Parents’ early writing support and its associations with parenting practices in the United States and Israel

We observed the nature of parents’ writing support and studied their reports about their parenting practices. Participants were 130 middle socioeconomic status parent-preschooler dyads in the United States and Israel (69 American). Parents were videotaped while helping their children write an invitation to a birthday party in English in the United States and in Hebrew in Israel. We analyzed the degree to which parents helped children segment words into their respective sounds (graphophonemic support) and print letters independently (printing support). Parents also filled out a parenting-practices questionnaire about their home learning environment (HLE); warmth, autonomy support, and expectations (WSE), and management/discipline (MD). Across cultures, parents valued WSE the most, followed by MD and HLE. In both cultures, parents prioritized WSE most, followed by MD and HLE. Across cultures, higher MD related to higher writing (graphophonemic and printing) support. Our findings stress the importance of cross-cultural studies when investigating how parents guide and support young children’s early literacy development.