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The relationship between child rearing practices and identity styles among students of both genders of pre-university level in Rasht
Dr. Javad Khalatbari, Dr. Mohammad Ebrahim Maddahi, Dr.Shohreh Ghorbanshiroudi, Vahidehsadat Mousavi, Mo- hammad Mojtaba Keikhayfarzaneh
Abstract— The main aim of this re exploring is to consider the relationship between child rearing styles and identity methods. The statistical community includes both female and male students of Rasht’s pre-university level. The re exploring method is measurable, therefore 150 female and male students in mathematics and experimental science fields were selected by multi- stage cluster sampling data were collected through two shifter child–nurture methods and Benion Adams identity modes questionnaire, to test child nurturing methods and identity modes. Data analysis has been performed in descriptive level with average and Standard deviation methods and inferential levels with multi variable regression (canonical correlation) method. Finally this reexploring leads to following results:
There is a significant relationship between parent authoritative style and diffused and foreclosed identity status and no relationship with achieved and moratorium identity status. There is a significant relationship between parent indifference style and diffused, foreclosed and moratorium identity status and no relationship with achieved identity. There is no significant relationship between parent permissive style and diffused, foreclosed and moratorium identity status and has a relationship with achieved identity and also there is a significant relationship between parent authoritarian style and diffused and achieved
identity status and no relationship with foreclosed and moratorium identity status.
Index Terms— Identity status, Child nurturing styles, Identity-diffusion, Identity- foreclosure, Identity-Moratorium.
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VERY stage of human development has its own cha- racteristics and tasks. Different development tasks are attributed to the adolescence and youth periods in various development theories. According to the social- mental theory of Ericson, the most significant task of ado- lescence is overcoming the identity crisis and acquiring a string and coherent identity ( Aghasoltani, 1999). The teens ask himself in this age that “ who I am” and desire to find a new identity for themselves and consider them- selves as lost ones who are needed to be helped to obtain
an identity (Ericson, 1959).
Identity always has been a person’s conception of oneself,
and the person obtains a coherent concept of oneself, and
he judges values in life based on that concept (Brewer
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Shahed University, Department of Psychology, Tehran, Iran
Department of Psychology, Tonekabon Branch, Islamic Azad University,
Tonekabon, Iran
and Gardner).
According to Marcia, identity is organizing and internal
self, including constructing oneself, the system of beliefs,
desires, skills and personal history that is in fact resulted
from a crisis ( Aghasoltani, 1999), and according to what
experts mentioned, understanding this critical and impor-
tant period is dependent on dominant relations in family.
( Samani, 2002), and families have a clear and effective
impact on teen’s development (Brandi, 2000, quoted from
Heybati, 2002), and it is considered as the most significant agent in developing children’s identity ( Shaltsis and Blas- tin, 1994).
Each family takes certain ways in their children’s social and educational upbringing. These methods named as child nurturing practices are influenced from various fac- tors as social, political and economical etc. ones( Hardy et al.)
Thus, parent’s attitudes, beliefs and behaviors are pat- terned in familial model or child nurturing styles, and it is an essential factor in developing personality and estab- lishing moral characteristics of children and their identity ( Karegar Shouli and Paknejad, 2003). Each of these spe- cial education practices can have a key role in developing the child’s personality and identity, as growing in a warm and amicable family atmosphere is positively related to a healthy mental development in their adolescence ( Gro-
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towant and Koper, 1986).
Marcia proposes four styles for identity and he believes that teenagers pass four styles in their progress towards a coherent identity, namely 1. confused or bewildered iden- tity, 2. premature identity (early identity), 3. belated iden- tity ( delayed identity) and 4. advanced identity ( Identi- ty-achieved).
The main characteristics of this kind of identity is apa- thy along with lack of commitment and exploring. These people are mainly indifferent and uninterested and left aside the social roles they experienced and are believed in chance and fate and are taken along with what others do. Their most characteristics is low-self-esteem, impulsivity and irregular thinking ( Street Matropit, 1989, quoted from Berck, 2001, translated by Muhamamdi, 2004).
