Apply the idea of the custom complex to parent-child conflict in the American majority culture. How do the typical topics of conflict reflect certain cultural beliefs?
Excerpt from textbook:
In traditional cultures, it is rare for parents and adolescents to engage in the kind of frequent, petty conflicts typical of parent–adolescent relationships in the American majority culture (Kapadia & Miller, 2005; Schlegel & Hewlett, 2011). Part of the reason is economic. In traditional cultures, family members tend to rely on each other economically. In many of these cultures, family members spend a great deal of time together each day, working on family economic enterprises. Children and adolescents depend on their parents for the necessities of life, parents depend on children and adolescents for the contribution of their labor, and all family members are expected to assist one another routinely and help one another in times of need. Under such conditions, the pressure to maintain family harmony is intense because the economic interdependence of the family is so strong.
However, more than economics and the structure of daily life are involved in the lower levels of parent–adolescent conflict in traditional cultures. Levels of conflict are low in parent–adolescent relationships not only in nonindustrialized traditional cultures but also in highly industrialized traditional cultures, such as Japan and South Korea, as well as in the Asian American and Latino cultures that are part of American society (Calzada et al., 2010; Harwood et al., 2002). This indicates that even more important than economics are cultural beliefs about parental authority and the appropriate degree of adolescent independence. As discussed previously, the role of parent carries greater authority in traditional cultures than in the West, and this makes it less likely that adolescents in such cultures will express disagreements and resentments toward their parents (Arnett, 1999; Phinney et al., 2005).
A key point in understanding parent–adolescent relationships in traditional cultures is that the independence that is so important to Western adolescents is not nearly as prized in non-Western cultures. In the West, as we have seen, regulating the pace of adolescents’ autonomy is often a source of parent–adolescent conflict. However, parents and adolescents in the West agree that independence is the ultimate goal for adolescents as they move into adulthood (Aquilino, 2006). Individuals in the West are supposed to reach the point, during emerging adulthood, where they no longer live in their parents’ household, no longer rely on their parents financially, and have learned to stand alone as self-sufficient individuals (Arnett, 1998, 2015). The pace of the adolescent’s growing autonomy is a source of contention between parents and adolescents not because parents do not want their adolescents to become independent, but because the ultimate goal of self-sufficiency that both of them value requires continual adaptations and adjustments in their relationship as they move toward that goal. Increasing autonomy prepares adolescents for life in a culture where they will be expected to be capable of independence and self-sufficiency. The discussion, negotiation, and arguments typical of parent–adolescent relationships in the West may also help prepare adolescents for participation in a politically diverse, democratic society.
Apply the idea of the custom complex to parent-child conflict in the American ma
By admin