Parental involvement and the academic achievement and social functioning of Cuban school children

Abstract

The goal of the current study was to investigate whether parental involvement is an important predictor of student outcomes within the Cuban school system, where extensive support for pupils’ progress and adjustment are available from the peer group, community, and family. The participants were 188 children in Grades 2 and 3 from four localities in Cuba. School-based involvement was significantly higher among parents of children not at risk for behavioral problems than among parents of at-risk children. Parental involvement in Year 1 did not significantly predict changes in student academic competency or total difficulties between Year 1 and Year 2. These results suggest that school-based parental involvement may be of some importance in the adjustment of Cuban children. Any effects of parental involvement, however, were not strong enough to cause changes in ratings of student adjustment and achievement from Year 1 to Year 2.

Keywords

Academic achievement Cuba elementary schools parental involvement social adjustment

Vygotsky’s theory of child development underscores the processes of mediation that intervene between individuals and their broad social context; these mediators account to a considerable degree for the cultural process of learning. Within this framework, parents assume the important function of mediators between their children and the surrounding culture, filtering the basic values of the culture before transmitting them to their children (Vygotsky, 1978).

One fundamental way in which parents transmit the cultural value of education is by becoming involved in their children’s schooling. Empirical research on parental involvement has yielded relatively consistent associations between a variety of parental involvement behaviors and positive student outcomes, including: Academic achievement (Fan & Chen, 2001; McWayne, Hampton, Fantuzzo, Cohen, & Sekino, 2004), lower dropout rates (Barnard, 2004), school attendance rates and lower grade repetition (Miedel & Reynolds, 1999), social skills (McWayne et al., 2004), and intrinsic motivation and positive student-teacher relationships (Sanders, 1998). Teachers have been found to view parent involvement positively (Koutrouba, Antonopoulou, Tsitsas, & Zenakou, 2009). Nevertheless, results vary widely among individual studies. In a meta-analysis of 25 studies, Fan and Chen (2001) found an overall correlation of r = 0.30 between parental involvement and student academic achievement, with parental expectations for their children’s education the dimension of involvement associated most strongly with academic outcome. On the other-hand, a review of 41 parent-involvement program evaluations in United States public schools concluded that little empirical support could be found for parental involvement improving student academic achievement but attribute the lack of evidence to serious, methodological flaws in the literature (Mattingly, Prislin, McKenzie, Rodriguez, & Kayzar, 2002).

Englund, Luckner, Whaley, and Egeland (2004) suggest that discrepant results across studies may in part be due to the lack of a consistent, accepted operational definition of parental involvement. Parental involvement is a multidimensional construct that encompasses a number of possible behavioral components. The operationalization of parental involvement has varied widely, focusing on parental academic aspirations for their children (Keith et al., 1998), and parents’ communication about education-related issues with their children (Keith, Reimers, Fehrmann, Pottebaum, & Aubey, 1986), parent-initiated activities or rules at home related to education (Shumow & Miller, 2001; Zellman & Waterman, 1999), parents’ participation in school-based activities (Zellman & Waterman, 1999) including volunteering in the classroom (Okpala, Okpala, & Smith, 2001), and formal and informal conferencing between parents and teachers (Deslandes, Royer, Turcotte, & Bertrand, 1997). These individual aspects of parental involvement behavior are not necessarily intercorrelated (Keith et al., 1993). However, in many studies, all forms of parent involvement are agglomerated to constitute a unitary construct of involvement as an independent variable, making it difficult to test for possible differential associations between components of parental involvement and outcome (Englund et al., 2004; Fan & Chen, 2001).

Recent research in the area of parental involvement has benefitted from the development of several promising theoretical frameworks. Epstein’s theory of overlapping spheres of influence proposes that meaningful partnerships between homes, schools, and the community provide a mutual support system that may be directed towards the common goal of nurturing higher levels of academic achievement, motivation, and social development in students (Driessen, Smit, & Sleegers, 2005; Epstein & Sanders, 2006). Based on her research, Epstein also outlined six types of parental-school involvement opportunities that have been shown to promote productive engagement:

Parenting––parents expectations and attitudes regarding education.

Communicating––communication between home and school regarding school program and student progress.

Volunteering––parental help during school events or activities (e.g. field trips, concerts, sports teams).

Learning at home––monitoring and assisting with school related tasks (e.g. homework); registration in extracurricular academic or arts programs.

Decision making––involvement in a parent-teacher organization or higher level educational committee.

