Parenting
Issues of New Immigrants in Three Cities
Sixth International
Metropolis Conference
Joanna Ochocka PhD
Rich Janzen MA
Centre for Research and Education in Human Services
This paper
presents a new framework for understanding immigrant parenting, and highlights
implications of this framework on public policy. The framework was developed by
a multidisciplinary research team, through an intensive qualitative study on
immigrant parenting in Ontario, Canada.
In this paper
we discuss the process and findings of a recently completed provincial study on
parenting issues of newcomer families in Ontario. Funded by the Ontario
Administration of Settlement and Integration Services (OASIS), the study was
carried out by the Centre for Research and Education in Human Services (CREHS)
and the Joint Centre for Research on Immigration and Settlement (CERIS).
Principal investigators for the study were Joanna Ochocka, Rich Janzen, Paul
Anisef and Kenise Murphy Kilbride.
The purpose of
this study was to explore the issues faced by immigrant mothers and fathers
across twelve language groups, and from three Ontario cities (Ottawa, Waterloo
and Toronto). The research also explored the supports and resources that could
assist newcomer parents in addressing their parenting issues. Wide-ranging
recommendations were generated by a multi-stakeholder steering committee that
guided the study. This committee consisted of immigrant parents from each of
the study's three sites, a representative of the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving
Immigrants (OCASI), a representative of the funder (OASIS) and the primary
investigators.
The research
study used in-depth qualitative methods and a participatory action research
approach (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Nelson, Ochocka, Griffen & Lord, 1998)
to speak with over 300 recent immigrant parents who were in Canada for less
than three years, and were from 12 diverse language groups. A total of 50 focus
groups were held (half with mothers, have with fathers) in Toronto, Ottawa and
Waterloo, and another 48 individual interviews were conducted with immigrant
parents in Toronto (36 mothers and 12 fathers). All interviews were conducted
in home languages by trained researchers from that linguistic community.
Additionally the study completed an in-depth literature review on immigrant
parenting and held another 24 key informant interviews with service providers,
academics and policy makers across the province.
A New
Framework for Understanding Immigrant Parenting
Given the
limitations in existing parenting models to describe the immigrant parenting
experience, we developed and tested a new framework for understanding immigrant
parent. This framework includes the recognition of the immigration process on
parenting and directly highlights the implications for public policy designed
to support immigrant mothers and fathers.
The framework
begins with parenting orientations.
Orientations are the beliefs, biases and values that form a parent's
expectations for their children's behaviours and hopes for their children's
futures. Parenting orientations include the values parents want to pass on to
their children (what makes a "good" child), the qualities that parents should
adopt (what makes a "good" parent), and the aspirations or future goals parents
have for their children.
Parenting styles are the implementation of parenting orientations. Parenting
styles include the ways that parents relate to and interact with their
children. In other words, parenting styles are how people go about doing
parenting; how they shape their children and the relationships they build with
them.
The host country context is an intervention,
or filter, potentially impacting the parenting orientations and parenting
styles of newcomers. As people settling in a new country, immigrant parents
have entered into a new context. They form opinions about what they perceive to
be the "parenting ways" in this new host country. These ways of parenting might
be similar or different to the ones that they themselves hold.
Parenting modifications are the changes that immigrants make in their parenting or
understanding and practice of parenting within their new host country. The
immigrant settlement process has frequently been described as a reciprocal
relationship between immigrants and the host society (e.g., Bourhis, 2000).
This "two-way street" understanding of settlement acknowledges that immigrants
not only adapt to their new home, but that they also influence and shape this
society.
The final
component in our framework deals with the parenting
supports needed for immigrant parents. We propose that parenting supports
are needed to: 1) help immigrant parents understand and settle within their new
host country, 2) help them through the process of parenting modifications, and
3) help encourage mutual exchange between immigrants and others in the host
country.
Study Findings
Parenting Orientations - Beliefs, Values and Hopes
When talking
about parenting orientations, study participants clarified the beliefs and
values that guided them as parents today. Three main themes emerged. The first
dealt with the value of respect (usually meaning submitting to authority
figures), the second with the importance of the family and the need to
contribute to family life, and the third with the passing of traditional
religion and culture on to their children.
While the
themes of respect and family were common across all language groups, there was
a range of opinions on the significance of maintaining religion and culture.
Participants who emigrated from regions with strong religious traditions (e.g,
Iran, Afghanistan, Somalia and the Punjab) tended to place a very high value on
teaching both religious and cultural values. At the
other extreme were parents who stated that teaching religion and their
traditional language was not a priority. In fact, one facilitator went so far
as to say that learning English was the most important priority for her
participants and their children. As mentioned earlier, all parents stressed
teaching children to respect others and to understand the importance of the
family.
