ResearchDirection
My research addresses a fundamental question in psychological mechanisms: What aspects of socialization affect children’s development universally and what function differently across cultures? Specifically, I am interested in the role of two major socializers of children: parents and peers. My past research provided evidence for both the culture universalistic and culture specific views on different aspects of parenting and children’s adjustment. I am currently exploring how children allocate their free time and how time spent with peers affects their development across cultural contexts. In the future, I hope to also address the question by examining children’s social and academic lives in rural and urban areas of China as norms and values vary within China. I follow two principles in my research program. First, I strive to conduct research that has both theoretical and practical implications. For example, I focus on the development during early adolescence as the period is psychologically and academically transitional such that cultural socialization may shape differences essential for children’s future adaptiveness. Second, I make every effort to achieve methodological rigor by not only considering every aspect of the research design (e.g., comparable demographics in the sample, cultural appropriateness of the measures) but also using state-of-art quantitative methods (e.g., within-individual level longitudinal models; measurement invariance; discussed more below). |