Influence of Parent Education on Communication Pattern of Children in Public Primary Schools
CHAPTER ONE
OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
Specifically, the study sought to:
- Determine the influence of parental education on their children’s’ communication pattern
- Ascertain the difference in communication patterns between children that are read to by parents and their peers that are not read to.
- Determine the influence of parent-child communication patterns on the in-school children’ academic achievement.
CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF RELATED AND RELEVANT LITERATURE
Introduction
Family communication is a challenging phenomenon to theorize about because it simultaneously depends on intrapersonal and on interpersonal processes. In other words, the variables that explain family communication reside within each individual as well as within the family system. Thus, “a complete explication of family communication needs to consider both intersubjectivity and interactivity (Koerner & Fitzpatrick, 2002a, p. 73). Intersubjectivity refers to the similarity of meaning that family members assign to their communicative behaviors and is best understood in terms of relational cognition. In contrast, interactivity refers to the degree to which family members’ creation, use, and interpretation of symbols are interdependent and is best understood at the level of interpersonal behavior. Consequently, a comprehensive theory of family communication must consider both relational cognition and interpersonal behavior and explicate how these two are interdependent. In this chapter, we will present Family Communication Patterns Theory as a comprehensive theory of family communication that operates at the levels of both relational cognition and interpersonal behavior. First, we consider the origin of Family Communication Patterns Theory as a model of how families create a shared social reality through the process of orientation and the subsequent reformulation of the model as a theory of interpersonal behavior. After describing the underlying cognitive processes, we then describe the resulting communication behaviors in terms of the two dimensions of conversation orientation and conformity orientation and four resulting family types. Then, we discuss what we see as the strengths of Family Communication Patterns Theory and conclude with an outlook on the role that the theory could play in future research on family communication.
DEVELOPMENT OF FAMILY COMMUNICATION PATTERNS THEORY
Family Communication Patterns and the Sharing of Social Reality
McLeod and Chaffee (1972, 1973) developed the original model of family communication patterns to describe families’ tendencies to develop fairly stable and predictable ways of communicating with one another. As mass media researchers, McLeod and Chaffee were not interested in family communication as an end in itself. Rather, they wanted to explain how families create and share social reality. Specifically, they were interested in explaining how parents socialize their children to process information stemming from outside the family; in particular, information in the form of mass media messages. At that time, psychology and allied fields experienced a renewed interest in cognitive processes as they turned away from behaviorism and an almost exclusive interest in message properties to explain communication outcomes (Reeves, Chaffee, & Tims, 1982). Thus, it is no surprise that McLeod and Chaffee based their explanation of family communication on the cognitive theory of coorientation. Coorientation is one of the fundamental concepts of social cognition initially described by Heider (1946, 1958) and Newcomb (1953) and refers to two or more persons focusing on and evaluating the same object in their social or material environment. In dyads that are aware of their shared focus, coorientation leads to two different cognitions for each person.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research Design
The researcher used descriptive research survey design in building up this project work the choice of this research design was considered appropriate because of its advantages of identifying attributes of a large population from a group of individuals. The design was suitable for the study as the study sought to assess the influence of parent education on communication pattern of children in public primary schools.
Sources of Data Collection
Data were collected from two main sources namely:
Primary source and Secondary source
Primary source:
These are materials of statistical investigation which were collected by the research for a particular purpose. They can be obtained through a survey, observation questionnaire or as experiment; the researcher has adopted the questionnaire method for this study.
Secondary source:
These are data from textbook Journal handset etc. they arise as byproducts of the same other purposes. Example administration, various other unpublished works and write ups were also used.
Population of the Study
Population of a study is a group of persons or aggregate items, things the researcher is interested in getting information to assess the influence of parent education on communication pattern of children in public primary schools. A total of two hundred (200) respondents (parents) from different public primary schools.
CHAPTER FOUR
PRESENTATION ANALYSIS INTERPRETATION OF DATA
Introduction
Efforts will be made at this stage to present, analyze and interpret the data collected during the field survey. This presentation will be based on the responses from the completed questionnaires. The result of this exercise will be summarized in tabular forms for easy references and analysis. It will also show answers to questions relating to the research questions for this research study. The researcher employed simple percentage in the analysis.
DATA ANALYSIS
The data collected from the respondents were analyzed in tabular form with simple percentage for easy understanding.
A total of 133 (one hundred and thirty three) questionnaires were distributed and 133 questionnaires were returned.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
Introduction
It is important to reiterate that the objective of this study was to examine influence of parent education on communication pattern of children in public primary schools.
In the preceding chapter, the relevant data collected for this study were presented, critically analyzed and appropriate interpretation given.
In this chapter, certain recommendations are made which in the opinion of the researcher are drawn from the findings of the study.
Summary
This study was undertaken to examine influence of parent education on communication pattern of children in public primary schools. The study opened with chapter one where the statement of the problem was clearly defined. The study objectives and research hypotheses were defined and formulated respectively. The study reviewed related and relevant literatures. The chapter two gave the conceptual framework, empirical and theoretical studies. The third chapter described the methodology employed by the researcher in collecting both the primary and the secondary data. The research method employed here is the descriptive survey method. The study analyzed and presented the data collected in tables and tested the hypotheses using the chi-square statistical tool. While the fifth chapter gives the study summary and conclusion.
Conclusion
Family Communication Patterns is a powerful aspect of family communication that is based on a sophisticated model of social cognition and has showed to be relevant to a number of important family processes, such as communication apprehension (Elwood & Schrader, 1998), conflict and conflict resolution (Koerner & Fitzpatrick, 1997, 2002c), resiliency of children (Fitzpatrick & Koerner, in press), social self-restraint and social withdrawal (Fitzpatrick, Marshall, Leutwiler, & Krcmar, 1996), enactment of family rituals (Baxter & Clark, 1996), effects of parents’ work environments on family communication (Ritchie, 1997), children’s influence on family political discussions (Saphir & Chaffee, 2002), and self-orientation in family conversation (Koerner & Cvancara, 2002). Although impressive in its scope, this research has barely scratched the surface of the proverbial iceberg, and we expect the Family Communication Patterns to play an important role in our and our colleagues’ investigation and understanding of family communication and family processes in the future. In our opinion, the most promising direction that research on Family Communication Patterns can take involves the integration of family communication patterns with family communication schemata.
Like other relationship type schemata, family communication schemata involve complex, hierarchically integrated mental representations that family members have of themselves, their family members and their family relationships. Included in family communication schemata is the procedural knowledge of how to achieve agreement and a shared social reality that determines family conversation and conformity orientation (Koerner & Fitzpatrick, 2002a). As such, family communication schemata have the potential to provide an integrative framework not only for research on family communication patterns but also for other research on family communication behaviors, such as communication standards, attachment, and parenting styles. It is our hope that such research will allow family communication scholars to develop a comprehensive model of family communication that goes far beyond just family communication patterns.
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