School and parent collaborations with the community (Barnard, 2004; Dreissen et al., 2005; Fan & Chen, 2001; Henderson & Mapp, 2002; Jordan, Orozco, & Averett, 2002).

The six types provide a useful framework within which parental involvement behaviors may be organized and understood. It has, however, been argued that a more comprehensive theoretical framework would also need to account for why the parent chooses to become involved (Fan & Chen, 2001).

Hill and Taylor (2004) presented two possible mechanisms through which parental involvement might promote student achievement: Increased social capital and social control. They suggest that when parents become involved with their child’s schools, the parents’ social capital increases as they gain awareness about the school’s expectations for behavior and homework, develop relationships with teachers, and meet and share insights with other parents (Hill & Taylor, 2004). The skills and information gained with increased social capital may better equip parents to guide their children through school-related activities and therefore promote student achievement. The social-control mechanism occurs when parents and schools come to a consensus as to what constitutes appropriate behavior so that children receive consistent messages across different contexts, reducing the confusion that may arise when the authority of a parent or teacher is undermined (Hill & Taylor, 2004).

Any attempts to study the impact of parental-school involvement on student outcomes must recognize the distinction between involvement that occurs in response to a child having ongoing difficulties with school work and social functioning and involvement that occurs as part of an ongoing positive communication process between school and parent (Hill & Taylor, 2004). Thus, parental involvement may be either a cause or consequence of children’s difficulties in school. This ambiguity may explain some of the inconsistencies in the empirical findings. For example, in a review of 51 studies published between 1995–2002, Henderson and Mapp (2002) found that in a few cases, parental help with homework and parent-initiated contact with school were negatively associated with academic outcome measures (Driessen et al., 2005; Fan & Chen, 2001; Shumow & Miller, 2001). Similarily, a study of Hong Kong students found a direct and negative association between perceived parental support and academic achievement for Form 4 students (Chen, 2008). Shumow and Miller (2001) explained this relationship with the contention that parents of academically struggling students were by necessity more involved in educational activities at home than parents of more successful students. They found that, although in-home parental involvement was associated with more positive education-related attitudes in children, it was negatively related to concrete outcome measures such as grades and test scores. Therefore, when interpreting a weak correlation between in-home parental involvement and academic outcomes, it is important to consider pre-existing academic performance deficits or problem behaviors that may act as mediators. Although parent involvement is advocated vociferously in much of the literature on learning and behavioral problems, only a few studies have demonstrated the specific benefits of involvement for the progress of children with special learning needs (Engelbrecht, Oswald, Swart, Kitching, & Eloff, 2005; Gerstein, 2006).

Several theorists and researchers have proposed that the benefits of parent involvement depend on the specific cultural context (Sung, 2010). For example, in some cultures (e.g. Asian-American), the value of educational achievement is transmitted so strongly and generally that individual differences in parent involvement may fail to predict outcome (Jeynes, 2003). In fact, in reference to the findings of his meta-analysis of the effects of parental involvement on minority children, Jeynes has suggested that the impact of parental involvement may be greatest in cultures with less emphasis on educational achievement. McNeal (1999) maintained that the cultural capital available to majority-culture European-American parents augments the direct and specific effects of parent involvement. In contrast, parents from less privileged minority backgrounds may not have the resources or time to become involved in their children’s schools in ways that are valued by the school (Lee & Bowen, 2006). The findings of a recent survey of 21 secondary schools in New Zealand have suggested that specific strategies may be required to promote the involvement of parents of minority backgrounds in the scholastic lives of their children (Hornby & Witte, 2010).

Parent involvement in Cuban schools

Almost all research to date on the effects of parent involvement has been conducted either in English-speaking countries or in Asia. Our study was focused on the effects of parent involvement for elementary-school children in Cuba. The extended family is the cornerstone of the traditional Latin-American society. Cuban society is characterized by very strong interactions between family, school, and community in the socialization of children. Many of these interactions, including those between parents and schools, are prescribed officially and incorporated explicitly into the structures of the respective institutions. In addition, Cuban families are integrated less formally into the social network of ‘la calle’––their street or neighborhood, where all residents know each other well and are informally expected to look after each other’s welfare (Arés, 2004). Research on the values of Cuban parents has shown a very strong emphasis on both academic achievement as a way of ‘being some-one in life’, but also on adaptation to the cooperative social structure of the school as a way of promoting adjustment to the very collectivistic society of which the children will become members (Martín & Castillo, 1988). Despite the emphatic role of the state and schools as socializing agents for all children, the family remains a fundamental mediator of the cultural values of cooperation and learning (Alvarez, 1997).