Parents also articulated what hopes, dreams and aspirations
they held for their children's future. Most participants were very optimistic
of their children's future in Canada for their families here in Canada. The
most common hopes that parents, particularly fathers, had for their children
centred on their long-term economic security and on getting a good education.
Education was usually seen as the key to an economically successful future and
parents often held high educational goals for their children. Other hopes and
aspirations for children included maintaining good values, being healthy and
happy, and that children would contribute back to society.
Parenting Styles - Shaping
Children
When talking
about parenting styles, participants often mentioned two prerequisite roles
that parents needed to adopt. One role was to be a "provider and protector" of
their children, the other was to provide "unconditional love". In addition to
these two prerequisite parents spoke of four main types of parenting actions to
help them to shape their children. These main types of actions include
"responding to bad", "preventing bad", "presenting good", and "promoting good".
Parents from all cultures generally performed all types of actions.
The first three main categories of parenting actions (i.e.,
responding to bad, preventing bad, presenting good) can be seen as dealing with
issues of morality. That is, parents saw their role as helping their children
to understand the difference between what is good and what is bad. The final
main category of parenting action (i.e., promoting good) was different in
nature. The "good" being promoted was less to shape good behaviour than to
shape well-adjusted and productive adults.
For most participants, shaping their children meant teaching
children the difference between right and wrong (I.e., responding to bad,
preventing bad, presenting good). Mothers tended to use a broader variety of
discipline methods, while fathers focused on more intensive methods such as
lecturing their child or corporal punishment.
Canadian Context - Perceptions of
Canadian Parenting
Immigrant
parents talked about Canada emphasizing similarities and differences between
socio-political, educational, cultural, and lifestyle factors. Major
similarities in parenting with other families in Canada included emphasizing
the well being of their children. Parents also wanted their children to become
respectful, responsible and productive.
Major
differences included immigrant parents believing that they were stricter in
discipline, and having closer families. "Normal" relationships where the father
earns for a wife and the mother takes care of children, are challenged in
Canada as well as the idea of "dating," which is opposite to the way many
parents were raised.
Parents also highlighted differences in education, seeing immigrants as
placing a greater emphasis on
education and school. Fathers were more critical towards Canadian education
than mothers. In the view of many immigrant parents, sex education was
inappropriate, as was the dating behaviour of boys and girls in public.
Modifications - Parenting in
Transition
Most parents admitted that their methods, styles and
attitudes towards parenting had undergone major changes with varying degrees,
depending on the personal circumstances, individual experience, age of children
and duration of stay in Canada. They admitted that they were consciously making
parenting changes not necessarily in harmony with what they knew or believed.
Some parents found it hard to reconcile their cultural ways of parenting with
those of Canadians. Often parents wanted their children to fit in, but they did
not want them to act in the "Canadian" way. They also found it hard to raise
kids traditionally according to their old culture because the
"Canadian" ways of parenting were supported by institutions and the
community.
The process of modification involved an ongoing negotiation between
what people believed to be good parenting and what they saw others believe to
be good parenting. Because immigrant parents typically did not have much
exposure to the "Canadian" way of parenting, the process of learning and
modifying was often painful and slow.
Many immigrant parents resisted the power reversals in
family roles they experienced since coming to Canada. These related to children
playing important adult functions as translators, interpreters, negotiators or
information providers. Role reversals were also experienced between mothers and
fathers. Parents spoke of giving more
freedom to they children since living in Canada. Parents of older children
(born outside Canada) showed preferences to stronger control of their children
than those having younger children (born outside or in Canada).
Parenting Contributions - Benefits
to Host Country
Study participants mentioned four main areas. The first
dealt with the behaviour of children with immigrant parents believing that
Canadian children could learn more about being polite, showing respect to
elders, eating healthier and obeying laws. The second area focused on
emphasizing that children should take care of older parents and other less
fortunate in society. The third area of contribution was in the greater
emphasis of education and taking a greater interest in a child's education.
Finally, immigrant parents also believed that Canadian parents could learn
about how to be more directive in their parenting role.
Immigrant
Parenting Supports with Implications for Policy
The workshop ended by exploring the implications of the
immigrant parenting framework for public policy. These implications are based
on the study recommendations which highlight three main themes relevant for
government policy. These include a call for parenting supports that 1) help
immigrant parents understand and settle within their new Canadian context, 2)
help them through the process of parenting modifications, and 3) help encourage
mutual exchange between immigrants and other Canadian parents.
The
diagram below summarizes their opinions. This diagram is in the form of a
program logic model that identifies main component areas, implementation
objectives, sample activities and sample outcomes. Notice that the three main
components of support correspond to our immigrant parenting framework (i.e.,
Canadian context, modifications and contributions).
