How empathy, perceived parental care, and overprotection indexes are affected by participants' sex: investigating cultural differences.

Culture seems to affect how empathy's development is influenced by parental behaviors. Considering that empathy is a social ability whose development is affected by many environmental and biological factors, differences can be expected in the way fathers and mothers care for and protect their sons and daughters, as social roles are influenced by culture. The objective of this research was to assess to what extent empathy, perceived parental care, and overprotection are affected by the offspring's sex.

Ownership reasoning in children across cultures.

To what extent do early intuitions about ownership depend on cultural and socio-economic circumstances? We investigated the question by testing reasoning about third party ownership conflicts in various groups of three- and five-year-old children (N=176), growing up in seven highly contrasted social, economic, and cultural circumstances (urban rich, poor, very poor, rural poor, and traditional) spanning three continents. Each child was presented with a series of scripts involving two identical dolls fighting over an object of possession. The child had to decide who of the two dolls should own the object.

Dimensions of familial allocentrism in Brazilian mothers from state capitals and small cities.

This study focuses on 606 Brazilian women's cultural models regarding their relation with their family, as evaluated by the Family Allocentrism Idiocentrism Scale (FAS). The scale was translated into Portuguese, submitted to back-translation and adapted. Analyses of the scale's structure indicated that the best fit model involves two independent factors.

Profiles of maternal care observed in a group of Brazilian mothers: an exploratory study.

The aim of this study is to characterize profiles of maternal care in a sample of Brazilian mothers, using a cultural-biological perspective. Participants were 315 women who had at least one child younger than six years-old. They were selected from six Brazilian states.