Value of Children

The value of children (VOC) has already been described as a central concept in Kagitcibasi’s theory of family change. The VOC follows from the needs children fulfill for their parents (Hoffmann & Hoffmann, 1973). It relates the nature and degree of (potential) parents’ valuing of children to their motivation for having children (Arnold et al., 1975) and is conceptualized as a psychological mediator between macro-level institutional changes and fertility rates (Nauck, 2007). In the original value of children studies in the 1970ies it was found that with economic development of a country there seemed to be a decline in the economic-utilitarian value of children while the emotional or psychological value of children

stayed high or even rose (Arnold et al., 1975; Kagitcibasi, 1982). These observations were explained by the fact that with the development of state-run social security systems parents’

needs for children’s financial assistance in the presence and in old age diminished while the costs of bringing up children rose with the rising necessity of providing children with a good (and ever longer lasting) education. Thus, economic reasons for having children become less important with industrialization and societal modernization. At the same time, the emotional gratification that results from having children was not affected by modernization. Results reported in the framework of the current VOC-study suggest that the importance of the emotional VOC seems to be rather independent of the economic development of a culture: it has been shown to be very high in all cultures studied (Nauck & Klaus, 2007).

A differentiation between economic/utilitarian, social/normative, and emotional benefits from having children has proven empirically useful in cross-cultural analyses (Arnold et al., 1975; Kagitcibasi, 1982). More recent analyses suggest that economic/utilitarian VOC and social/normative VOC may also combine to form a utilitarian/normative VOC (Albert, Trommsdorff, Mayer, & Schwarz, 2005; Kim, Park, Kwon, & Koo, 2005; Mayer, Albert, Trommsdorff, & Schwarz, 2005; Mishra, Mayer, Trommsdorff, Albert, & Schwarz, 2005;

Sabatier & Lannegrand-Willems, 2005; Sam, Peltzer, & Mayer, 2005; Suckow, 2005; Zheng, Shi, & Tang, 2005). Further intra-cultural studies comparing the value of children across generations and across rural and urban regions largely confirm the results obtained in the original VOC-study. In Germany no generational differences were found with respect to the emotional VOC, but strong differences occurred for the utilitarian/normative VOC dimension with grandmothers overall reporting the highest importance (Mayer et al., 2005). In India a higher emotional VOC resulted for the urban as compared to the rural samples, and the older generations reported a higher importance of the utilitarian/normative VOC as compared to the younger generations in the urban sample, while no generational differences resulted in the rural sample (Mishra et al., 2005). In Indonesia, urban mothers reported a somewhat higher emotional VOC than rural mothers. With regard to the utilitarian/normative VOC, older as compared to younger generations as well as rural as compared to urban participants reported a higher importance of these values (Albert et al., 2005). In South Africa, grandmothers showed a higher importance of emotional as well as utilitarian/normative VOCs than their adult daughters (Sam et al., 2005). Sabatier and Lannegrand-Willems (2005) report high emotional VOCs of French mothers and grandmothers, and a higher utilitarian/normative VOC of grandmothers as compared to their adult daughters. Suckow (2005) compared Jewish and Arabic mothers in Israel and found a substantially higher utilitarian/normative VOC of Arabic

mothers while no differences resulted for the emotional VOC. In China the emotional VOC was similarly high in all regions and generations. On the contrary, for the utilitarian/normative VOC strong regional and generational effects occurred with a relatively higher importance for grandmothers as well as for rural and “floating” samples as compared to younger generations and urban samples. As already described above (see section 2.2.2.4), Kagitcibasi and Ataca (2005) report only small differences with respect to the emotional VOC, which was of high importance for all samples. Substantial differences were found for their scale of economic/utilitarian VOC with older generations reporting a higher importance than younger generations and rural as well as urban low-SES samples reporting a higher importance than urban high-SES samples.

2.3.2 Behavioral Intentions: Support for Family and Family Future Orientation Adolescents’ intention to support their family and their family future orientation are concrete and behaviorally relevant aspects of family models. In the following, these two concepts are introduced theoretically and in terms of cross-cultural empirical research.