While those who have premature identity and do not have had the initial exploring and are adhered to a group of objectives, values and beliefs (Marcia, 1980). The tee- nagers that their identity is prematurely established, the approval of what they do is so essential for them. Their self-esteem is largely dependent on the approval of oth- ers. The authorities are often so important to them and are agreed to others and are less independent ( Masen et al. translated by Yasaie, 1991).
Belated identity means an active exploring along with little commitment. In this kind of identity, the person is required to test himself in various experiences to reach a deep understanding of himself. Belated identity may be along with confusion and stress; and consequently, these people are more inclined to be remained less amount of time in this state in comparison with other states ( Meos,
1992, quoted from Schwartz).
The advanced identity indicates the commitment is ob- tained after a period of exploring ( Marcia, 1996). He be- lieved that this state is the final point of forming the process of identity. This special state is an individual agent that the identity crisis is passed on and the person has been committed to an identified identity.
Beliefs, attitudes, activities and actions of parents can be appeared in the form of family patterns or child- nurturing styles of parents. The kinds of various styles of nurturing is influenced by many factors in a family, and most of these factors are resulted from the dominant so- cial and cultural situations. However, the goal of all child-
nurturing styles is shaping the mental personality and strengthening the child’s competence. Paying attention to these aims and the two dimensions of parent’s behavior; that is, accepting opposing rejection and austerity oppos- ing leniency caused most experts discussed concerning the child-nurturing styles of the parents and the impacts each one has on children’s development and presented various patterns. However, all these patterns are almost summarized in these four child-nurturing practices:
1.Authoritative and reassuring parents ( authoritarian).
2.Lenient parents.
3.Dictatorial parents.
4.Permissive and indifferent parents.
Is there a relationship between child-nurturing (le- nient, indifferent, dictatorial and authoritative) and iden- tity ( confused identity, premature identity, belated iden- tity and advanced identity).
in the courses of experimental sciences, mathematics and
humanities in the schools of Rasht pre-province in the
academic year 2010-2011. The statistical sampling in-
cludes 150 boys and girls students who are selected using
a multistage random cluster sampling method.
the tools used in this experiment are as follows:
1.Benion and Adams’ identity styles test.
2.Shifer’s child-nurturing practices.
Adams and Benion’s (1987) test is used for measuring
the identity styles. This test is devised based on the Eric-
son’s and Marcia’s theory concerning identity and is
composed of 64 items, and it is assessed for identity styles
as confused identity, premature identity, belated identity
and advanced identity.
The concurrent validity methods, structure, predictor
and converging are used for validating the test, and the obtained results showed an acceptable validity. The test reliability is reported by Adams and Benion (1987) as
0.60 and 0.80 by Cronbach’s alpha, and Carlson (1986) ( quoted from Adams and Benion 1989) reported the inter- nal consistency between 0.66 and 0.86.
The test reliability is reported by Aghasoltani ( 1999) in Iran between 0.65 to 0.77 using the intermediate method and between 0.72 to 0.86 using the Cronbach’s alpha. Shokrkon (quoted from Omidian, 2002) reported that the validity is acceptable.
The questionnaire devised by Naghashian (1979) based on the one conducted by Schifer (1965) in Shiraz is used to assess the child-nurturing methods of the parents. This
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questionnaire is based on two dimensions of love (cold- warm) and control (control-freedom) and includes 77 pos- itive and negative options.
The test reliability is reported by Naghashain as 0.87 using intermediate method and between 0.82 to 0.92 us- ing the intermediate and Cronbach’s alpha by Yaghoubk- hani ( 1993), and Tahmotan ( 1998 ) reported the test re- liability as 0.74 for the control and freedom dimensions,
0.89 for cold and warm relationship dimensions and 0.85 for the whole scale using the Cronbach’s alpha.
