Perceptions Among Adolescents In Penang And Kedah Of Their Father's And Mother's Parenting
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Date
2012-07
Authors
Ooi, Pei Wen
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Publisher
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Abstract
Mothers have culturally been seen as the primary caregivers of children while fathers are seen as principal breadwinners. With women’s increased involvement in the labour market especially through working outside of the home, equal distribution of parenting responsibilities between mothers and fathers have become relevant areas of inquiry, especially in the context of the possible problem of “double-burden” for women in the family. Based on a sample of 339 Form Four students from Penang and Kedah, this study investigates how adolescents perceived the parental nurturance and involvement of their mothers and fathers by using 20 domains of parenting. It also assesses possible differences in the way the male and female adolescents perceived their relationships with either parent and their life satisfaction and stress level. The factors of socioeconomic and gender that might be influencing the adolescents perceptions and the parents’ nurturance and involvement are also analysed. The descriptive analysis indicates that participants perceived mothers to be more involved compared to the fathers and their relationships are closer with their mothers too. They however, desire higher parenting involvement from their fathers compared to what they currently receive. Overall, the results show that gender of the adolescents has no direct significant differences towards their perceptions on their fathers and mothers’ parental nurturance, involvement and their relationship with both parents. However, parents should have the same level of involvement in both the son and the daughter since the daughters are reporting lower involvement from the parent especially their fathers. The results also show that pattern of parenting as perceived by children may be said to conform to the cultural expectation of mothers as primary caregivers. However, it also shows that more equal parenting involvement is important since children appear to desire an increase in the role of fathers in parenting.
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Keywords
Perceptions among adolescents in Penang and Kedah , their father's and mother's parenting