Cultural Differences in Early Mathematics Learning: A Comparison of Euro-American, Chinese-American, and Taiwan-Chinese Families

Abstract

Forty second-generation Euro-American, and 40 Chinese-American children were drawn from well-educated two-parent families in the suburban Chicago area and 40 Chinese children were drawn from a similar population in Taipei, Taiwan (10 preschool girls, 10 preschool boys, 10 kindergarten girls, and 10 kindergarten boys in each group). Chinese-American and Taiwan-Chinese children outperformed Euro-American children on measures of mathematics, spatial relations, and numeral formation. Chinese-American parents gave more formal, direct mathematics instruction, structured their child’s time to a greater degree, and reported more encouragement for mathematics-related activities than did Euro-American parents. A path analysis using Eccles’ (1993) model of academic motivation showed that ethnicity, parents’ child-specific beliefs, and parents’ work-oriented practices directly predicted mathematics-related outcomes.