Testing Scales of Parenting Practice and Filial Acts in Children and Exploring Their Correlations

Abstract

Given filial piety is open-ended and can be very demanding in the Oriental culture, adult children can only become accustomed to caring for their elderly parents if their grateful thought is internalised into filial acts in their childhood development. This chapter tested two newly developed scales of filial acts in children and parenting practice, and explored the correlations between filial acts and parenting practices. A total of 589 high school students in northeastern China participated in the survey. Results indicated the validity and reliability of both scales. Factor Analysis was used, which brought down the item number for the scale of parenting practice from 31 to 20, while the items of filial acts were all retained. Analysis of the correlations revealed that discipline plays a role twice as important as parental love and induction in helping children engage in filial acts, in particular in sharing housework, which is in line with the painful nature of internalisation of grateful thought.