درس احساسات در خانواده: نقش هوش هیجانی در رضایت از زندگی میان دانشجویان دانشکده تایوان Lesson of Emotions in the Family: The Role of Emotional Intelligence in the Relation Between Filial Piety and Life Satisfaction Among Taiwanese College Students

Good parent–child relationships are considered important in developing individuals’ emotional intelligence. Perceived warmth and responsiveness in authoritative parenting (Manzeske & Stright, 2009; Morris, Silk, Steinberg, Myers, & Robinson, 2007; Strayer & Roberts, 2004; Olson, Bates, & Bayles, 1990) were found to be linked to various dimensions of trait emotional intelligence, including understanding of emotions, knowledge of emotions, and regulation of emotions (Alegre, 2011; Argyriou, Bakoyannis, & Tantaros, 2016; Asghari & Besharat, 2011). According to Asghari and Besharat (2011), the connection between perceived authoritative parenting and emotional intelligence can be conceptualized through self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 1985). By satisfying three fundamental psychological needs (competence, relatedness, and autonomy), authoritative parenting characterized by a high degree of support, warmth, and autonomy facilitates children’s internalization of their parents’ attitudes, the establishment of self-regulation abilities, and the development of emotional competence in children (Asghari & Besharat, 2011). In particular, recent research has focused on children’s perceptions of parenting styles as a more proximate criterion to determine the impact of parenting styles on children. However, parenting styles are tied to parents’ ideas about their children, rather than children’s perspective about their relationships with parents. Furthermore, research fails to consider the cultural uniqueness of parent–child interactions in some cultural contexts, for instance, the Chinese cultural context that highly emphasizes the close-knit connections between parents and children (Chao & Tseng, 2002). Therefore, taking a different approach, Chen (2014) proposed that filial piety can serve as a more accurate and proximate variable to represent the culture-specific indicators of parent–child interaction quality from the children’s perspective by asking children about their beliefs about parent–child interactions. Filial piety in Chinese societies is defined as a culture-specific Confucian concept that represents an important virtue and responsibility in children’s interactions with their parents (Ho, 1996). Filial piety prescribes how children should care for, respect, and honour their families (Ho, 1996; Wong, Leung, & McBride-Chang, 2010; Yeh & Bedford, 2003). It includes a variety of forms of emotional and material support offered by children to their parents, including love, attentiveness, compliance, and memorialization (Yeh, 2003). Over thousands of years, filial piety has become one of the leading guidelines for maintaining harmonious intergenerational relationships within Chinese families (Yeh, Yi, Tsao, & Wan, 2013). Embedded in the sociocultural context of family interdependence (Chao & Tseng, 2002), filial piety has been shown to play a significant role in Chinese individuals’ social adaptation and psychological functioning, including life satisfaction (Chen, 2014; Yeh et al., 2013), happiness (Chen, Wu, & Yeh, 2016), and family cohesion (Cheung, Lee, & Chan, 1994; Yeh & Bedford, 2004). However, it is unclear whether filial piety can link to individuals’ emotional intelligence. Furthermore, the process by which filial piety links to individuals’ psychological outcomes has been neglected by research. Therefore, the present study sought to investigate how filial piety contributes to young adults’ life satisfaction by shaping individuals’ emotional intelligence.