Why Do Parents Abstract Become Involved? Research Findings ... Research... · Howard M. Sandler Darlene Whetsel Christa L. Green Andrew S. Wilkins Kristen Closson Vanderbilt University

The Elementary School JournalVolume 106, Number 2q 2005 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.0013-5984/2005/10602-0003$05.00

Why Do ParentsBecome Involved?Research Findingsand Implications

Kathleen V. Hoover-DempseyJoan M. T. WalkerHoward M. SandlerDarlene WhetselChrista L. GreenAndrew S. WilkinsKristen ClossonVanderbilt University

Abstract

A decade ago, Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler of-fered a model of the parental involvement pro-cess that focused on understanding why parentsbecome involved in their children’s educationand how their involvement influences studentoutcomes. Since then, we and others have con-ducted conceptual and empirical work to en-hance understanding of processes examined inthe model. In this article (companion to Walkerand colleagues’ article about scale developmenton the model in this issue), we review recentwork on constructs central to the model’s initialquestion: Why do parents become involved inchildren’s education? Based on this review, weoffer suggestions for (1) research that maydeepen understanding of parents’ motivationsfor involvement and (2) school and family prac-tices that may strengthen the incidence and ef-fectiveness of parental involvement across var-ied school communities.

Whether construed as home-based behav-iors (e.g., helping with homework), school-based activities (e.g., attending schoolevents), or parent-teacher communication(e.g., talking with the teacher about home-work), parental involvement has been pos-itively linked to indicators of studentachievement, including teacher ratings ofstudent competence, student grades, andachievement test scores (e.g., Deslandes,Royer, Potvin, & Leclerc, 1999; Epstein &Van Voorhis, 2001; Fan & Chen, 1999; Grol-nick & Slowiaczek, 1994; Henderson &Mapp, 2002; Hill & Craft, 2003; Miedel &Reynolds, 1999; Okagaki & Frensch, 1998;Shaver & Walls, 1998; Sui-Chu & Willms,1996; Wang, Wildman, & Calhoun, 1996).Involvement has also been associated withother indicators of school success, includinglower rates of retention in grade, lower

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drop-out rates, higher on-time high schoolgraduation rates, and higher rates of partic-ipation in advanced courses (e.g., Barnard,2004; Ma, 1999; Marcon, 1999; Miedel &Reynolds, 1999; Trusty, 1999).

In addition to these outcomes, parentalinvolvement has also been linked to psy-chological processes and attributes thatsupport student achievement (e.g., Grol-nick, Ryan, & Deci, 1991; Hoover-Dempseyet al., 2001; Steinberg, Elmen, & Mounts,1989). These attributes support achieve-ment across groups of students, includingstudents at risk for poorer educational ordevelopmental outcomes (e.g., Grolnick,Kurowski, Dunlap, & Hevey, 2000; Miedel& Reynolds, 1999). These student motiva-tional, cognitive, social, and behavioral at-tributes are particularly important becausethey are susceptible to direct parent andteacher influence. They include studentsense of personal competence and efficacyfor learning (“I can do this work”; e.g., Ban-dura, Barbaranelli, Caprara, & Pastorelli,1996; Fantuzzo, Davis, & Ginsburg, 1995;Frome & Eccles, 1998; Ginsberg & Bron-stein, 1993; Grolnick et al., 1991; Sanders,1998); mastery orientation (e.g., Gonzalez,Holbein, & Quilter, 2002); perceptions ofpersonal control over school outcomes (e.g.,Glasgow, Dornbusch, Troyer, Steinberg, &Ritter, 1997; Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994;Trusty & Lampe, 1997); self-regulatoryknowledge and skills (“I know how to dothis work”; e.g., Brody, Flor, & Gibson, 1999;Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994; Xu & Corno,2003); as well as attentive, adaptive schoolbehavior, engagement in schoolwork, andbeliefs about the importance of education(“I want to do this work”; e.g., Fantuzzo etal., 1995; Grolnick et al., 2000; Izzo, Weiss-berg, Kasprow, & Fendrich, 1999; Marcon,1999; Sanders, 1998; Sheldon & Epstein,2002; Shumow, 1998).

Although cautions about limitations inthe parental involvement literature are war-ranted (e.g., much research to date has re-lied on correlational and nonexperimentalmethods: Mattingly, Prislin, McKenzie,

Rodriguez, & Kayzar, 2002; White, Taylor,& Moss, 1992), an increasingly multidisci-plinary body of research supports the as-sertion that parents’ attitudes, behaviors,and activities related to children’s educa-tion influence students’ learning and edu-cational success. This evidence underscoresthe importance of continued attention toimprovements in research in this area, in-cluding careful delineation of conceptualand theoretical foundations, thoughtful se-lection of design and methodology, and sys-tematic attention to the derivation of impli-cations for sound and effective educationalpractice.

