy in addition to make individual
choices, where parental direction is very small because parents surrender the position of
influence along with see their kids more like equals. In Canada, children are left to make the
individual choices and do not have to consult their parents on what to do, but rather undertake
activities that they believe that they are right. The parents have given the authority to the children
and they have no authority to guide their children on their daily activities (In Khanlou & In
Pilkington, 2015). The parents socialize freely with their kids that make them equals, especially
in their daily activities. On the contrary, the Chinese parents guide their children on what to do
and they do not give their children total freedom to make choices on their daily activities (Liu &
Guo, 2010). The Chinese parents emphasize on unit, where obedience to authority promotes
child’s situation, as well as security in the family. Thus, it is the duty of the child to demonstrate
respect to the authority and build up the proper moral conduct. Among the Chinese parents,
autonomy is a theory connected to becoming a crucial family members rather than growing a
sense of oneself as it is the case in Canadian parents. Therefore, the Canadian parents are more
permissive to their children than the Chinese parents (Anolli, Wang, Mantovani & De Toni,
2008).

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Neglectful/Uninvolved Parenting Style
This style of parenting give children a lot of freedom and generally the parent does not
involve in any way with the child’s activities. In this style, there is no discipline style used and
children are left to do what they want, perhaps out of absence of information or caring. The
parents do not set limits or elevated standards for their children (Susan, Glozman, Green &
Rasmi, 2018). Both in China and Canada, uninvolved parenting style do not exist because
parents in both countries belief that neglecting their children without proper guidance will results
in mental issues like maternal depression, physical abuse and child neglect. Thus, this parenting
style is nonexistent in the two countries because of the negative aspects associated with it (Safdar
et al., 2009).
Conclusion
Both Canada and China has different parenting style based on the different principles that
guide parents founded on the society. Canada is guided by principles that are based on
individualism while China is guided by principles of collectivism seen through Confucius
principle. Thus, the advancement of parenting style is employed to maintain ordinary variations
in parent’s attempts of managing, shaping as well as socializing with their kids simultaneously.
Consequently, parenting is a general progress with the manifestation of the overall tone of the
parent to child relationships.

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References
Anolli, L., Wang, L., Mantovani, F. & De Toni, A. (2008). The voice of emotion in Chinese and
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Camras, L., Kolmodin, K. & Chen, Y. (2008). Mothers’ self-reported emotional expression in
Mainland Chinese, Chinese American, and European American families. International
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families: An international approach. Cham : Springer.
In Khanlou, N., & In Pilkington, F. B. (2015). Women's mental health: Resistance and resilience
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Rathus,S.A.& Rinaldi, C.M.(2015). Voyages in Development. Toronto, ON: Nelson Education.
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