Parental goals and parenting practices of upper-middle-class Korean mothers with preschool children

In order to understand how mothers develop their parenting styles under rapidly changing cultural contexts, this study examines and compares Korean upper-middle-class mothers' parental goals and real parenting practices as they reported. For this purpose, face-to-face in-depth interviews with 20 Korean mothers were conducted. By analyzing the data, we found that Korean mothers' parenting beliefs focused on 'raising a child with good social and emotional characteristics', while their reported practices mainly concentrated on children's academic achievements. Korean mothers failed to connect their beliefs and behaviors because they tended to compare their parenting practices with those of other mothers. Although the mothers followed expectations from current Korean society, they constantly had to deal with guilty and uncomfortable feelings of not corresponding with their personal parental beliefs and goals.