As part of this continuous improvementeffort, we review recent empirical work re-lated to the constructs included in Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler’s (1995, 1997) modelof the parental involvement process as re-vised in work reported in Walker et al.(2005, in this issue). These constructs focuson parents’ motivations for involvementand include (a) an active role constructionfor involvement (i.e., parents believe thatthey should be involved) and a positivesense of efficacy for helping the child learn;(b) perception of invitations to involvementfrom the school, teacher, and student; and(c) important elements of parents’ life con-text that allow or encourage involvement.1

Before turning to the review, we brieflyacknowledge two realities about parentalinvolvement. First, not all parents need en-couragement to become involved; as expli-cated well in a literature focused primarilyon social class, culture, and family-schoolrelations, some parents are heavily involvedin their children’s education and need fewincentives for still further involvement. Thisliterature suggests that such involvement isoften accompanied by beliefs that schoolsshould give priority to one’s own child aswell as one’s own views, needs, and socialperspectives, often to the implicit or explicitexclusion of other families’ needs and per-spectives (e.g., Brantlinger, 2003; Brantlin-ger, Majd-Jabbari, & Guskin, 1996; Graue,Kroeger, & Prager, 2001; Lareau, 1989, 2003;

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Wells & Serna, 1996). Such involvement cancreate substantial difficulties for membersof the school community. For example,overly involved parents may diminish stu-dents’ opportunities to learn personal re-sponsibility and may create debilitatingpressures on schools’ abilities to meet theeducational needs of all students (i.e., par-ents may control not only their own chil-dren’s educational choices and progress butthe opportunities and choices available toall families served by the school: Brantlin-ger, 2003; Brantlinger et al., 1996; Graue etal., 2001; Lareau, 2003; Wells & Serna, 1996).Although such involvement may be ex-plained by our model,2 we focus here on un-derstanding the involvement of most par-ents, especially those whose children maybenefit from increased, or increasingly ef-fective, involvement.

The second reality about parental in-volvement that frames this review is devel-opmental in nature. Evidence suggests thatparental involvement tends to decline, forseveral reasons, in students’ later middleschool and high school years (e.g., Adams& Christenson, 2000; Griffith, 1998; Grolnicket al., 2000; Izzo et al., 1999; McCaslin &Murdock, 1991; Simon, 2004). It also sug-gests clearly that developmentally appro-priate parental involvement continues to beassociated with positive student outcomesacross elementary, middle, and high schoolyears (e.g., Dornbusch, Ritter, Liederman,Mont-Reynaud, & Chen, 1987; Gronick etal., 2000; Simon, 2004; Steinberg et al., 1989;Steinberg, Lamborn, Dornbusch, & Darling,1992). However, because most of the re-search related to model constructs has cen-tered on students in the elementary andmiddle school grades, we have focused thisreview on parental involvement duringthese years.

In the sections that follow, we review re-cent work on the three major sets of con-tributors to parents’ involvement: parents’motivational beliefs, parents’ perceptions ofinvitations to involvement, and parents’life-context variables that are likely to influ-

ence involvement. Within each section be-low, we offer construct definitions and re-view findings from recent research. We thenoffer recommendations for school strategiesand practices based on this theoretical andempirical work. We conclude the articlewith observations and recommendationsfor next steps in research on the parentalinvolvement process.

Parents’ Motivational Beliefs

Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler’s (1995,1997) model suggests that parents’ in-volvement is motivated by two belief sys-tems: role construction for involvement,and sense of efficacy for helping the childsucceed in school. Parental role construc-tion includes a sense of personal or sharedresponsibility for the child’s educationaloutcomes and concurrent beliefs aboutwhether one should be engaged in sup-porting the child’s learning and school suc-cess. Parental sense of efficacy for helpingthe child succeed in school includes the be-lief that personal actions will help the childlearn. Both constructs are defined morefully and a sample of recent research oneach is reviewed below.

Parental Role Construction

Parental role construction is defined asparents’ beliefs about what they are sup-posed to do in relation to their children’seducation and the patterns of parental be-havior that follow those beliefs (Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1995, 1997; Hoover-Dempsey, Wilkins, Sandler, & O’Connor,2004; Walker et al., 2005, in this issue). Roleconstruction for involvement is influencedby parents’ beliefs about how children de-velop, what parents should do to rear theirchildren effectively, and what parentsshould do at home to help children succeedin school. Role construction is also shapedby the expectations of individuals andgroups important to the parent about theparent’s responsibilities relevant to thechild’s schooling.

