A Review of Parenting in A Multicultural Country: The Malaysian Experience

Abstract

The multicultural nature of Malaysian parents expectedly gives rise to heterogenous parenting practices. Despite this heterogeneity, the country’s common collectivistic background that values familism may have shaped parenting behaviours. Since there is a great influence of culture on parenting, there appears to be a need to explore the Malaysian way of parenting. This review aimed to assess, synthesise, and organise the available research evidence on parenting behaviours and parent-child interactions in Malaysia. Recent publications from 2002 to 2021 were examined using a narrative approach. A literature search was conducted using the Scopus, Dimensions.ai, Google Scholar databases, and citation tracking using keywords such as parenting style, parenting, parent-child interaction, parent-child relation, and childrearing. Twenty-four papers on parenting styles, 13 on parenting practices, and 19 on parent-child interactions were included for review. The majority of the studies were quantitative and published in the last couple of years. While findings revealed diverse parenting styles in the country, culturally-conformed parenting behaviours are thought to be more effective than the standard authoritative parenting. Recommendations are made for future research.