2.3.2.1 Adolescents’ Support for Family

An important theoretical model regarding adolescents’ support for their parents and family is the model of intergenerational solidarity proposed by Bengtson and colleagues (Bengtson, 2001; Bengtson & Roberts, 1991; see also Schwarz, in press). This theoretical approach describes a five-dimensional structure of familial solidarity: association (frequency and quality of contact), norms of familial solidarity and familial obligations; affect (emotions); exchange of support and reciprocity; and opportunity structures (like close living distance). The cultural context is considered in so far as cultural context conditions should affect the norms of familial solidarity and of familial obligations as well as the opportunity structures of a society. However, Bengtson’s focus is much more on the influence of culture in terms of societal change (in Western societies) than on explicit intercultural comparisons.

His main point in this respect is that the importance of intergenerational solidarity has been stable across the last decades in spite of societal changes towards more individualistic value orientations and that due to the decreasing dependability of the (horizontal) nuclear family (through rising numbers of divorce etc.) the importance of (vertical) intergenerational ties will even be rising in the future (Bengtson, 2001). At the same time it is acknowledged that rising individualism also entails rising conflicts between the fulfillment of (individual) needs and preferences on the one side, and family obligations and intergenerational assistance on the other side (Bengtson, Marti, & Roberts, 1991). Genuine cross-cultural studies testing aspects

of the model of intergenerational solidarity in different cultural context are rare and have been mostly concerned with adult daughters’ help for their old mothers (Schwarz, Trommsdorff, Zheng, & Shi, in press; Trommsdorff & Schwarz, 2007). Though Bengtson’s model is useful for conceptualizing the different features of intergenerational support for adolescents, to my knowledge there is no cross-cultural study with adolescents that directly bears on it.

There are two different lines of cross-cultural research dealing with adolescents’

support for their families: one regards the concrete help adolescents provide in their families households, while the other is concerned with the broader topic of family obligations and family assistance, referring to a duty to respect one’s parents, sacrifice individual goals for broader family needs, and maintain a collective identity. First, cross-cultural and cross-ethnic studies with respect to adolescents’ concrete help in the household will be reviewed, followed by studies with regard to family obligations and family assistance.

With regard to research on adolescents’ help in the household, two types of work have been differentiated: self-care (e.g., cleaning one’s own room) and family work (e.g., cleaning the living room, washing dishes, Goodnow & Delaney, 1989). Since the present study is concerned with adolescents’ help for the family I will concentrate on the latter type of task in this review. Family work tasks are the type of tasks that Whiting and Whiting (1975) report as being emphasized in most non-Western cultural groups in their famous Six-Cultures Study (Mexico, India, Kenya, Okinawa [Japan], the Philippines, and the US). These tasks like bringing objects for working adults, bringing water for family use, or babysitting a younger sibling were observed more often in the non-Western cultures while in the US household tasks consisted mainly of the self-care type (Whiting & Whiting, 1975). Grusec, Goodnow, and Cohen (1996) studied the amount of family-care and self-care household work provided by children and adolescents from Australian and Canadian families. They found that only routinely performed family-care household tasks were positively correlated with an altruistic concern for others. Broad cross-cultural differences with respect to the different kinds of tasks are expected by Brannen (1995, p. 319), who contends that “norms that children should clear up their own mess derive from an emphasis on individualism, while dealing with the mess created by others has collectivist or familial undertones.”

In one of the few culture-comparative studies on this topic, Brannen (1995) asked adolescents about the household work they regularly performed. All participants lived in the UK but came from different ethnic origins. Four ethnic groups were differentiated: White, Asian, Black, and Other. The results of the quantitative study showed that overall female

adolescents were more likely to engage both in self-care (e.g., make/change own bed, tidy/clean own room, wash own clothes) and family-care (e.g., wash up/fill dishwasher, make meals for others, babysit for siblings) type of tasks than male adolescents. With regard to ethnic differences, Asian adolescents were the ones reporting the most household tasks performed, followed by Black adolescents and adolescents of “Other” ethnic origin, with White adolescents taking the last position on most of the tasks. In a second – qualitative – study they carried out in-depth interviews with adolescents and their parents in 64 families selected from the greater quantitative study. The results of this study revealed that especially parents of Asian and Middle Eastern origin considered family obligations in general and expectations of help in the household in particular as very important. This strong normative emphasis “is based upon the ‘respect’ which is seen to be owed to elders by younger generations” and “trading leniency in return for ‘good relations’ with young people was unnecessary since these parents took for granted the nature of present ties with their children”

