Parallel change process of paternal and maternal homework involvement with early adolescents: the role of parental motivational beliefs

Parental homework involvement is a critical parent-child interaction that connects home and school and may change drastically in early adolescence. Little is known about the trajectory of parental homework involvement and the predictive role of parental motivational beliefs as adolescents grow. Drawing on parental involvement process model, we examined these issues from a dynamic perspective and explored the differences and interactions between fathers and mothers based on family systems theory. We conducted sixwaves of three-year designs for parents of Grade 4 primary students, involving 3,655 fathers and 3,867 mothers. The results revealed that maternal homework involvement declined more slowly in the initial stage and more quickly at later stages in a nonlinear manner, whereas paternal homework involvement decreased linearly. Furthermore, fathers’ and mothers’ motivational beliefs consistently predicted the mean initial value, change trajectory and long-term maintenance of their own homework involvement, which extended the parental involvement process model from a dynamic and family system perspective. Specifically, higher levels of role activity beliefs for involvement, self-efficacy for helping children, and positive valence toward school were associated with greater initial homework involvement and a slower decline in homework involvement over time. In particular, maternal self-efficacy for helping children had a positive slope effect and a continuous effect on paternal homework involvement. Therefore, we should give attention to the dynamic and systematic nature of parental homework involvement in early adolescence, to formulate more accurate promotion plan for parental homework involvement from the perspective of parental motivational beliefs.