The Cuban educational system is a unique case among developing countries: A very large percentage of students attain high levels of academic achievement, there is universal school enrolment and attendance, and nearly universal adult literacy (Carnoy, 2007; Gasperini, 2000; Malott, 2007). The Cuban government commits approximately 10% of its gross domestic product to education, which is high compared to other Latin American and Caribbean countries, and what is recommended by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO; Malott, 2007). Teachers benefit from life-long training, which give teachers, who typically meet as a collective every two weeks, an opportunity to discuss any concerns relating to strategies, problems, or the general learning environment with their colleagues (Malott, 2007). Teachers are then expected to bring the strategies they have learned in these sessions into the classroom in an ongoing effort to improve on and develop new educational practices. Cuban teachers also get to know their students outside of the classroom by devoting 20% of their work time to community organizations and the implementation of educational strategies in targeted homes; this might involve organizing student study groups or assisting with parental education (Malott, 2007). Both Asian and Western research has shown that such positive and supportive teacher-student relationships are significant predictors of student academic adjustment (Chong, Huan, Quek, Yeo, & Ang, 2010).

Considering how involved Cuban teachers are in the lives of their students, the main purpose of the current study was to investigate whether parental involvement is an important predictor of student academic and social outcomes within the Cuban school system as has been shown to be the case in studies conducted in the United States. Specifically, we expected parents who were more involved in their children’s schooling to have children who were less at-risk for behavioral and academic problems than children of parents who were rated as less involved. We also predicted that Cuban schoolchildren whose parents were more involved in their education at three levels (home-based involvement; school-based involvement; home-school conferencing) would show improvements from Year 1 to Year 2 on ratings of academic achievement and social functioning measures.

Method

Participants

The participants were 188 children (104 boys and 84 girls). The children were between 7 and 8 years of age and enrolled in Grades 2 and 3 in elementary schools across Cuba. Schools from four distinct localities were selected in order to best represent the diverse regions of Cuba. Thirty-nine participants came from the small rural community of Quemado de Guines, in the Central Cuban province of Villa Clara. Forty-nine participants lived in Santa Clara, the provincial capital of Villa Clara and home of the Universidad Central ‘Marta Abreu’ de Las Villas. A further 47 participants were from the small city of Matanzas on the north shore of Cuba, located just east of Havana. The remaining 53 participants came from the provincial capital of Holguin in eastern Cuba. Although the East is considered the poorest region of the country, the city of Holguin itself is characterized by a varied, viable economy, including services to the surrounding rural communities, mining installations, and the beach resorts north of the city. The parents of children included in the study represented a wide variety of occupations and educational levels.

Procedure

Data regarding the level and nature of parental involvement in the educational lives of children were collected across a two-year period. Cuban school authorities act in loco parentis and do not require parental permission for children to participate in research or school trips. Nevertheless, parents were informed of the research underway, and we indicated that we would only work with parents and children who wished to be involved; there were no refusals. The children completed the measures individually at school.

All instruments were translated from English to Spanish by Professor Alvarez of the Universidad Central ‘Marta Abreu’ de Las Villas, Cuba. Professor Schneider of the University of Ottawa back-translated the items back to English and the results were then compared in order to insure accuracy. Because the instruments were developed for the U.S. school system, which is very different from that of Cuba, we first assembled a team of Cuban faculty members, graduate students, and teachers in order to determine the relevance of each item. They made minor changes to a very small number of the original items to enable the items to correspond with possible modalities of parental involvement and with daily routines in Cuban schools. We then piloted the instruments in Cuban schools to ensure that the translated items were understandable to the respondents; no further revision was needed at that stage. Finally, we pilot tested the instruments in Cuban schools to confirm the factorial validity and internal consistency of the instruments. The results were very satisfactory, with the alpha values indicated in the following sections.

