title: The relationship of the family social environment, peer influences, and peer relationships to altruistic orientation in Chinese children.
abstract: This study investigated the correlation between the family social environment, peer influences, and peer relationships to altruistic orientation in Chinese children. Results in the present study showed that (a) altruistic orientation measured by the Child Altruism Inventory (H. K. Ma & M. C. Leung, 1991) was directly associated with a positive family social environment, (b) altruistic orientation was directly associated with positive peer influences and was inversely associated with negative peer influences, and (c) altruistic orientation was directly associated with perceived prosocial behavior of one's best friend and inversely associated with perceived antisocial behavior of one's best friend. The findings suggested that a good family social environment, positive peer influences, and good peer relationships tended to increase altruistic orientation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Education Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon Tong. hkma@hkbu.edu.hk
authors.forename: Hing Keung
authors.initials: HK
authors.lastname: Ma
mesh_terms: D000533:Altruism; D002648:Child; D002681:China; D003469:Culture; D005190:Family / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010379:Peer Group; D010555:Personality Inventory; D012044:Regression Analysis; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012931:Social Environment; D012938:Social Perception; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires