Language development and the home language environment during early childhood are critical for long-term child outcomes. Caregiver mental health may influence early language outcomes directly, but it can also introduce perception bias, which refers to the discrepancies between caregiver self-assessments and the actual status of child language outcomes. This study examines the associations between caregiver mental health symptoms and (1) child language development and home language environment, and (2) caregiver perception bias in self-report assessments of child language development and home language environment. The study recruited 137 rural Chinese households with children aged 16-24 months. Objective measures of child language development and the home language environment were collected using Language Environment Analysis (LENA) technology. Caregiver perception biases were measured by the discrepancies between the objective and caregiver self-report measurements. Results show that caregiver anxiety and stress symptoms were linked to poor child language development, while symptoms of depression and anxiety were associated with less stimulating home language environment. Caregivers with depressive and anxiety symptoms tended to overestimate their children's language development, and those with depressive symptoms also overestimated their own verbal inputs. These findings call for caution when implementing self-report assessments of early childhood development.
In rural China, there exists a gender gap in academic achievement where girls outperform boys, suggesting similar differences in early language development. Moreover, recent research has revealed that children in peri-urban communities have worse language outcomes than children in rural communities. This study examines the impact of gender on early language development in low-SES, peri-urban Chinese communities. Data from 81 children (56.79% boys) aged 18-24 months (Mage = 21.16) living in peri-urban China were collected using two caregiver-reported tests for child language development and ability, and language environment analysis technology for measuring the home language environment. Results show that in peri-urban communities, girls were generally exposed to more adult-child conversations and showed higher counts of vocalizations than did boys; girls scored higher on language development measures than did boys. The implications of these findings on the gender gap and child development are discussed.
China's urbanization has created growing peri-urban communities, where children face challenges to early childhood development (ECD) despite proximity to developed urban areas. Little is known about how the environmental factors of ECD differ between rural migrants and new urban residents. To address this, we sampled 77 peri-urban households with 18-24-month-old Han Chinese children to examine the associations between early cognitive and language development, parental self-efficacy, stimulating parenting practices, and the home language environment measured with Language Environment Analysis (LENA). We find that rural migrants and new urban residents exhibited no significant difference in any child or household characteristic except parental residency. There was no significant difference in the family environment factors or early cognitive or language development, either. However, parental self-efficacy and stimulating parenting practices both predicted better cognitive and language development in rural migrant households, whereas only conversation turn counts predicted better language development in new urban resident households.
Language development and the home language environment during early childhood are critical for long-term child outcomes. Caregiver mental health may influence early language outcomes directly, but it can also introduce perception bias, which refers to the discrepancies between caregiver self-assessments and the actual status of child language outcomes. This study examines the associations between caregivers mental health symptoms and (i) child language development and home language environment, and (ii) caregiver perception bias in self-report assessments of child language development and home language environment. The stduy recruited 137 rural Chinese households with children aged 16–24 months. Objective measures of child language development and the home language environment were collected using Language Environment Analysis (LENA) technology. Caregiver perception bias were measured by the descrepency between the objective and caregiver self-report measurements. Results show that caregiver anxiety and stress symptoms were linked to poor child language development, while symptoms of depression and anxiety symptoms were associated with less stimulating home language environment. Caregivers with depressive and anxiety symptoms tended to overestimate their children’s language development, and those with depressive symptoms also overestimated their own verbal inputs. These findings call for caution when implementing self-report assessments of early childhood development.
Research suggests that elements of the family environment may have significant associations with cognitive and language development outcomes. Less is known, however, about the family environment in peri-urban China, where rates of cognitive and language delay in children aged 0-3 years are as high as 51% and 54%, respectively. Using data collected from 81 peri-urban households with toddlers aged 18-24 months in Southwestern China, this study examines the associations between stimulating parenting practices, the home language environment, and parental self-efficacy, with cognitive and language development. The results indicate that stimulating parenting practices was significantly associated with cognitive development, the home language environment was significantly associated with language development, and parental self-efficacy was significantly associated with cognitive development. The implications of such findings reveal several mechanisms for supporting healthy cognitive and language development among toddlers from peri-urban China.