Measures

Parent ratings of parental involvement

The Family Involvement Questionnaire (FIQ; Fantuzzo, Tighe, & Childs, 2000) is a 42-item multidimensional scale used to obtain data about the nature and extent of parental participation in the scholastic lives of schoolchildren. The FIQ was developed for use with parents and teachers of children in preschool, kindergarten, and first grade. The three factors of the FIQ, (a) school-based involvement, (b) home-school conferencing, and (c) home-based involvement, reflect the conceptual framework of parental involvement developed by Epstein (1995). The authors adapted the items of the FIQ scale as developmentally appropriate behavioral statements to evaluate the involvement of parents at particular periods in the education of their children. The items are rated on a four-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (rarely) to 4 (always) (Fantuzzo et al., 2000). In our Cuban data, the alpha coefficients for home-based involvement were 0.95 in Year 1 and 0.96 in Year 2. Alpha coefficients for school-based involvement were 0.89 in Year 1 and 0.71 in Year 2, and 0.91 in Year 1 and 0.85 in Year 2 for home-school conferencing.

Teacher ratings of student social and academic competence

The Social Skills Rating System (SSRS; Gresham & Elliot, 1990) is a multi-informant approach for the assessment of social behavior in schoolchildren along three scales: Social Skills, Problem Behaviors, and Academic Competence. The items within each scale are rated according to perceived frequency and importance. In the current study, we used the Teacher Form (SSRS-T) which assesses the following subscales of the Social Skills scale: Cooperation, Assertion, and Self-Control. The Problem Behaviors scale assesses behaviors that might impact the development of positive social skills along three subscales: Externalizing Problems, Internalizing Problems, and Hyperactivity. Finally, the Academic Competence Scale provides an estimate of academic functioning through teacher ratings on nine items measuring students’ reading and mathematics performance, motivation, parental support, and general cognitive functioning. The items of the Academic Competence Scale are rated on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (below grade level) to 5 (above grade level) (Gresham & Elliot, 1990). In our Cuban data, the alpha coefficients for the SSRS scales averaged 0.86 in Year 1 and Year 2. All scales had alphas above 0.80 with the exception of the Internalizing Problems Scale (0.72 in Year 1 and 0.77 in Year 2).

Results

In order to test our hypotheses, two major types of statistical analyses were conducted. First, we chose to use a multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) model to interpret our data. A MANOVA is an extension of the widely-used ANOVA technique which allows for the simultaneous comparison of the means and distributions of several groups to determine whether differences between the groups are statistically significant. Using a MANOVA is preferable to repeated ANOVAs because if multiple ANOVAs are performed on data from the same groups, some of the results may emerge as significant purely by chance. Two MANOVAs were performed using Year 1 data to compare the level of involvement of parents of children identified as at-risk for behavioral or academic problems with the involvement of parents of children identified as not at-risk. In the MANOVAs, parental involvement was defined along three dimensions used as dependent measures: School-based involvement, home-based involvement, home-school conferencing. Multiple regressions were then conducted to assess the relative contributions of Year 1 data, child’s sex, parental involvement behaviors, and interactions between risk status and parental involvement and child’s sex and parental involvement, in the prediction of changes in the academic competence and total difficulties experienced by children between Year 1 and Year 2. It is recalled that, according to the hypotheses stated above, we expected parents who were more involved in their children’s schooling to have children who were less at risk for academic and behavioral problems than the children of parents who were less involved. We also expected that parental involvement in Year 1 would be a significant predictor of improvements in academic achievement and social functioning between the two data collection points.

In Year 1, 30 children were identified as at-risk for behavioral problems by splitting the sample at z = 1.00 for total teacher-reported behavior problems. The remaining 158 children, with z scores below 1.00, were considered not at-risk in this domain. A MANOVA was conducted to investigate potential differences between involvement behaviors of parents of at-risk and not at-risk children (see Table 1). Using Pillai’s Trace statistic, there was a significant multivariate effect of child behavioral risk status on the frequency of parental involvement behaviors, V = 0.13, F(3, 184) = 9.28, p < 0.001. Follow-up univariate ANOVAs revealed that only the dimension, school-based involvement, was significantly higher in parents of children not at-risk for behavioral problems than in parents of at-risk children, F(1, 186) = 12.52, p < 0.001. There were no significant differences between parents of at-risk and not at-risk children in terms of home-based involvement, F(1, 186) = 3.24, p > 0.05, or home-school conferencing, F(1, 186) = 0.95, p > 0.05.
Table 1.
Mean scores and Standard Deviations for measures of parental involvement as a function of academic and behavioral risk status

