EDLF 5011 Project Proposal
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Aaron Stiles
September 27, 2012
EDLF 5011
Adolescent Learning and Development
Option A
Project Topic:
What is the relationship between parenting styles and classroom behavior in African American adolescent males?
Seems like you have a very defined focus here Aaron and a great list of articles dealing with your topic. One thing I would be curious of is if you plan to focus this paper on all African American adolescent males or if there would be a regional bias to your study. I would focus part of the paper on either defending or refuting the notion that parenting styles effect African American adolescent males behavior in the classroom uniformly across the whole nation.
You have a very interesting topic here, and it looks like some great sources as well. I might suggest that you refine your word “behavior”. Are you talking about academic classroom behaviors (academic achievement)? Or “bad” vs “good” behavior as classified by teachers, administrators, students, or parents? Or behaviors of self control in the class room (again as defined by whom)?
Morgan, good point. Given that academic performance is more easily quantified than “behavior” I will probably focus on that. Thanks!
Whatever information you do find, I think it’s important that you remember not to form quick generalizations. Correlation does not prove causation. There are an abundance of factors that influence an African American male’s behavior/academic performance in school.
Perhaps you should nuance your argument.
References:
Jones, Y. (2009). The maternal influence: A comparative study of the differences in parenting styles among mothers of high achieving and lower-achieving African American adolescents. (Doctoral Dissertation). Retrieved from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses.
Mitchell, Y. (2002). Child-rearing styles and achievement test performance of African American students: an individual growth analysis. (Doctoral Dissertation). Retrieved from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses.
Odubote, B. (2008). Parenting style, race and delinquency: A comparative study of European American, African American and Nigerian families. (Doctoral Dissertation). Retrieved from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses.
Bean, R., Bush, K., McKenry, P., & Wilson, S. (2003). The impact of parental support, behavior control, and psychological control on the academic achievement and self-esteem of African American and European American adolescents. Journal of Adolescent Research, Vol. 18 No. 5, September 2003, 523- 541
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I think that this is a great topic and I like the specificity. My only question is whether or not there will be any focus on socioeconomic status or if you will be drawing on examples from multiple levels of the socioeconomic spectrum. Would your paper be different if you focused on class? Or is the implication that you will be focusing on the lower half of the socioeconomic spectrum?
Aaron, I think you have a wonderful topic here, and after hearing your response to question about behavior v. academic performance I think you have addressed what would have been my major concern about your project. The only other thing I can think of is the age of the adolescents in the studies, are you thinking of primarily middle school or high school age students? Of a combination of the two?
Thanks Louis for your thoughts on socio-economic status.
I guess I hadn’t fully considered the implications of socio-economics (in that they might trump any cultural implications in parenting styles). I think I will attempt to control for socio-economics. We’ll see how that goes in the research.
Thanks!
I think will probably try to narrow in on high school adolescents given that I am trying to teach at the secondary level.
Hi Aaron,
This is an interesting topic and I agree with the other commenters that you might refine the focus a bit more. Definitely with regard to ‘behavior’ – I think the articles you have chosen suggest that you’re actually interested in achievement and academic outcomes. It may be helpful to find a comparative study that either supports or refutes that there is anything culturally significant about parenting styles for this population and how that either is or is not connected to region, rural/urban, socioeconomic status, etc. I think the Bean article will be most useful for this. Second, the other three articles are all dissertations. I would prefer for you to find articles that have been published in peer-reviewed sources. My assumption is that probably all of these authors have more recent publications related to their dissertations that would be useful (or they reference some useful empirical articles). Given those suggestions, the Odubote article might send you in a different direction so that is also something to consider.
In terms of your comment “It may be helpful to find a comparative study that either supports or refutes that there is anything culturally significant about parenting styles for this population and how that either is or is not connected to region, rural/urban, socioeconomic status, etc”
Are you suggesting locating an article that considers whether or not cultural differences in parenting styles are the causal mechanism of achievement? Considering other demographic factors?
In other words articles that evaluate the causal significance of culture compared to other factors?
I would add that I have found it difficult to find peer reviewed journal empirical articles from ~2000 onward. Plenty of dissertations however. I was able to find another empirical peer reviewed article of relevance but its from 1992.
I feel confident I have exhausted PsycNet, though being less familiar with its search I could easily have missed something.
Hi Aaron,
I was thinking something along the lines of an article that looks into whether parenting styles are more important for african-american males than they are for other children. As in, what in either existing empirical literature or theoretical articles suggests that to be the case? (I’m not doubting, just curious as to what is already out there that will help you make your case or at least introduce your topic). I’ve found a few things, I’ll paste the links here. My hunch, just from perusing the abstracts, is that they might provide some useful insight in their literature reviews.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8624.00405/abstract
(I know this one is girls but the lit review may have info on boys)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1532-7795.00010/abstract
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1998.tb06244.x/abstract
Hopefully one of those gives you some more leads to work with!
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