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Understanding the Relationship between Parental Psychological Control and Prosocial Behavior in Children in China:
Wangqian Fu1, Qianqian Pan2, Weida Zhang3
1Faculty of Education, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China.
Objectives:
Prosocial behavior is essential for individuals' development, and the study aims to analyze the relationship between parental psychological control and prosocial behavior.
Method:
The current study investigated the relationships among Paternal Psychological Control (endogenous variable), General Self-Efficacy (mediator), and Prosocial Behaviors (exogenous endogenous variable) via a moderated mediation modeling approach (gender as the moderator). A total of 1822 Chinese students aged from 7- to 17-year-old (Mage = 12.4 years old, SDage = 1.89, 48.6% girls) were included in the current study.
Results:
After controlling participants' age, the only child status, family income, and parent's education level, results revealed that higher levels of parental control were associated with lower levels of students' self-efficacy, which, in turn, reduced students' prosocial behavior intention. Moreover, the relationship between self-efficacy and prosocial behavior intention was moderated by students' gender, where the positive effects of self-efficacy on prosocial behavior intentions were reduced in girls.
Conclusion:
Findings highlight the importance of parental psychological control for supporting children's self-efficacy to promote prosocial behaviors on different gender groups.
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