This study investigates the influence of parenting styles, namely authoritarian, authoritative, and permissive, as well as moral identity, on the growth of altruism in young individuals. Gathering data from a broad sample of volunteers, a quantitative technique was used to analyse the influence of several factors on altruistic behaviours. The study utilised regression analysis to examine the predictive efficacy of each parenting style and moral identity on altruism, offering a nuanced comprehension of the interplay between these factors within a socio-cultural framework. The results indicate that both authoritarian and permissive parenting styles have a significant correlation with the cultivation of altruistic behaviour in young individuals. Contrary to expectations based on Western research, this study found no significant relationship between the authoritative parenting style and altruistic behaviours. Similarly, this study did not find a significant relationship between moral identity and altruism, indicating that the influence of personal moral standards may be intricate and influenced by unaccounted factors. The findings highlight the importance of cultural context in influencing the efficacy of different parenting approaches. According to this study, both authoritarian and permissive parenting styles can promote altruistic behaviour. However, the specific ways in which these styles influence prosocial behaviour may vary depending on cultural norms and particular family dynamics. These findings question the idea that authoritarian parenting is universally the most successful style and emphasise the importance of considering cultural factors when studying the development of compassion. This study adds to the wider discussion on moral development and parenting, urging for additional research on the interplay between specific elements of parenting and individual moral identity in shaping prosocial behaviours such as altruism. These insights are essential for creating customised educational and parental practices that effectively encourage altruistic behaviours in various cultural contexts.
Aquino, K., & Reed, A. II. (2002). The self-importance of moral identity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83(6), 1423-1440.
Bandura, A. (1977). Social Learning Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Blasi, A. (1984). Moral identity: Its role in moral functioning. Morality, Moral Behavior, and Moral Development, 128-139.
Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.). (2012). Handbook of Cultural Developmental Science. New York: Psychology Press.
Carlo, G., Crockett, L. J., Wilkinson, J. L., & Beal, S. J. (2011). The role of emotional reactivity, self-regulation, and puberty in adolescents' prosocial behaviors. Social Development, 20(4), 665-683.
Chao, R. K., & Tseng, V. (2002). Parenting of Asians. In M. H. Bornstein (Ed.), Handbook of Parenting: Biology and Ecology of Parenting (Vol. 2, pp. 59-93). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.
Chen, X. (2000). Cultures of socialization: Chinese and North American. In L. J. Crockett & R. K. Silbereisen (Eds.), Negotiating Adolescence in Times of Social Change (pp. 235-251). Cambridge University Press.
Eisenberg, N., Spinrad, T. L., & Knafo-Noam, A. (2015). Prosocial development. In R. M. Lerner (Ed.), Handbook of Child Psychology and Developmental Science (7th ed., Vol. 3, pp. 610-656). Wiley.
Grusec, J. E. (1997). A new look at parenting styles. Developmental Psychology, 33(4), 508-517.
Grusec, J. E., & Goodnow, J. J. (1994). Impact of parental discipline methods on the child's internalization of values: A reconceptualization of current points of view. Developmental Psychology, 30(1), 4-19.
Grusec, J. E., Davidov, M., & Lundell, L. (2002). Prosocial and helping behavior. In P. Smith & C. Hart (Eds.), Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Social Development (pp. 457-474). Blackwell Publishers Ltd.
Hardy, S. A., & Carlo, G. (2011). Moral identity: What is it, how does it develop, and is it linked to moral action? Child Development Perspectives, 5(3), 212-218.
Hertz, S. G., & Krettenauer, T. (2016). Does moral identity effectively predict moral behavior?: A meta-analysis. Review of General Psychology, 20(2), 129-140.
Kiang, L., Glatz, T., & Buchanan, C. M. (2017). Acculturation conflict, cultural parenting self-efficacy, and perceived parenting competence in Asian American and Latino/a families. Family Process, 56(4), 943-961.
Knafo, A., & Plomin, R. (2006). Parental influence on children's prosocial behavior: A multivariate genetic analysis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 91(2), 368-378.
Kohlberg, L. (1984). Essays on Moral Development, Vol. II: The Psychology of Moral Development. San Francisco: Harper & Row.
Krevans, J., & Gibbs, J. C. (1996). Parents' use of inductive discipline: Relations to children's empathy and prosocial behavior. Child Development, 67(6), 3263-3277.
Padilla-Walker, L. M., & Thompson, R. A. (2015). Differing effects of parental roles within adolescent socialization: Analyses of prosocial behaviors. Journal of Moral Education, 44(2), 232-245.
Padilla-Walker, L. M., Fraser, A. M., Black, B. B., & Bean, R. A. (2017). Associations between friendship, sympathy, and prosocial behavior toward friends. Journal of Adolescence, 55, 46-55.
Pratt, M. W., Arnold, M. L., Pratt, A. T., & Diessner, R. (2016). Moral identity and the expanding circle of moral regard toward out-groups. Journal of Moral Education, 45(4), 480-492.
Rothbaum, F., & Weisz, J. R. (1994). Parental caregiving and child externalizing behavior in nonclinical samples: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 116(1), 55-74.
Tomasello, M., Carpenter, M., Call, J., Behne, T., & Moll, H. (2005). Understanding and sharing intentions: The origins of cultural cognition. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 28(5), 675-691.
Turiel, E. (2002). The Culture of Morality: Social Development, Context, and Conflict. Cambridge University Press.
Hasbullah, N., Ma’rof, A. A., & Azam, M. N. D. (2024). Relationship Between Moral Identity and Parenting Styles on Prosocial Behavior among Youth in Selangor, Malaysia. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 14(8), 1823–1836.
Copyright: © 2024 The Author(s)
Published by Knowledge Words Publications (www.kwpublications.com)
This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this license may be seen at: http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode
