Solicitous Parenting and Chinese Children's Perspective-Taking: The Moderating Role of Child Temperamental Inhibition.

Abstract

This study examines whether the effect of solicitous parenting on Chinese preschoolers' perspective-taking varies depending on child temperamental inhibition. Longitudinal data were collected from 163 Chinese children (70 girls, 93 boys; M_age = 2.59 years at the first visit) and their parents. Child inhibition was assessed at Age 2, solicitous parenting at Age 3, and children's perspective-taking skills at Age 3 (as baseline) and Age 5. Regression analysis supported the moderating effect of temperamental inhibition: solicitous parenting predicted better perspective-taking among children with relatively lower levels of inhibition, but poorer perspective-taking among children with extremely high inhibition. This contrastive effect pattern reflects the coexistence of goodness-of-fit and poorness-of-fit that best characterized the goodness-of-fit model. The findings suggest that solicitous parenting cannot be simply regarded as a positive or negative parenting style; its effect on social adaptation varies based on child's characteristics and cultural context.