This study was conducted to understand the relationships of children's familial environment, maternal propensity for perfection and parenting belief in children's development to their creative personality and creative thinking. To clarifying these rel...
This study was conducted to understand the relationships of children's familial environment, maternal propensity for perfection and parenting belief in children's development to their creative personality and creative thinking. To clarifying these relationships, this researcher established the creative personality profiles of 4-5 years old children, and investigated three factorsthat influence creative personality and thinking: familial environment, maternal propensity for perfection and parenting. The objective of the study is to provide fundamental data on desirable mother-child relation by clarifying the relationship between maternal propensity for perfection and parenting beliefs, two factors which have a critical influence on a child creative development (Torrance, 1976).
The subjects of this study were 124 children (69 boys, 55 girls) of age 4-5 attending kindergarten in the Kyunggi area as well as their mothers.
To measure the maternal propensity for perfection, this used the "multi-dimensional perfection measurement" technique designed by Cho Bokhee et al. (2002) which takesin consideration the sociocultural background of Korea. Also,’s (1988) PRIDE(Preschool and Kindergarten Interest Descriptor) was used as a tool to help class teachers assess their students creative personality. In addition, to test children's creative thinking, the Korean edition of TTCT (Torrance Test of Creative Thinking originally developed by Torrance(1981) and translated by Kim Youngchea (2002) was used. To assess parental child-rearing beliefs in the development of children autonomy, this research used Child-Rearing Beliefs Scales originally developed by Okagaki and Sternbreg(1993) and translated into Korean by Jung Minja(2005) . Also to measure parental child-rearing beliefs in supporting children, the Parent Belief of Support Inventory, originally developed by Simon, Lorenz, Conger, & Wu(1992) and translated into Korean by Jung Minja(2005), was used for this study.
To analyze the gathered data, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were employed. The results obtained from this study can be summarized as follow
First, from this study it was found that, maternal propensity for perfection is not influenced by the mother's age or education level but is strongly affected by the family income. Mothers whose family income is in the $4000-5000 bracket showed higher standards of maternal propensity for perfection a concept related to socially expected perfection.
Second, from this study it was found that children creativity is not affected by their parents’ age and education level and by their order of birth. However, 5 years old children showed higher independence- perseverance in creative characteristic << (I don’t know what this means) than 4 years old. Moreover,in imagination-pleasure and whole creative characteristic << (I don`t know what this means), girls showed higher standards than boys. Finally, regarding monetary factors, children from families having incomes in the $4,000-5,000 bracket demonstrated higher independence-perseverance in creative characteristic than others.
Third, , maternal propensity for perfection was found to influence both children's creative personality and creative thinking, but it was found that maternal propensity for perfection hasa greater influence on creative personality than on creative thinking. Socially expected perfection of maternal propensity for perfection showed positivecorrelations with uniqueness, various interest and general creative personality whole creative characteristics. Also, fear related to mistakes, failure of maternal propensity for perfection showed adverse correlations with uniqueness andwhole creative characteristics general creative personality. Regarding the correlation between maternal propensity for perfection and children's creative thinking, socially expected perfection of maternal propensity for perfection showed adverse correlation with proficiency, originality, premature closure and general creative thinking. Finally, fear related to mistakes, failure of maternal propensity for perfection showed adverse correlation with proficiency, originality, exquisiteness and general creative thinking.
Fourth, mother's parental child-rearing beliefs were found to affect both children's creative personality and creative thinking. Mother's parental child-rearing beliefs were shown to have a greater influence on creative personality than creative thinking. Mother's parental child-rearing beliefs in the development of the children’s autonomy presented positive correlations with uniqueness, imagination-pleasure and general children's creative personality as well as with premature closure and originality of children's creative thinking. Moreover, mother'sparental child-rearing beliefs in supporting children showed correlations with uniqueness, various interest and whole creative characteristics, whereas mother's parental child-rearing beliefs in supporting children and children's creative thinking showed correlation with only premature closure. Namely, mother's parental child-rearing beliefs in supporting children has more high correlation with children's creative characteristics than creative thinking.