A Correlation Study Between Maternal Psychological Control Level And Autonomy Of Three To Five Years Old Children

Autonomy (Independence) is one of the important research subjects of psychology. In contrast with other psychology domains, however, it is very weak in the researches on the theory and confirmation in China. Therefore, using a confirmable method to discuss the correlate issue in autonomy domain is a beneficial supplement for autonomy research in our country. Autonomy is the desire and ability to choose one's goal by oneself, which consists of self-reliance, self-control and self-assertion. Self-reliance and self-assertion are the contents of what the children want to do, which reflect the personal tropism in autonomy. Self-control is the content of what the children should do, which reflect the social tropism in autonomy. Parental control is one of the influence factors on autonomy. According to research abroad, as a part of parental control, parental psychological control is one of the significant influence factors on children autonomy. Psychological control refers to parental behaviors that intrude upon children's thoughts and feelings. Despite there are confirmable researches on the correlation between self-control and parental control. But there is little confirmable research on the relation between self-reliance, self-assertion and psychological control in our country. This study wanted to probe into the relations between self-reliance, self-control and maternal psychological control based on 3-5 years old children. We used the method which combines the experiment and self-made questionnaire. The results showed that: (1) the self-made questionnaire has high reliability and validity; (2) significant correlation was found between autonomy and maternal psychological control. Mother with more psychological control developed low level autonomy; Mother with little psychological control developed high level autonomy; (3) significant correlation was found between self-reliance and self-assertion. Mother with more psychological control developed low level self-reliance and self-assertion; so it was on the other side; (4) mother with high guilt-induction, inhibit sex information and anxiety-induction developed low level self-reliance and self-assertion; so it was on the other side. Mother with high encourage independence, protect children, parental independence developed high level self-reliance and self-assertion; so it was on the other side; (5) there was no differences between boys and girls according to maternal psychological control; (6) the self-reliance and self-assertion developed with age among 3-5 years old children; (7) there was no significant gender differences for children autonomy.