Parenting styles and self-efficacy beliefs in Armenian-American families and their relationship to their children's school performance

This study explored the relationship between parenting styles, parenting efficacy, parental education and children's academic efficacy, school performance and educational aspirations in an Armenian-American sample of 72 parent-child dyads. There were 66 mothers and 6 fathers among the participating parents. All children were in 8th grade, and were recruited from four Armenian schools, a public school and a dance studio in the Los Angeles area.;In addition to a demographic questionnaire, parents were asked to complete the Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire (Robinson, Mandleco, Olsen, & Hart, 2001) and the Hoover-Dempsey Parent Efficacy Scale (Reed, Jones, Walker, & Hoover-Dempsey, 2000). After completing the Morgan-Jinks Student Efficacy Scale (Jinks & Morgan, 1999), the children indicated their GPA and educational aspirations. Pearson's product moment and Spearman's rho correlations were utilized to measure the relationship between variables. Results of the five hypotheses testing and exploratory analysis were as follows. As hypothesized, there was a significant relationship between parenting efficacy beliefs and parenting styles, such that endorsement of authoritative parenting techniques was positively correlated with parenting efficacy beliefs, while endorsement of authoritarian parenting techniques was negatively correlated with parenting efficacy beliefs. Consistent with the previous research there was a significant positive relationship between students' academic efficacy beliefs and their school performance. There was a significant positive relationship between authoritative parenting style and students' self-reported GPA, and a significant negative relationship between permissive parenting style and students' self-reported GPA.;Contrary to expectation, there were no significant relationships between parenting efficacy beliefs and students' academic efficacy beliefs, or between parents' educational level and their efficacy beliefs. The results of an exploratory analysis were consistent with the previous research about the significant positive relationship between students' self-reported GPA and their educational aspirations. There was an unexpected significant positive relationship between authoritarian and permissive parenting styles; the items on the two scales appeared to overlap somewhat in terms of parents' use of threats of punishment. Results are discussed in terms of the applicability of psychological constructs of parenting styles and self-efficacy beliefs to the academic outcome and aspirations of Armenian-American students as they prepare for transition to high school.