The purpose of the present study was to compare the parenting attitudes of
AfricanAmerican, European American (native to the United States), Asian Ame
rican, Asian-Indian, and Hispanic mothers (immigrant population who were no
t natives of the United States). Research has indicated that parents develo
p their parenting styles based on their cultural socialization, family back
ground, personality style, and personality of their children (Belsky, 1984)
. One hundred and eighty two mothers participated in the study. The parenti
ng attitudes of the mothers were measured using the Adolescent-Adult Parent
ing Inventory (AAPI, Bavolek, 1984), a 32 item assessment. 1 way ANOVA perf
ormed on each of the 4 subscale scores of the parenting attitudes indicated
that the five cultural groups differed in their parental attitudes. Post-h
oc Tukey tests for ethnic group differences in the parental attitude subsca
le scores yielded significant results for 16 of the 40 pairwise comparisons
. These results suggest that some groups of ethnic mothers place stricter e
xpectations, demands and control on their children.