Purpose This paper aims to explore how firms enter or exit B Corp certification faced with the tension between local and B Corp institutions, providing a better understanding of the unique impact of institutional complexity on B Corps' decision-making. Design/methodology/approach This paper applies multi-case analysis to 20 Chinese firms in various stages of B Corp certification, including eight certified B Corps, six decertified firms and six candidates. The qualitative data was used to code separately for two research questions. Findings The study findings reveal that: (1) Participants who can obtain expected social and economic benefits by innovating their operational mode to efficiently deal with this tension attempt to continuously pursue B Corp certification. A self-renewal model was developed to show how firms hybridize the two institutional logics; (2) Participants who find it hard to mitigate this tension tend to compromise with the local institution and conform less with the B Corp institution due to high opportunity and accounting costs, low short-term benefits and collective culture. Originality/value By highlighting the different responses of firms to institutional complexity, this study contributes to B Corp research, social identity theory and institutional complexity, providing practical implications for B Lab strategies in China.
Purpose: This mixed-methods study examined how differences in parental time, knowledge, and economic constraints, as well as community socioeconomic contexts, may contribute to differences in home language environment and child language ability outcomes between peri-urban and rural households in China. Method: We conducted an explanatory sequential mixed-methods analysis using data from 158 children aged 18-24 months among peri-urban and rural households with low socioeconomic status (SES) in southwestern China. Audio recordings were collected from each household and analyzed using the Language ENvironment Analysis system. The Mandarin version of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories was administered to each child's primary caregiver. We also conducted qualitative interviews with primary caregivers in 31 periurban and 32 rural households. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, and coded. Results: The quantitative results reveal that children in peri-urban households heard less adult speech and had lower language ability than children in rural households. Directed content analysis of interviews found that peri-urban caregivers faced more severe time constraints and less favorable community socioeconomic contexts than rural primary caregivers. Taken together, these findings suggest that differences in time constraints and community socioeconomic contexts between the two populations are the most likely factors contributing to the inferior language environment and language ability among children in peri-urban households. Conclusion: The mixed-methods study indicated that parental time constraints and community socioeconomic contexts should be considered alongside SES for a comprehensive understanding of factors influencing parental investment in the home language environment in China.
The home language environment is a critical point of investment in early language skills. However, few studies have quantitatively measured the home language environment of low-socioeconomic-status households in non-western settings. This mixed methods study describes the home language environment and early child language skills among households in a low-socioeconomic-status, peri-urban district of Chengdu, China, and identifies factors influencing parental investment in the home language environment. Audio recordings were collected from 81 peri-urban households with children ages 18-24 months and analysed using the Language Environment Analysis (LENATM) system. The Mandarin version of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory was administered to each child's primary caregiver. The quantitative results revealed large variation in home language environments and child language skills among the sample, with relatively low average scores when compared to other Chinese samples. Qualitative interviews with a subset of 31 caregivers revealed that many caregivers face constraints on their knowledge of interactive parenting, compounded, in some households, by time constraints due to work or household responsibilities. The findings indicate a need for increased sources of credible parenting information for peri-urban caregivers of young children to promote investment in the home language environment.
In low- and middle-income countries, urbanization has spurred the expansion of peri-urban communities, or urban communities of formerly rural residents with low socioeconomic status. The growth of these communities offers researchers an opportunity to measure the associations between the level of urbanization and the home language environment (HLE) among otherwise similar populations. Data were collected in 2019 using Language Environment Analysis observational assessment technology from 158 peri-urban and rural households with Han Chinese children (92 males, 66 females) aged 18-24 months in China. Peri-urban children scored lower than rural children in measures of the HLE and language development. In both samples, child age, gender, maternal employment, and sibling number were positively correlated with the HLE, which was in turn correlated with language development.