Parental involvement measure

School based involvement
Home based involvement
Home school conferencing

Group M SD M SD M SD

Academic risk status

Not at-risk 26.94 5.57 41.05 4.91 28.46 4.53

At-risk 24.14 5.19 39.05 5.96 26.64 5.21

Behavioral risk status

Not at-risk 27.22 5.24 41.10 4.98 28.10 4.55

At-risk 23.40 6.31 39.30 5.39 29.00 5.11

A second MANOVA was conducted to investigate potential differences between the involvement behaviors of parents of children at-risk and not at-risk for academic problems (see Table 1). Using Year 1 data, 22 children were identified as at-risk and the remaining 166 as not at-risk by splitting the sample at z =− 1.00 for teacher ratings of academic competence. Using Pillai’s Trace statistic, there was no significant multivariate effect of child risk status on the frequency of parental involvement behaviors, V = 0.03, F(3, 184) = 1.82, p > 0.05. Although the multivariate F was non-significant, separate univariate ANOVAs revealed significantly more school-based involvement behaviors in the parents of children not at-risk of academic problems than among parents of children identified as at-risk, F(1, 186) = 4.99, p < 0.05. As the multivariate F was not significant, this finding must be interpreted with great caution until replicated. There were no significant differences between parents of children at-risk and not at-risk of academic problems in the dimensions of home-based involvement, F(1, 186) = 3.08, p > 0.05, or home-school conferencing, F(1, 186) = 3.03, p > 0.05.

In the first multiple-regression procedure, the dependent variable was academic competence in Year 2. Using the hierarchical method the following predictor variables were entered into the model: academic competence in Year 1, child’s sex, the three dimensions of parental involvement rated in Year 1 (home-school conferencing, school-based involvement, and home-based involvement), and interactions between academic risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement (see Table 2). These interaction terms were included to reveal whether involvement was more beneficial for pupils at risk for academic problems or for members of a particular sex. Because the autocorrelation was included as the first step, subsequent steps represent prediction of the difference between the two data-collection years. The change in R² in Model 1, with only the autocorrelation entered into the equation was significant, F change(1, 186) = 405.24, p < 0.001. Sixty-nine percent of the variability in Year 2 academic competence was accounted for by academic competence in Year 1. The autocorrelation between Year 1 and Year 2 academic competence remained significant in all four models, p < 0.001. Models 2–4, however, in which child’s sex, the three dimensions of parental involvement, and interactions between academic risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement were added to the equation, did not produce a significant change in R², p > 0.05. At Step 2, the F for the equation was 205.52(2, 185), p < 0.001 and at Step 3, F(5, 182) = 83.25, p < 0.001. In the final step, F(11, 176) = 37.27, p < 0.001. Child’s sex, the three dimensions of parental involvement, and interactions between academic risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement did not appear to significantly improve the prediction of academic competence in Year 2.
Table 2.
Hierarchical analysis summary for predictors of academic competence in year 2

Variable B SEB β R2 ΔR2

Step 1 0.69 0.69*

Academic competence in Year 1 0.82 0.04 0.83*

Step 2 0.69 0.00

Academic competence in Year 1 0.81 0.04 0.81*

Sex −0.55 0.35 −0.07

Step 3 0.70 0.01

Academic competence in Year 1 0.80 0.04 0.81*

Sex −0.55 0.35 −0.07

Home school conferencing (HSC) −0.16 0.10 −0.09

Home based involvement (HBI) 0.13 0.09 0.08

School based involvement (SBI) 0.01 0.08 0.00

Step 4 0.70 0.00

Academic competence in Year 1 0.81 0.06 0.82*

Sex 1.79 2.86 0.22

HSC −0.22 0.39 −0.13

HBI 0.34 0.27 0.21

SBI −0.26 0.30 −0.17

Academic risk x HSC 0.07 0.34 0.09

Academic risk x HBI −0.18 0.23 −0.30

Academic risk x SBI 0.24 0.26 0.27

Sex x SBI −0.02 0.08 −0.07

Sex x HSC −0.05 0.10 −0.18

Sex x HBI −0.01 0.10 −0.04

*
p < 0.001.