(Brannen, 1995, p. 328). Thus, an emotional closeness (based on a hierarchical relationship) that does not have to be negotiated as in more egalitarian Western parent-child relationships is emphasized (see also Cooper, Baker, Polichar, & Welsh, 1993; Hardway & Fuligni, 2006;

Rothbaum et al., 2000; Rothbaum & Trommsdorff, 2007). This is in line with the further result that most parents and some of their adolescent children with a non-Western background expressed strong opposition to the idea of monetary payment for the fulfillment of household tasks. On the contrary, in some White UK-origin households housework provided by children and adolescents was seen as a system of exchange, and payment as an incentive (Brannen, 1995).

A second cross-cultural study of adolescents’ help in the household was conducted by Bowes, Flanagan, and Taylor (2001). In this study, a total of 4627 adolescents from six countries (Australia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Sweden, and the USA) were asked to report their views on children’s participation in work around the home. The main questions regarded the general value of household work, and whether or not children and adolescents should receive monetary payment for such work. As in previous studies, self-care and family-care tasks were differentiated. It was expected that adolescents from cultures characterized by more individualistic values (USA and Australia) would emphasize self-care household tasks and place less emphasis on family-care tasks compared with adolescents from more collectivistic cultures (Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Czech Republic). Sweden was categorized as an individualist culture but at the same time as more “social-contract oriented” (having a well-organized and well-funded social security system) and less “capitalistic” than the other

two Western cultures in the study (Bowes et al., 2001, p. 62). The clearest differences resulted with regard to adolescents’ ideas about payment for household work. Most adolescents from Australia, USA, and Sweden supported payment for household work, either through an amount of pocket money for helping in the household in general or through payment for extra or big jobs. In contrast, adolescents from Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, and Hungary were against payment for household work or supported only payment for extra or big jobs. Results with regard to the value of household work for children’s personal and social development showed that US and Australian adolescents placed a particularly high value on the development of individual responsibility through participation in household work whereas Czech, Hungarian and Swedish adolescents valued the development of social responsibility.

Thus, with respect to the value of household work as well as monetary compensation the cross-cultural differences were as expected with Swedish adolescents changing sides.

With regard to cross-cultural and ethnic differences referring to the broader topic of family obligations, a number of studies have been published in the last two decades. For example, Sabogal, Marín, Otero-Sabogal, VanOss Marín, and Perez-Stable (1987) compared attitudinal familism between Hispanic and non-Hispanic adolescents in the US. One result was that familism reflects a core characteristic of Hispanic culture, regardless of the specific national origin of the Hispanic adolescents in the study. Though family obligations diminished with the level of acculturation adolescents experienced, Hispanic adolescents consistently reported higher levels of a sense of obligations toward their family as compared to White US-adolescents. Similar differences between White and non-White adolescents with respect to familism were found by Gaines et al. (1997). In a series of studies these authors compared American young adults from European American, African American, Asian, and Latino backgrounds with respect to their levels of familism, individualism, and collectivism.

Overall, the results showed that non-White participants as compared to White participants endorsed familism and collectivistic values more strongly while no differences resulted for individualism.

Another study comparing immigrant adolescents from different ethnic origins with White US-born adolescents with regard to familial obligations is reported by Tseng (2004).

The author examined family interdependence among late adolescents and emerging adults with Asian, Latino, African/Caribbean, and European backgrounds. Among other things, the results showed that adolescents from immigrant families in general and especially Asian American participants placed more importance on family interdependence than did European

Americans. Similar results were found for adolescents’ attitudes towards family obligations (supporting and assisting their families) and for their actual behavior (caretaking, help in the household, and financial assistance). Higher degrees of family obligation and family assistance of adolescents with Latino and Asian backgrounds as compared to adolescents with European backgrounds were also reported in a recent study by Kiang and Fuligni (2009).