Using premier Language Environment Analysis technology to measure and analyze the home language environment, this observational study aims to describe the home language environment and child language ability, drawing on empirical data from 77 households with children aged 18-24 months from rural China. The results show large variation in measures of the home language environment and early language ability, similar to other rural Chinese samples. Results also demonstrate significant correlations between child age and the home language environment, maternal employment and the home language environment, father's educational attainment and the home language environment, adult-child conversations and early language ability, and child vocalizations and early language ability.
Parental investment in the home language environment during the earliest years is a critical predictor of early language development. Because most studies investigating the home language environment and child language development have been conducted in Western, high-income, and developed settings, less is known about such environments in low- or middle-income settings. This study was conducted in a peri-urban area in Southwestern China in a sample of 81 rural migrant and urbanized farmer families with children aged 18-24 months. The home language environment was measured using Language Environment Analysis (LENA) recorders and software, while early language development was measured using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Developmental Inventories expressive vocabulary scale. Findings reveal large and substantial variation in the sample's home language environments and a strong association between the home language environment and child language development. Certain demographic characteristics, such as household resources, maternal employment, and gender, are associated with the home language environment. These findings highlight the needs for interventions specifically targeting the home language environment to improve early language development of young children and for more research on early childhood development in peri-urban China.
The objectives of this paper were to examine the risk of depression and depressive symptoms among Han and minority children and adolescents in rural China, the links between academic performance and depressive symptoms, and the prevalence of these links among specific subgroups. A total of 8392 4th, 5th, and 6th grade students at 105 sample rural schools in eight low-income counties and districts in a prefectural-level city in Southwestern China were randomly selected using a three-step sampling strategy. A total of 51% of the sample were female (SD = 0.50), and the age range was 7 to 19 years (mean = 11.35 years; SD = 1.05). Using the Patient Health Questionnaire 8-item depression scale, the prevalence of depressive symptoms in the sample was assessed, while data on students' academic performance (standardized math test) and demographic characteristics were also collected. Our results show that the rates of major depression were 19% for Han students, 18% for Tibetan students, and 22% for Yi students; the rates of severe depression were 2% for Han and Tibetan students, and 3% for Yi students. Yi students were at significantly higher risks for major and severe depression than Han students. We conducted multivariate regression and heterogeneous analyses. Academic performance was negatively and significantly correlated to depressive symptoms. Across the whole sample, students with lower math scores, minority students, boys, younger students, and students with migrant parents were most vulnerable to depressive symptoms. The heterogeneous analysis suggests that among poor-performing students, subgroups at higher risk for depression include boys, non-boarding students, and students whose mothers had graduated from high school or above. These findings indicate a need to improve mental health outcomes of rural Han and minority primary school students, targeting academic performance for possible intervention.
Family-level factors that characterize the home environment are critical inputs to early language and cognitive development, and potential mechanisms for improving developmental outcomes in vulnerable populations. Many studies conducted in high-income and Western settings highlight stimulating parenting, the home language environment, and parental self-efficacy as possible mechanisms of early development, though less is known about how these family-level factors impact child development in low- or middle-income settings. Even less is known about these family-level factors and early childhood development in rural China, where rates of cognitive and language delay in children aged 0-3 years are as high as 45% and 46%, respectively. Using data collected from 77 rural households with children aged 18-24 months in Southwestern China, this study examines the associations between stimulating parenting, the home language environment, and parental self-efficacy, and early cognitive and language development. The results indicate that stimulating parenting was significantly associated with cognitive, language, and overall development; the home language environment was only significantly associated with language development; and parental self-efficacy was not significantly associated with any developmental outcomes. The implications of such findings reveal mechanisms for supporting healthy child development in rural China.