The second multiple regression procedure examined the ability of the variables child’s sex, the three dimensions of parental involvement rated in Year 1, and interactions between behavioral risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement to predict total difficulties experienced by the child in Year 2 (see Table 3). Once again, the autocorrelation was included in the first step of the equation meaning the subsequent steps represent prediction of the difference between the two data-collection years. In Step 1, with only the autocorrelation entered into the equation, the change in R² was significant, F change (1, 186) = 110.03, p < 0.001. Thirty-seven percent of the variability in Year 2 total difficulties was accounted for by total difficulties experienced in Year 1. The autocorrelation between Year 1 and Year 2 total difficulties remained significant in all four models of the equation, p < 0.001. Models 2–4, after the addition of child’s sex, the three dimensions of parental involvement rated in Year 1, and interactions between behavioral risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement, however, did not produce a significant change in R², p > 0.05. At Step 2, the F for the equation was 57.02(2, 185), p < 0.001 and at Step 3, F(5, 182) = 23.04, p < 0.001. In the final step, F(11, 176) = 10.55, p < 0.001. Thus, child’s sex, parental involvement in Year 1, and interactions between behavioral risk and parental involvement and between sex and parental involvement did not appear to significantly improve the prediction of total difficulties experienced by the child in Year 2.
Table 3.
Hierarchical regression analysis summary for predictors of total difficulties in year 2

Variable B SEB β R2 ΔR2

Step 1 0.37 0.37*

Total Difficulties in Year 1 0.65 0.06 0.61*

Step 2 0.38 0.01

Total Difficulties in Year 1 0.60 0.07 0.56*

Sex 0.80 0.47 0.11

Step 3 0.39 0.01

Total Difficulties in Year 1 0.62 0.07 0.58*

Sex 0.80 0.47 0.11

Home school conferencing (HSC) −0.06 0.12 −0.04

Home based involvement (HBI) 0.12 0.11 0.08

School based involvement (SBI) 0.04 0.10 0.03

Step 4 0.40 0.01

Total Difficulties in Year 1 0.67 0.11 0.63*

Sex −2.12 3.62 −2.89

HSC −0.52 0.40 −0.33

HBI 0.36 0.29 0.25

SBI 0.24 0.34 0.18

Behavioral risk x HSC 0.41 0.32 0.69

Behavioral risk x HBI −0.22 0.22 −0.45

Behavioral risk x SBI −0.18 0.27 −0.24

Sex x SBI −0.03 0.11 −0.10

Sex x HSC 0.02 0.13 0.07

Sex x HBI 0.08 0.12 0.44

*
p < 0.00.

Discussion

These results partially supported our primary hypothesis that parents who were more involved in their children’s education would have children who were less at-risk for behavioral and academic problems than children of parents who were less involved. Although the first MANOVA revealed a significant effect of child behavioral risk status on the frequency of parental involvement behaviors, only school-based involvement was found to be significantly more frequent in parents of children not at-risk than in parents of children at risk for behavioral problems. The second MANOVA did not reveal any significant multivariate effect of child academic risk status on the frequency of parental involvement. However, the follow-up ANOVAs revealed similar results to the first MANOVA; school-based involvement occurred significantly more frequently in parents of children not at-risk for academic problems than in parents of at-risk children. Although the results of the second MANOVA must be interpreted with caution due to the non-significant multivariate F, it appears that school-based parental involvement may be the more important factor in the adjustment of Cuban schoolchildren over home-school conferencing and home-based involvement. This result merits confirmation in future studies.

The results of both MANOVAs support and reinforce the conceptualization of parental involvement as a multidimensional construct with distinct aspects that may not necessarily function in the same way (Keith et al., 1993). By following the framework developed by Epstein (1995), and testing the three dimensions of parental involvement as separate entities we were able to distinguish one form of involvement (school-based involvement) as more important than others (home-school conferencing and home-based involvement) in regard to the current data. These results suggest that in Cuba, where teacher involvement in the educational lives of students is high, parental help with schoolwork in the home and formal parent-teacher conferencing may not be necessary for the adjustment of schoolchildren. Parents’ school-based involvement, on the other hand, may promote student achievement by conveying a message about the importance of education. By taking the time to become involved with in-school activities, parents may indirectly communicate their own attitudes regarding education to their children in addition to transmitting the value placed on education within the Cuban culture (Vygotsky, 1978). Our finding that home-based parental involvement was not significantly more frequent in parents of children not at-risk for academic and behavioral problems is similar to trends found in several previous studies. For example, Shumow and Miller (2001) found that although parental help at home in educational activities was associated with more positive education related attitudes in children, it was negatively associated with student achievement outcome measures such as grades or standardized test scores. Fan and Chen (2001) also found a very weak relationship between parental supervision at home over homework and student academic outcomes measures. In contrast to this trend, a Brazilian study on the effectiveness of parent-led reading interventions for schoolchildren found that a more structured approach to parental involvement at home, including strict training and adherence to the Paired Reading technique, resulted in significant academic improvements (Murad & Topping, 2000). Future research may wish to explore whether training in structured parental home involvement programs provides additional academic advantages within the Cuban context.

