A Study On The Effect Of Parental Marital Quality On Children’s Pro-social Behavior And Intervention

Pro-social behaviour is the behaviour of individuals who interact with others in society in a way that is socially desirable and beneficial to others and society.It is an important research topic for human beings and an important component of children’s personality and social development.As the first and most important other with whom children come into contact,parents have a significant influence on children’s pro-social motivation and behaviour,but the mechanisms by which parental marital quality affects children’s pro-social behaviour are unknown.The aim of this study was to uncover the relationship between parental marital quality and children’s prosocial behaviour and the mediating role of children’s self-concept and empathy,and to further explore group psychological intervention programmes that could improve children’s prosocial behaviour.In Study 1,565 students and their parents were selected from a school,and their marital quality was measured by administering questionnaires to their parents online,and their self-concept,empathy and pro-social behaviour levels were measured by administering questionnaires to the students offline,and the data were analysed using SPSS 25.0 and Process V3.3.Study 2 investigated the effectiveness of group counselling by screening student subjects and dividing them into an experimental group and a control group of 20 subjects each.The experimental group underwent eight sessions of targeted group counselling while the control group was left untreated.By analysing the results of Study 1 data,the study found that:(1)Parental marital quality significantly and positively predicted children’s pro-social behaviour;(2)Parental marital quality significantly and positively predicted children’s level of self-concept;(3)Parental marital quality significantly and positively predicted children’s empathy;(4)Self-concept mediates the relationship between parental marital quality and children’s pro-social behaviour;(5)Empathy mediated the relationship between parental marital quality and children’s pro-social behaviour(6)Children’s self-concept significantly and positively predicted their empathy;(7)Self-concept and empathy mediated the chain between parental marital quality and children’s pro-social behaviour.The group counselling intervention in Study 2 found that the experimental group members showed improvements in self-concept,empathy and pro-social behaviour,and therefore the group counselling was effective.This study reveals that parental marital quality influences children’s prosocial behaviour through the mediation of self-concept and empathy and its chain mediation,and provides directions and recommendations for targeted group counselling.