Poster Sessions

Dev-14

Magdalen Toole

M. Toole, L. Cote

Korean American Mothers’ Perceptions of their Parenting

Korean American mothers’ perceptions of their parenting styles were examined. Specifically, 1st, 1.5, and 2nd generation Korean American mothers’ ratings of the actual and ideal amount of social, didactic, and limit setting activities in which they engaged with their 5-month-old infants was examined. We hypothesized that 1st generation mothers would engage in more social behaviors with their children than 1.5 and 2nd generation mothers. However, no generational differences were found in the amount of social, didactic, or limit setting behaviors that mothers reported. Instead, mothers of all generation levels reported engaging in more social than didactic or limit setting behaviors. We also hypothesized that mothers’ ratings of their ideal behavior would exceed their actual behavior, particularly for social behavior. Consistent with this hypothesis, there was a significant multivariate Domain x Situation interaction, F (2, 53) = 40.94, p < .001, η2p = .61. Pairwise comparisons demonstrated that mothers reported that they would ideally engage in more social behaviors than they actually do. Moreover, mothers reported engaging in more social than didactic or limit setting behaviors. These findings suggest that Korean American mothers continue to identify with Korean parenting goals, even when they were born and raised in the United States.