Dissertation
Grandparents' Beliefs about and Intention to Be Involved in Grandchildren's Play: A Study in China
Washington State University
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
01/2021
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7273/000006452
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/119390
Abstract
Grandparents’ involvement in offering care to grandchildren is prevalent worldwide (e.g., Sadruddin et al, 2019), including in China (e.g., Tang et al., 2018). With the involvement in grandchild caring, grandparents usually participate in grandchildren’s day-to-day activities. Existing research has studied the grandparents’ involvement in various types of grandchildren’s activities such as the children’s academic learning (e.g., Kenner et al., 2007), showing important influences of the involvement on grandchildren’s development (e.g., Pong & Chen, 2010; Zeng & Xie, 2014), yet little focus has been placed on the involvement in grandchildren’s play, though play is ubiquitous among children and facilitates children’s social, emotional, cognitive-learning, physical, and recreational development (see in Roopnarine & Jin, 2012). To fill these gaps in the literature, this dissertation seeks to understand grandparents’ involvement in grandchildren’s play. The exploration is situated in mainland China, where there are millions of families involving grandparents in taking care of grandchildren, either custodially or alternatively (Ko & Hank, 2014), assuming grandparental involvement in grandchildren’s play may display. This dissertation consists of two studies. The first study, guided by previous research on caregivers’ beliefs about child play (e.g., Jiang & Han, 2016), examined Chinese grandparents’ beliefs about grandchildren’s play with a modified play beliefs scale (Fogle & Mendez, 2006). Three underlying belief constructs were identified, including Developmental Significance of Play, Play for Future-Level Education, and Academic Significance of Play. As the grandparents’ play beliefs were indicated positive by the first study, the second study was carried out. Building upon the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1985; 1991), this study investigated whether the grandparents’ play-related beliefs predicted their intention to get involved in grandchildren’s play. With data collected by a newly developed and validated grandparental involvement scale, the second study found that the grandparents’ play intention was only predicted by their self-identified control over their involvement in play, while the other two belief constructs—the attitudes towards the involvement and the sociocultural norms on the involvement—were not significant predictors. The theoretical and literature significance of the studies are also discussed.
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Details
- Title
- Grandparents' Beliefs about and Intention to Be Involved in Grandchildren's Play: A Study in China
- Creators
- Yue Huang
- Contributors
- Thomas Salsbury (Advisor)Jane Kelley (Committee Member)Kelly Puzio (Committee Member)Shenghai Dai (Committee Member)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Department of Teaching and Learning
- Theses and Dissertations
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University
- Number of pages
- 88
- Identifiers
- 99900592258401842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Dissertation