Understanding the impact of parental involvement subtypes on Chinese preschool children’s language ability

Parental involvement, especially home-based involvement and home‒school communication, is an important factor affecting the development of preschool children’s language abilities. Although previous studies suggest that parents are important catalysts in shaping children’s language achievement, it is still unclear how types of parental involvement affect children’s language abilities. This study surveys 874 preschool children in China and finds that home-based involvement boosts children’s language abilities via improved approaches to learning. Surprisingly, we also find that home‒school communication negatively predicts children’s language abilities via decreased approaches to learning. Moreover, school-based involvement has no significant association with children’s language abilities. This study contributes new insights to the literature on children’s language abilities by uncovering the various impacts of the subtypes of parental involvement and providing a process explanation accordingly.