Parents’ hedonic, eudaimonic, and extrinsic motives for happiness: associations with parenting behaviors

Although happiness motives are known to influence personal well-being, their relevance to parenting behaviors, which are crucial for child well-being, remains understudied. This study examined how parents’ hedonic (e.g., seeking fun), eudaimonic (e.g., seeking meaning), and extrinsic motives (e.g., seeking wealth) relate to parenting behaviors in a cross-sectional study involving parents from China (Study 1) and in a two-wave longitudinal study with parents from the United States (Study 2). The findings show that eudaimonic motives relate to higher levels of autonomy support/behavioral control and lower levels of psychological control/inconsistent parenting, whereas extrinsic motives relate to lower levels of autonomy support and higher levels of psychological control.

Furthermore, we observed inconsistent findings regarding the relationship between hedonic motives and parenting behaviors across the two studies. These findings highlight the importance of extending happiness motive research beyond intrapersonal domains into interpersonal contexts, thereby helping identify the relevance of different happiness motives to others’ well-being. The work described in this paper was supported by the General Research Fund from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No.

LU15602521) conferred to LL; by the Departmental Research Fund (P0046089) from the Department of Applied Social Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University conferred to HWC. Lingnan University, Hong Kong SAR, China The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong SAR, China Correspondence to Li Lin or Hoi-Wing Chan. The authors declare no competing interests.

Study 1 involved participants from China and Study 2 involved participants from the United States. Prior to data collection, the studies were approved by the Research Ethics and Safety of the Research Committee of Lingnan University (EC027/2122) on December 29, 2021. The scope of approval includes all research variables in the studies.

For Study 2 conducted online without physical intervention and involving anonymous participation, additional local ethics committee approval was not required in the United States. All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed Consent Informed consent was obtained from all participants on the date of assessment.

Participants were fully informed about the research purposes, data use, potential risks, voluntary participation, and assurance of their anonymity. Consent covered participation, data use, and consent to publish. In Study 1, parent participants provided written consent from February 28 to March 08, 2023.