“The family” has long been a focus of cross-party
attention. While family is perceived as foundational to
society’s success, how parents rear their children is perhaps
the most conservative or persistent part of concern. While
Chinese immigrant families and Chinese families in Asia –
in Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, mainland China, and
elsewhere – are struggling with a socialization process that
has emphasized support for traditional values, they are also
simultaneously being confronted by modern ideologies and
technologies. Professionals have a growing interest in
addressing the culturally diverse needs and the gender issues
of Chinese families.
The theme of this issue of The Open Family Studies
Journal, then, is “Gender, family and parenting in the
Chinese context”. The heart of this special issue lies in a
concern for families, in particular for the challenges posed to
families and parenting practices in a changing world. The
family, like any social group, is a product of history, culture
and context. Because of economic and technological
changes, and the increasingly pluralistic nature of our
society, both gender relations and family structures have
undergone tremendous change, and many challenges await
elucidation. The seven papers in this special issue thus
feature new perspectives on family, gender and parenting
issues.
The issue opens with a paper on scale validation. Since
intimacy is a construct that has received limited attention in
the Chinese context, the first paper, “Intimacy as a distinct
construct: validating the intimacy scale among older adults
of residential care homes in Hong Kong”, aims to develop a
valid measurement for the quality of the relationship
between older adults and family caregivers in the Hong
Kong Chinese context. The study results demonstrate the
reliability and validity of the instrument across samples of
older adults.
Paper 2 and 3 that follow are qualitative studies adopting
cultural perspectives to understand Chinese American
immigrant adults and older female survivors of intimate
partner violence in Taiwan. In paper 2, “Understanding
family connections and help-seeking behavior in Chinese parental lives. These findings illustrate how existentialism
provides a new frame of reference and new practice
directions for conducting parent-education programs.
The final paper titled “Internet supervision and parenting
in the digital age: The case of Shanghai” echoes the
technological advancement and its impact on parenting. In a
changing world, and in a society permeated by the Internet
and by nearly instantaneous communication, families
constantly need to adapt to different and changing ways of
parenting. The paper explores the issue of parenting
confidence in supervision of children’s Internet use in
Shanghai, China. Multiple-regression models are used to
identify factors affecting parents’ confidence about their own
parenting. The findings suggest that efforts to assist parents
should help them review their attitudes towards the Internet. American immigrant adults who attempt suicide”, the
authors investigate beliefs, values and norms in the Chinese
family culture and examine Chinese cultural influences on
attitudes and beliefs about mental health and mental health
services in the immigrant context. Paper 3, “Older female
survivors of intimate partner violence in the Taiwanese
cultural context” examines the needs of older female IPV
survivors in another Chinese cultural context. The findings
of both studies reflect the importance of family and the
influence of Chinese family culture; they make it clear that
traditional family beliefs are still highly valued and hold a
prominent position in Chinese culture. The authors of these
two papers question the efficacy of service-delivery models
based on Western cultures, and they call for ethnically
sensitive intervention approaches that incorporate cultural
premises into developing viable options for service
recipients.
Paper 4 is titled “The Macau family-in-transition: the
perceived impact of casino employment on family
relationships among dealer families”. This paper draws on
findings from a qualitative study to explore the impacts of
casino employment on family life and family relationships.
The family, like other social group, is a product of culture
and context, and the specific socio-economic context of
Macau poses challenges to dealer families and casino
workers in performing their parental role. The paper sheds
much-needed light on our understanding of Macau dealer
families.
The final three papers in this special issue all address the
issue of parenting. Paper 5, “Reflective inquiry on
professionals’ view on parents and about parenting”,
examines professionals’ views of parents, their attitudes and
beliefs about parenting, and the values underpinning their
practice. The study’s findings on the theme of parent
blaming provide an impetus for professionals to reflect on
the attitudes and assumptions they hold, and their impact on
parents. The paper calls for reflection on parenting work to
recognize the difficulties and challenges faced by
contemporary families.
Paper 6, “Reviving parents’ life momentum: A qualitative
evaluation of a parent education program adopting an
existential approach”, reports the results of a qualitative
analysis of the participants’ perceptions of a parent-education program. The findings of this study demonstrate
that a program of this nature can make parents aware of the
existential dimensions of being a parent and help them
understand the significance of creating meaning in their
In fact, family, parenting and gender are vastly contested
terms which encompass a range of topics. The seven varied
papers recommended for publication in this special issue
reflect the considerable attention that we have placed on
family, parenting and gender, and also the vision of this
special issue. These papers add to the growing body of
research and literature, and they provide both food for
thought and a platform for discussion.
In the last, I offer both my sincere thanks to the authors
who have contributed to this special issue, and my gratitude
to those who have participated as blind peer reviewers. Their
thoughtful comments and criticisms have certainly improved
the quality of each and every paper in this special issue.
Parental emotional management benefits family relationships: A randomized controlled trial in Hong Kong, China