Because role construction is shaped by


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the expectations of pertinent social groupsand relevant personal beliefs, it is con-structed socially. It is created from parents’experiences over time with individuals andgroups related to schooling. These often in-clude the parent’s personal experienceswith schooling, prior experience with in-volvement, and ongoing experiences withothers related to the child’s schooling (e.g.,teachers, other parents). Because it is so-cially constructed, parents’ role construc-tion for involvement is subject to change. Itchanges in response to variations in socialconditions, and it may change in responseto intentional efforts to alter role construc-tion (e.g., Biddle, 1979, 1986; Chrispeels &Rivero, 2001; Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler,1997).

Recent work on role construction offersconsiderable support for its importance toparents’ decisions about involvement. Forexample, Drummond and Stipek (2004),who studied parents of African American,Caucasian, and Latino elementary students,reported that role construction motivatedparents’ involvement practices. Consistentwith theoretical work on stability andchange in role construction (e.g., Biddle,1979, 1986), they also observed that parents’ideas about appropriate roles in children’seducation were subject to social influence:when teachers offered recommendationsabout parental help with learning in specificareas, parents’ beliefs about the importanceof their help in those areas increased. Shel-don’s (2002) study of the parents of elemen-tary students from urban and suburbanschools showed that role construction pre-dicted parents’ home- and school-based in-volvement activities. Grolnick, Benjet, Ku-rowski, and Apostoleris (1997) also reportedpositive links between parents’ beliefs thatthey should take an active role in their chil-dren’s education and their engagement in in-tellectually stimulating activities with theirchildren.

Similar evidence has been found in stud-ies of varied cultural groups. Chrispeels andRivero (2001), for example, reported that La-

tino immigrant parents’ ideas about appro-priate roles in children’s education influ-enced their thinking about how they shouldbe involved, how much they should be in-volved, and how they should interpretschool invitations to involvement. Partici-pation in a parent education programstrengthened their role beliefs and involve-ment. Gonzalez and Chrispeels (2004) sub-sequently reported that parental role con-struction was the strongest predictor ofinvolvement among Latino parents of ele-mentary and secondary students prior toparticipation in a parent education interven-tion program. (Participation in the programincreased parents’ knowledge of the schoolsand strengthened parents’ active role con-struction.) Other investigators have reportedevidence that parents of high-performingsecondary students from Latino migrantfamilies hold active role construction for in-volvement in their children’s education(Trevino, 2004). Still others have reportedpositive links between school emphases oncollaborative relationships with parents andparents’ construction of active roles in chil-dren’s schooling (Scribner, Young, & Ped-roza, 1999).

This sample of recent work underscoresthe power of role construction as a moti-vator of parents’ involvement in their chil-dren’s education at the elementary and sec-ondary levels and across ethnic and culturalgroups. It also supports the observation thatrole construction is influenced by school at-tributes and well-designed interventionprograms.

Parents’ Sense of Efficacy for Helpingthe Child Succeed in School

Our model argues that a second per-sonal motivator of parental involvement isself-efficacy, or belief in one’s abilities toact in ways that will produce desired out-comes (Bandura, 1986, 1997). Self-efficacyis a significant factor in decisions about thegoals one chooses to pursue as well aseffort and persistence in working towardthe accomplishment of those goals (Ban-


dura, 1997). Self-efficacy theory thus sug-gests that parents make their decisionsabout involvement in part by thinkingabout the outcomes likely to follow theiractions (Bandura, 1997; Hoover-Dempsey,Bassler, & Brissie, 1992). It asserts also thatparents develop behavioral goals for their in-volvement based on their appraisal of theircapabilities in the situation (Bandura, 1989).Thus, parents high in efficacy will tend tomake positive decisions about active en-gagement in the child’s education; further,they are likely to persist in the face of chal-lenges or obstacles and work their waythrough difficulties to successful outcomes.Relatively weak self-efficacy for involve-ment is often associated with lower parentalexpectations about outcomes of efforts tohelp the child succeed in school and rela-tively low persistence in the face of chal-lenges (Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1997).

