Children's sense of belonging and parental social capital derived from school

Parents' chance to seek help from other parents of schoolchildren attending the same school is an aspect of parental social capital. This social capital is supposed to contribute to schoolchildren's present sense of belonging to their school, society, and country. The relationship between social capital and a child's sense of belonging may vary as a function of the child's prior sense of belonging. Social capital may give a deeper encouragement or positive effect to children with higher prior sense of belonging (the strength building perspective) or to children with lower prior sense of belonging (the need fulfillment perspective). The author surveyed 289 parents and their schoolchildren in Grades 4-9 in Hong Kong, China, to ascertain which of the two perspectives holds. The results indicated that parental social capital was more highly associated with a child's present belongingness if his or her prior belongingness was high rather than low. This interaction effect is supportive of the strength building perspective.     

A factor analytic study of the COPE Questionnaire by sex of respondents

This work examined the effect of sex on factor structure of a Chinese version of the 1989 COPE questionnaire with a sample of 617 Hong Kong adolescents (Mdn age = 14 yr.). Some scales had low internal consistency reliability for both sexes. Not all 15 scales could be identified as unique factors through exploratory factor analysis separately for both sexes (275 boys, 338 girls, 4 unknown). In a second-order factor analysis, both sexes' data had factors related to problem-focused coping and avoidance/escaping coping, and these two factors were only weakly correlated. An emotion-focused factor was observed in girls' data, but not boys' data.     

Antecedents of career exploration among Hong Kong Chinese university students: Testing contextual and developmental variables

In this study we investigate the antecedents of career exploration. We apply the perspectives of Flum and Blustein [Flum, H., & Blustein, D. L. (2000). Reinvigorating the study of vocational exploration: A framework for research. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 56, 380-404] for the first time in Hong Kong, and we also test culture-specific factors in exploration. A quantitative research study was conducted with Chinese students from a university in Hong Kong over a period of up to six months to examine relationships between career exploration and its antecedent variables. Data were obtained from a cross-sectional sample of 271 students and a longitudinal sample of 101 students who participated in either a student internship or a series of career seminars. The results demonstrated that relational support and prior career exploration were related consistently to career exploration as hypothesized, but the claim that achievement motivation is an antecedent of exploration received only limited support. The framework of Flum and Blustein [Flum, H., & Blustein, D. L. (2000). Reinvigorating the study of vocational exploration: A framework for research. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 56, 380-404] was found very relevant in our conceptualization and analysis of career exploration in the Hong Kong context. Implications of this study are discussed and suggestions are made to further extend career exploration research in Hong Kong and other Chinese societies.