Chinese-American families are adapting to American culture by incorporating certain American values into their lifestyles while maintain core traditional Chinese beliefs that they believe are extremely important.  Chinese-American parents, especially those who are second-generation, are giving children more freedom, as opposed to strictly supervising children as ancient Chinese families did.  Members of Chinese-American families, especially those who are not the first generation on American soil, are becoming more individualistic and less dependent on the family, again very different from the historical Chinese family.  While family members are becoming more individualistic, the Chinese family still retains the value that family is an important part of a person’s life.

           This clearly begs a comparison of traditional Western, Anglo-Saxon values and of traditional, Eastern, Chinese values.  This table, based off information in the study “Implementing Positive Behavior Support with Chinese American Families: Enhancing Cultural Competence” done by Mian Wang, Amy McCart, and Ann P. Turnbull, delineates some important values of each.

Traditional Anglo-Saxon Values	Traditional Chinese Values
Equality	Deference to authority/Filial piety
Informality in communication	Formality in communication for maintenance of harmony
Directness/Assertiveness	Indirectness/Subtlety
Scientific rationale in viewing disability/problem behavior	Spiritual rationale in viewing disability/fatalism
Individualism/Centered on individuals	Collectivism/Centered on groups (especially families)
Change and progress for the future	No need for change/focus on past/maintain status quo
Action and achievement (usefulness of intervention)	Suspicion of intervention
Democratic discipline	Authoritarian discipline
Work and achievement (working hard to attain rewards/leisure)	Emphasis on education (sacrificing leisure for career success)

            Chinese families in the United States, especially those with parents who are not first-generation Chinese-Americans, are adapting many more Anglo-Saxon values into their family practices.  For example, many families now try to be more democratic in disciplining their children.  Instead of only yelling at the kids and punishing them, the parents will listen to kids’ explanations, take circumstances into account, and then deal out more reasonable punishment, as opposed to holding the child completely at fault.  As Benson Tong says in her book The Chinese Americans, families are replacing “familial supervision—considered traditionally as a way to show love—with more demonstrations of affection and Euro-American forms of nurturance.”

 Also, Chinese-American families are more accepting of change and progress, valuing the idea of a better future.  Chinese-American families also now encourage children to try to be more independent.  Tong describes that “members of the family [are becoming]….more individually assertive and less situation-centered or socially dependent on each other.”  However, even with this adaptation of Anglo-Saxon values, Chinese-American families still place importance on work and education—that particular value has not changed much.  Chinese-American families are similar to many other families in that parents just want their kids to be happy, and Chinese-American parents focus on education and hard work as the path to happiness for their children.  Also, Chinese-American families still place more importance on the family than Anglo-Saxon families typically do; parents expect their children to care for them when they’re older.  Basically, for Chinese-Americans, as Walter H. Slote says in his article, “Psychocultural Dynamics within the Confucian Family,” the “core patterns remain and have been effectively maintained.”