Corporate social irresponsibility (CSIR) scandals are frequently reported in China and have a huge impact on the enterprise and society. Aiming to understand the underlying mechanisms between CSIR and enterprise outcomes, this study uses a sample of 2618 firms from the 2018 National Survey of Private Entrepreneurs Survey and examines the corporate social irresponsibility punishments from the perspective of stakeholders by introducing transaction costs. The results indicate that although the punishments for corporate irresponsible behaviors may not be strong enough to deter enterprises from irresponsibility in China, punishments from various stakeholders are increasing in terms of transaction costs. In addition, crisis management capacity may negatively moderate the relationship between CSIR and transaction costs, while regional economic development positively moderates it. This study adds to the extant research on CSIR consequences by combining stakeholders with transaction costs and provides new insights into transaction costs.
Corporate social irresponsibility (CSIR) scandals frequently reported in China, which has a huge impact on enterprises and even society. This paper examines the effect of CSIR on the transaction cost of Chinese private enterprises by focusing on the irresponsible behavior of enterprises. By introducing listed companies, crisis management capacity, we further studied whether CSIR behaviors of enterprises with high visibility bring higher costs, and how enterprises reduce the impact of CSIR on transaction costs under the unique institutional environment of China. Based on data from the 2018 National Survey of Private Entrepreneurs Survey, we found that CSIR increases the transaction cost for firms, especially in listed companies. Moreover, crisis management capacity plays a moderating role in reducing the threat. The conclusion of this study contributes to the understanding of CSIR behavior and its influencing mechanism, as well as the sustainable development strategy of enterprises.
The home language environment is critical to early language development and subsequent skills. However, few studies have quantitatively measured the home language environment in low-income, developing settings. This study explores variations in the home language environment and child language skills among households in poor rural villages in northwestern China. Audio recordings were collected for 38 children aged 20–28 months and analyzed using Language Environment Analysis (LENA) software; language skills were measured using the MacArthur–Bates Mandarin Communicative Developmental Inventories expressive vocabulary scale. The results revealed large variability in both child language skills and home language environment measures (adult words, conversational turns, and child vocalizations) with 5- to 6-fold differences between the highest and lowest scores. Despite variation, however, the average number of adult words and conversational turns were lower than found among urban Chinese children. Correlation analyses did not identify significant correlations between demographic characteristics and the home language environment. However, the results do indicate significant correlations between the home language environment and child language skills, with conversational turns showing the strongest correlation. The results point to a need for further research on language engagement and ways to increase parent–child interactions to improve early language development among young children in rural China.
Despite the prevalence of volunteering around the world, sustainable participation in voluntary activities is difficult to maintain. Motivation is a good predictor of intention, but little research has examined how motivation affects future volunteering intention, especially autonomous motivation and controlled motivation. Based on motivation theory and cognitive theory, we conducted a two-stage survey using Structural Equation Modeling to study the mediating effect of volunteering engagement and volunteering experience between motivation and future volunteering intention. The results show that different motivations would affect future volunteering intention. Autonomous motivation positively affects volunteering engagement, while controlled motivation negatively affects volunteering engagement. In addition, the higher the level of engagement, the stronger of the meaning and skill acquisition from volunteering activities. In the end, we found that the more meaningful and skill acquisition from volunteering activities, the stronger the intention of volunteering activities in the future. These findings provide new perspectives to provide an alternative method in researching volunteer intention and to strengthen the sustainability of volunteer programs.
高校基金会在吸纳高额捐赠方面有着突出表现,由此也形成了公众对高校基金会认知的偏差.文章就此着重论述了高校基金会所具有的公共关系和品牌传播基因,其既是提升高校社会声誉和公众形象的重要载体,也是高校基金会自身发展的重要职能,在筹款、提升竞争力、培育捐赠文化方面具有重要作用.文章结合实际,就如何开展高校基金会品牌传播工作提出了具体的策略建议.
基于第十三次中国私营企业调查数据,报告回溯2008—2018年中国私营企业履行企业社会责任状况,对其发展趋势进行了描述性统计和分析.报告发现,过去10年,私营企业在员工权益、环保投入和慈善捐赠方面的意识不断增强,逐渐从仅关注企业经济绩效转向同时关注社会发展,但部分企业在合规经营、社会价值创造方面的意识相对薄弱.报告针对私营企业社会责任履行存在的问题提出了相应政策建议.