Naghashian achieved the test reliability through con- tent reliability in his study. Yaghobkhani (1993) used the main analysis components method through varimax rota- tion to show how much the factor narration of the ques- tions is effective, and showed in general that factor analy- sis confirms the factor narrations of the questions, and confirmed the opinion of the questionnaire designer re- garding the above tool assesses two dimensions men- tioned above.
Data analysis is performed in the two descriptive and deductive levels. Mean and standard deviation are used in descriptive statistics and multivariable regression test (focal correlation) is used in deductive statistics to consid- er the test hypothesis.
The statistical characteristics of the research variables are shown in table 1.
There is a relationship between child-nurturing (lenient, indifferent, dictatorial and authoritative) and identity ( confused identity, premature identity, belated identity and advanced identity).
TABLE 2
FREQUENCY AND PERCENT DISTRIBUTION OF PEOPLE IN TW O GROUPS OF SEXUAL GUILTY W OMEN AND NONSEXUAL GUILTY WOMEN IN TERMS OF LOCUS OF CONTROL VARIABLE
TABLE 1
THE STATISTICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE RESEARCH VA- RIABLES
*P<0.05 **P<0.01
The Pearson correlation is used to consider the research
hypothesis, and multivariable regression method ( focal correlation) is used in continuous.
The data in table 2 show that:
The results obtained in table 1 show that the confused identity mean is 47.54, the confused identity standard deviation is 11.18, the premature identity mean is 46.56, the belated identity standard deviation is 11.40, the ad- vanced identity mean is 67.66, the advanced identity standard deviation is 15.41, the lenient mean is 41.33, the lenient standard deviation is 13.60, the indifferent mean is
86.39, the indifferent standard deviation is 9.25, the dicta- torial mean is 67.19, dictatorial standard deviation is
11.17, the authoritative mean is 55.76 and the authorita- tive standard deviation is 23.35.
1. There is no relationship between lenient child- nurturing and confused identity. ( r=-0.079 and p=0.337).
2.There is a relationship between indifferent child- nurturing and confused identity (r=0.170 and p=0.038).
3.There is a relationship between dictatorial child- nurturing and confused identity (r=0.171 and p=0.037).
4.There is a relationship between authoritative child- nurturing and confused identity (r=-0.170 and p=0.038)
5.There is no relationship between lenient child- nurturing and premature identity ( r=-0.074 and p=0.369)
6. there is a relationship between lenient child- nurturing and premature identity. (r=0.167 and p=0.042).
7. there is a relationship between dictatorial child- nurturing and premature identity (r=0.161 and P=0.05).
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8. there is no relationship between authoritative child- nurturing and premature identity. (r=-0.150 and p=0.067).
9. there is no relationship between lenient child- nurturing and belated identity. (r=-0.008 and p=0.927).
10. there is a relationship between indifferent child- nurturing and belated identity. (r=0.191 and p=0.019).
11. there is no relationship between dictatorial child- nurturing and belated identity (r=0.132, p=0.107).
12. there is no relationship between authoritative child- nurturing and belated identity. (r=-0.152 and p=0.063).
13. there is a relationship between lenient child- nurturing and advanced identity (r=0.240, p=0.003).
14. there is no relationship between indifferent child- nurturing and advanced identity. (r=-0.036 and p=0.657).
15. there is no relationship between dictatorial child- nurturing and advanced identity. (r=-0.007 and p=0.928).
16. there is a relationship authoritative child-nurturing and advanced identity. (r=0.207 and p=0.011).