Similar results were found by Fuligni, Tseng, and Lam (1999) who studied attitudes towards family obligations of tenth and twelfth grade US-adolescents with Filipino, Chinese, Mexican, Central and South American as well as European backgrounds. The results showed that Asian and Latin American adolescents reported a much higher importance with regard to their duty to assist, respect, and support their families than adolescents with European backgrounds. These strong differences could not be accounted for by socioeconomic differences between the ethnic groups. The authors emphasize that the endorsement of family obligations did not decline with longer residence in the US (operationalized as first, second, and third generation of immigrants). However, in the latter generations (second and third)

“Asian and Latin American youths seem to simultaneously desire greater autonomy and recognize the importance of maintaining a close bond with their family.” (Fuligni et al., 1999, p. 1040). Thus, as Sabogal et al. (1987) noted, acculturation seems to affect the family domain, but the core values of family obligation stay unchanged, even if values of autonomous decision making may change in line with mainstream American culture.

In a further publication Fuligni (2001) expands on this topic and reports that adolescents with Chinese, Filipino, Mexican, and Central and South American background believe that they should spend more time helping their family by taking care of siblings, helping out with household tasks, assisting their parents at work and spending time with the family as compared to their peers from European backgrounds. Especially Asian and Latin American teenagers were also more likely to emphasize the virtue of making sacrifices for the family and to take into account the preferences of the family when deciding important things about their own lives. These minority group adolescents also believed that such family obligations existed throughout their lives. Also, these attitudes remained strong across different generations of adolescents, once again indicating the persistent and acculturation-proof nature of family obligations especially in Asian and Latino contexts (Fuligni, 2001).

Fuligni and Pedersen (2002) followed up these samples of adolescents to young adulthood.

Their main question was whether the endorsement of family obligations declines, stays the same, or increases when adolescents experience the life transition to adulthood. On the one

hand, a decline could be expected since emerging adults are often geographically more distant from their families and the necessity for autonomous decision making could add a growing psychological distance to the family. On the other hand, they suggest that “the entrance into young adulthood may engender a sense of maturity among children whereby they feel greater responsibility for their families’ well-being” (Fuligni & Pedersen, 2002, p. 857). The results demonstrated that the value of family obligations increased for young adults from all ethnic samples, thus leaving the differences between ethnic groups found in adolescence intact:

young adults from Filipino and Latin American families reported the strongest sense of familial duty, and this feeling of obligation partly explained their tendency to stay living with their families and to make financially contributions to the family livelihood. The authors conclude that “even in an American society and a developmental period characterized by autonomy and independence, Filipino and Latin American young adults retain their families’

traditional emphasis on instrumental assistance and respect to parents and siblings.” (Fuligni

& Pedersen, 2002, p. 864).

Interestingly, in a study about parent-adolescent disagreement with respect to issues like household chores and taking family dinner together, Phinney, Kim-Jo, Osorio, and Vilhjalmsdottir (2005) found that European American adolescents showed an increased consideration of their parents’ views and feelings in emerging adulthood as compared to mid-adolescence. On the contrary, Armenian American and Mexican American adolescents showed a higher degree of consideration of parents in mid-adolescence and a higher degree of self-assertion in emerging adulthood. No changes across time were found for Korean American adolescents: this group upholds a high degree of understanding for their parents’

view both in mid-adolescence as well as in late adolescence/emerging adulthood. Thus, the development of family obligations from adolescence to emerging adulthood seems to be a complex issue – generally rising (see Fuligni & Pedersen, 2002) with some groups slightly decreasing from a very high level (due to acculturation?) and other groups (especially Asians) remaining unchanged.

The reported studies on helping in the household, family obligation, and family assistance clearly showed that in the United States as well as in the UK, youth from several minority ethnic groups, and especially those from Latino and Asian backgrounds consistently reported a higher sense of family obligations than their European American or White age mates. This difference in family obligations between White and non-White adolescents continues into young adulthood and the core family values stay unchanged even in the

presence of acculturative influences. In the following, the concept of family future orientation as an indicator of adolescents’ family models is introduced and cross-cultural empirical research is presented.