UC Berkeley

The purpose of this study was to gain more information about parents' involvement in their children's learning and special education. The study examined specific factors and their association to parent involvement among 48 Chinese and 47 non-Chinese parents who have a young child with a disability. The factors investigated were parents' belief on the expert role (e.g., parent is the expert in their child's education or teacher is the expert), parents' perceived partnership effort from their child's teacher/school (e.g., parent-professional collaboration), and parents' beliefs on causes of disability (e.g., biological, environmental, and spiritual causes). T-test analyses were used to compare the amount and type of parent involvement (i.e., overall total, PIT; home-based, PIH; school-based, PIS; and community-based involvement, PIC) between the two parent groups. The results indicated that all parents were involved with their children's education; however, this sample of Chinese parents were more involved, had a stronger belief that teachers are the experts, and had a stronger belief in spiritual causes of disability than the non-Chinese parents. Correlational analyses were used to examine the relations of the factors and parent involvement for the Chinese parents, as well as for the non-Chinese parents. The results indicated that involvement is higher for both groups when parents perceived more partnership effort given from the school and when parents had a stronger belief that they are the expert in their children's education. Regression analyses were used to describe how well the factors predicted PIT, PIH, PIS and PIC, while controlling for ethnicity. The most common predictors of parent involvement across the four different models were perceived partnership effort from the school and belief in parent as the expert. Interpretations of the findings are discussed and implications for practice are provided.