The results of the two multiple regressions did not support our hypothesis that greater parental involvement would predict improvements from Year 1 to Year 2 on measures of student academic achievement and social functioning. The lack of significant results from the multiple regressions suggests that parental involvement may not contribute to the adjustment of Cuban schoolchildren over time. Alternatively, our regression design may not have been the most appropriate method for measuring our hypotheses. The student outcome measures relied solely on teacher ratings which may have been biased by outdated and firmly held teacher impressions. As Cuban schools and class sizes are relatively small, a teacher’s impressions of a student’s achievement and adjustment may follow the student from class to class until a major change (e.g. moving to a different school) disrupts the cycle. Hill and Taylor (2004) noted the importance of considering multiple perspectives when collecting data on parental involvement; findings from some studies suggest only a moderate correlation between teacher, child, and parent ratings of parental involvement in the school. Alternatively, some research suggests that instead of teacher ratings, a less biased global indicator of student adjustment (e.g. standardized tests; final grades) may have been more likely to capture any changes that occurred between the two data collection points as a result of parental involvement (Fan & Chen, 2001).

The lack of significant results in the multiple regressions may also be related to the idea that students transitioning from elementary school Grades 2 to 3 may be less sensitive to the impact of parental involvement than students who are undergoing more dramatic and possibly stressful educational transitions. In Cuba, for example, the difference between kindergarten and Grade 1 in terms of academic content is substantial. The effects of parental involvement on student adjustment during these two early transitional years may be more pronounced than during the later elementary school grades. Chen (2008) stresses the importance of comparing across several grade levels to account for different grade specific demands when examining the relationship between parental support and academic achievement. In future studies, a longitudinal design across the elementary school years might be useful in identifying the periods where parental involvement has the most impact.

The limitations of the current study, as discussed above, include the use of only teacher ratings for student outcome measures of academic achievement and social functioning. A multi-informant perspective may also have been useful for ratings of parental involvement as opposed to our using only parents’ self-reported ratings. Finally, the statistics we used do not allow any inference on the directionality of the relationship between parental involvement and student adjustment.

The results of the current study have contributed to the idea that there may be cultural differences in terms of what aspects of parental involvement have the most impact on student adjustment. Our finding that school-based parental involvement is related to having children less at risk for academic and behavioral problems suggests that even in a society with a highly centralized economy and relatively few opportunities for upward mobility in terms of income, there are some indicators for the benefits of parental involvement. In fact, the education of children is known to be one of the highest priorities of Cuban parents (Domínguez, 2003). Programs that encourage school-based parental involvement in Cuba, and in cultures that share a similar value system to Cuba, may prove beneficial to the academic achievement and social functioning of elementary school-aged children.

	Parental involvement measure
Academic risk status
Not at-risk	26.94	5.57	41.05	4.91	28.46	4.53
At-risk	24.14	5.19	39.05	5.96	26.64	5.21
Behavioral risk status
Not at-risk	27.22	5.24	41.10	4.98	28.10	4.55
At-risk	23.40	6.31	39.30	5.39	29.00	5.11

Variable	B	SEB	β	R2	ΔR2
Step 1				0.69	0.69*
Academic competence in Year 1	0.82	0.04	0.83*
Step 2				0.69	0.00
Academic competence in Year 1	0.81	0.04	0.81*
Sex	−0.55	0.35	−0.07
Step 3				0.70	0.01
Academic competence in Year 1	0.80	0.04	0.81*
Sex	−0.55	0.35	−0.07
Home school conferencing (HSC)	−0.16	0.10	−0.09
Home based involvement (HBI)	0.13	0.09	0.08
School based involvement (SBI)	0.01	0.08	0.00
Step 4				0.70	0.00
Academic competence in Year 1	0.81	0.06	0.82*
Sex	1.79	2.86	0.22
HSC	−0.22	0.39	−0.13
HBI	0.34	0.27	0.21
SBI	−0.26	0.30	−0.17
Academic risk x HSC	0.07	0.34	0.09
Academic risk x HBI	−0.18	0.23	−0.30
Academic risk x SBI	0.24	0.26	0.27
Sex x SBI	−0.02	0.08	−0.07
Sex x HSC	−0.05	0.10	−0.18
Sex x HBI	−0.01	0.10	−0.04