TABLE 3
FOCAL CORRELATION BETW EEN IDENTITY AND CHILD-
NURTURING
id e nt it y | con- fused | 0.535 | 0.286 | - 0.028 | 0.000 7 | 0.3 89 | 0.151 | - 0.6 68 | 0.39 4 |
id e nt it y | prema ma- ture | 0.384 | 0.147 | - 0.186 | - 0.034 | 0.1 76 | 0.031 | 0.7 20 | 0.51 8 |
id e nt it y | be- lated | 0.097 | 0.009 | 0.359 | 0.128 | 0.1 72 | 0.030 | - 0.0 16 | 0.00 02 |
id e nt it y | Ad- vance d | 0.021 | 0.000 4 | 0.011 | 0.000 1 | - 0.0 71 | 0.005 | - 0.0 05 | 0.00 02 |
TABLE 5
CORRELATION COEFFICIENT FOCAL ANALYSIS OF STRUCTURE OR FOCAL FACTOR LOAD OF CHILD-NURTURING AND IDENTITY
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As is shown, the validity of this hypotheses has been con- sidered by fundamental correlation hypothesis.The re- search results showed that the children who have dicta- torial parents are affected to premature and confused identity. It has been found out that there is a significant relationship between understood dictatorial style and confused and premature identity, and it has no relation- ship with advanced and belated identity. It is clear that the parents who have dictatorial style implement severe control and show no affections. This austerity has two dimensions: either children gain identity before expe- rience any identity crisis, or they do not experience any crisis and gain no identity.
The research conducted by Barent and Kebria, Barouch and Pilig (1997) indicate that the strict parents nurture children who have lost their identity and are effected to psychological discomfitures, anxieties and depression, because they have been received no affection from their parents. This research is compatible with the one con- ducted by Afra Wafer and Monte Mayou (1995). The el- derly people are also affected to this problem in their ad- vanced growing. This issue is especially more clear in women than men ( Blastin, 1994). A research conducted concerning the relationship between attachment and ad- vanced growing in women which is compatible with that of this research. The results of this research also showed that there is a significant relationship between indifferent child-nurturing style and confused, premature and be- lated identity. However, it has no relationship with ad- vanced identity. The parents who have no role in control- ling their children and show no affection towards them, no patterns are presented in that family and their children are affected to either confusion or suspension. Having no thinking relationship children causes the children are af- fected to identity problems. This research is compatible with the one conducted by Waterman (1992), Marcia (1995), Joselson (1998) and Dowan and Edelson (1996), which shows that this issue is more important in women than men who have more interpersonal relations. the par- ents who reject their children do not create the feelings of exploring and commitment and cause their children to be affected to some problems in gaining advanced identity. Kerpolmen and Pitman (2004) achieved the same results in their research.
In the current research, it has been found out that there is a significant relationship between deduced lenient child- nurturing style and advanced identity; however it has no relationship with confused and belated and premature identity. This research is compatible with the one con- ducted by Muhammadi (2005) who showed that the free- dom-control dimension has no the significant power to predict the children’s commitment. Ina addition, child- nurturing dimensions has no significance to predict the exploring dimension, and it is compatible with the cur-
rent research. Brouks, Gan (1986) shows that competence progress and controlling emotion is significant in boys and an amiable relation and supervising on the behaviors is significant in girls.
Since the societies are economized and children made independent, the must nurture children who are able to experience the identity crisis and deal with it.
This research finally indicates that there is a significant relationship between child-nurturing and advanced iden- tity; however it has no relationship with premature and belated identity. Prosa Tom (1996) and Schaltsis and Blas- tin (1994) indicated in their research that family context has a main role in adolescent’s ability for developing an established identity. The results of this research is com- patible with the one conducted by Adamz (1995), Grager (1997) and Miller (1993). Khajeh Pour ( 2005 ) indicated that parents can make the positive development of identi- ty easy and also they showed that the worst consequences are long with indifferent and exclusive nurturing pat- terns.
It is concluded that the research shows that authoritative child-nurturing style is the best one, and it has nearly an effective role in developing the children’s identity. How- ever, indifferent and dictatorial styles create the worst condition in children’s development of identity.
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