Exposure to Chinese Culture-conforming Parenting and Subsequent Executive Function Skills in Chinese International College Students in the United States

Abstract

Executive functions (EF) is a collection of top-down mental processes that require a certain level of cognitive capacity, and its importance is rising increasingly. It can affect one’s daily functioning, influence academic and social outcomes, and even serve as a protective factor against adversity. In Western cultures, the “authoritarian” parenting style is thought to be harmful to children’s development and may leave long-term consequences. However, some studies have shown that children of East Asian descendent are, to a certain degree, exempted from that potential harm (e.g., Huang et al., 2017). Hence in the present study, we wish to explore the EF scores of Chinese international college students raised by Chinese culture-comfoming parents, and we hypothesized that they will have a negative correlation. We recruited 43 Chinese international students who is currently pursuing a Bachelor’s Degree in a four-year college in the United states, and have each participant go through a 20-min survey examining their EF scores, their caregiver’s parenting behaviors, their own beliefs regarding Chinese culture, and the extent to which they might have experienced risk and resilience factors growing up.