ABSTRACT
Certain psychological characteristics arise early in life, and the nature of parent-child interaction is thought to constitute at least one important source of individual development as well as cultural variation. This chapter explores formative experiences parents provide young children that relate to the origins and development of contrasting cultural styles through an examination of families from different Western and Eastern cultures. The particular topics discussed include cross-cultural variation and the nature of coherence in maternal activities, responsiveness, and speech as well as correspondences in mother-child interactions. Cross-cultural developmental research has many aims: to inventory and compare similarities and differences among children growing up in different lands; to evaluate the bases of adaptive processes in child development; and to assess the universality and cultural specificity of psychosocial principles. The studies reported here address these several aims.
