HUD Colloquium Fall 2024 Presents: Dr. Jin Li

The Human Development Colloquium Series Presents:

Cultural Influence on Children’s Learning Beliefs: Persistence Amidst Change

Dr. Jin Li

Professor of Education and Human Development

Education Department

Brown University

Bio: Dr. Li’s research focuses on East Asian virtue-oriented and Western mind-oriented learning models and how these models shape children’s learning beliefs, parental socialization, and achievement. She has studied children and families in China and Taiwan as well as those from, Chinese American, European American, and other cultural and ethnic backgrounds. Her research has been published in leading academic journals and presses. She has delivered lectures in a dozen different countries. Her 2012 book Cultural Foundations of Learning: East and West synthesizes

Abstract: Learning is a universal human capacity and activity. However, Western and East Asian people hold different beliefs about learning. These beliefs influence how they approach learning, childrearing, achievement, and adaptation. What are the different cultural learning models and why are they so different? Dr. Li will describe an important conceptual distinction she has advanced between the Western mind-model and the East Asian virtue model of learning. The former aims at cultivating the mind to understand the world, but the latter prioritizes moral and social self-cultivation. Dr. Li will present empirical research on different learning conceptions, children’s beliefs, parental socialization, and immigrant families’ adaptation. Despite their need to adapt to the mainstream culture’s learning model, immigrant families’ beliefs and related socialization as shaped by their home culture suggest persistence amidst change. Dr. Li will discuss research implications.