Variable	B	SEB	β	R2	ΔR2
Step 1				0.37	0.37*
Total Difficulties in Year 1	0.65	0.06	0.61*
Step 2				0.38	0.01
Total Difficulties in Year 1	0.60	0.07	0.56*
Sex	0.80	0.47	0.11
Step 3				0.39	0.01
Total Difficulties in Year 1	0.62	0.07	0.58*
Sex	0.80	0.47	0.11
Home school conferencing (HSC)	−0.06	0.12	−0.04
Home based involvement (HBI)	0.12	0.11	0.08
School based involvement (SBI)	0.04	0.10	0.03
Step 4				0.40	0.01
Total Difficulties in Year 1	0.67	0.11	0.63*
Sex	−2.12	3.62	−2.89
HSC	−0.52	0.40	−0.33
HBI	0.36	0.29	0.25
SBI	0.24	0.34	0.18
Behavioral risk x HSC	0.41	0.32	0.69
Behavioral risk x HBI	−0.22	0.22	−0.45
Behavioral risk x SBI	−0.18	0.27	−0.24
Sex x SBI	−0.03	0.11	−0.10
Sex x HSC	0.02	0.13	0.07
Sex x HBI	0.08	0.12	0.44

Footnotes

Note

Author biographies

Ibis M. Alvarez-Valdivia is a Professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona with research interests focused on cultural aspects of peer relationships of children and adolescents. Address: Campus de la UAB. Facultat de Psicologia. Edifici B, 08193. Bellaterra (Cerdanyola del Vallés) (Spain). Email: ibismarlene.alvarez@uab.es

Kenia Lorenzo Chavez is a Researcher at the Center for Psychological and Sociological Research, an agency of the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of Cuba. Her projects have focused on the development of social competence of children in school settings. Address: Centro de Investigaciones Psicológicas y Sociológicas (CIPS). Calle B No. 352 esq. B, Vedado, CP 10400. Ciudad de La Habana, Cuba. Email: keniacips@ceniai.inf.cu

Barry H. Schneider is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Ottawa, where he has taught since 1981. His major research interest is children’s friendships, with an emphasis on the friendships of children with psychological difficulties and cross-cultural differences in friendship. Address: University of Ottawa, 136 Jean-Jacques Lussier, 6018, Ottawa, Canada K1N 6N5. Email: barry.schneider@uottawa.ca

Jesse S. Roberts completed his Bachelor of Arts degrees in Psychology and Music Performance at the University of Ottawa, Canada. He is currently working as a research assistant for Dr Barry Schneider. Address: University of Ottawa, 136 Jean-Jacques Lussier, 6018, Ottawa Canada K1N 6N5. Email: jsamroberts@gmail.com

Laura E. Becalli-Puerta is Academic Vice-rector at the Pedagogical University of Matanzas, Cuba. Her research interests pertain to the professional identities of teachers. Address: Universidad de Ciencias Pedagógicas, Carretera de Cidra Km 11/2, Matanzas, 40100. Cuba. Email: lbecalli@ispmtz.rimed.cu

Dalgys Pérez-Luján is a Professor at the Center for Educational Studies at the Universidad Central de las Villas in Santa Clara, Cuba. Her research interests focus on children with special educational needs. Address: Universidad Central de Las Villas, Carretera a Camajuaní, Km 7 1/2, Santa Clara, 54830. Villa Clara, Cuba. Email: dalgys2@uclv.edu.cu

Yuri Arsenio Sanz-Martínez is Professor of Psychology and Head of the Psychology Department at the University of Cuba. His major research endeavours pertain to problematic anger and competent anger management among children and adolescents, its manifestations in school settings and its consequences in personal, social, educational and health domains. Address: Universidad de Holguín, Av. XX Aniversario No.4, Piedra Blanca, 80100. Holguín, Cuba. Email: ysanz@fh.uho.edu.cu

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	Parental involvement measure
	School based involvement		Home based involvement		Home school conferencing
Group	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD
Academic risk status
Not at-risk	26.94	5.57	41.05	4.91	28.46	4.53
At-risk	24.14	5.19	39.05	5.96	26.64	5.21
Behavioral risk status
Not at-risk	27.22	5.24	41.10	4.98	28.10	4.55
At-risk	23.40	6.31	39.30	5.39	29.00	5.11