Self-efficacy, like role construction, is so-cially constructed. Bandura (1989, 1997)suggests that it is grounded in personal ex-periences in four major domains: personalmastery experiences (success in achievinggoals in the given area), vicarious experi-ences (observing similar others’ success inachieving goals in the area), verbal persua-sion (encouragement from important othersthat one is capable of successful perfor-mance), and physiological arousal (physicaland affective states that individuals processas information about the importance ofgiven goals and personal ability to achievethem). These sources suggest strongly thatschools and important others (family mem-bers, social groups) exert significant influ-ence on parents’ sense of efficacy for help-ing their children succeed in school.

Research has supported theoretically pre-dicted relations between parental efficacyand several aspects of parental involvement.Bandura and colleagues (1996), for example,reported that parents with stronger efficacyfor managing and promoting middle school-ers’ academic development were more likelythan were lower-efficacy parents to supportchildren’s educational activities and develop

students’ self-management skills for effec-tive learning. Shumow and Lomax (2002), re-porting on a national sample of middle andhigh school students, found that a broadmeasure of parental efficacy predicted pa-rental involvement and parental monitoringof students. Parents’ involvement and moni-toring of student progress, in turn, predictedmeasures of students’ academic success, in-cluding grades; use of remedial, regular, oradvanced courses; and school behavior.Grolnick et al. (1997), who examined ele-mentary parents’ perceptions of personal ef-ficacy in relation to children’s education, re-ported higher involvement among parentswith stronger efficacy across all three do-mains of involvement: behavioral (partici-pating in school activities and helping thestudent at home), cognitive-intellectual (par-ents’ engagement with children in intellec-tually stimulating activities), and personal(monitoring the child’s school progress).

Other investigators who have examinedparents in groups including African Amer-ican, Hispanic, and Euro American familieshave also reported positive links betweenparents’ efficacy and their involvement be-haviors at home (e.g., Eccles & Harold,1996; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1992; Shel-don, 2002) and at school (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1992; Seefeldt, Denton, Gal-per, & Younoszai, 1998; Shumow & Lomax,2002). Others among these investigatorshave suggested that parental efficacy influ-ences involvement also because it is relatedto important parent attributes that also in-fluence student learning, including aspira-tions for the child and confidence in thechild’s ability to succeed (e.g., Wentzel,1998), parents’ abilities to negotiate a rea-sonable path between involvement and em-ployment demands (e.g., Weiss et al., 2003),and parents’ sense of empowerment in sup-porting the child’s educational interests inthe school system (e.g., Soodak et al., 2002).

As with role construction, research on ef-ficacy offers considerable support for its in-fluence as a motivator of parental involve-ment. Similarly, these findings appear across


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groups that vary in socioeconomic circum-stance, ethnicity, student school level, andtype of student educational program, thusunderscoring the power of both constructsas motivators of parental involvement inchildren’s education.

Invitations to Involvement fromOthers

Invitations to involvement from importantothers are often key motivators of parents’decisions to become involved (Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1997). Although strongrole construction and efficacy may precipi-tate involvement, invitations to involve-ment from members of the school commu-nity also serve as an important motivator ofinvolvement because they suggest to theparent that participation in the child’s learn-ing is welcome, valuable, and expected bythe school and its members. These invita-tions may be particularly significant for par-ents whose role construction is relativelypassive and whose sense of efficacy is rela-tively weak. Invitations from importantothers at school may contribute signifi-cantly to more active parental beliefs aboutpersonal role and increasingly positive be-liefs about the effect of one’s actions.

The most important invitations to in-volvement come from three sources: theschool in general (school climate), teachers,and students. Invitations generated by posi-tive school climate are significant becausethey suggest strongly that parents are wel-come at school and that their involvementis important, expected, and supported. In-vitations from teachers are important be-cause they underscore the value of parents’engagement in the child’s learning and thepower of parental action to affect studentlearning. Invitations from the student arealso uniquely important because they mo-tivate parental responsiveness to learningneeds.

Of course, invitations to involvementmust be perceived by parents if the invita-tions are to influence their decisions. In thissection, we focus on the pragmatic perspec-

tive that invitations must be developed andoffered before they can be perceived. (In ourconsideration of life-context variables thatfollows, we discuss ways in which schoolsand teachers can frame invitations to max-imize the likelihood that parents will in-deed perceive them and respond.)

General Invitations from the School:School Climate

Investigators have often suggested thatthe school environment, or school climate,influences parents’ ideas about involve-ment (e.g., Griffith, 1996, 1998; Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1997). Qualities of theschool environment, including school struc-ture and management practices, may en-hance several aspects of parent-school re-lationships, including parents’ knowledgethat they are welcome in the school, thatthey are well informed about studentlearning and progress, and that school per-sonnel respect them, their concerns, andtheir suggestions (e.g., Adams & Christen-son, 1998; Christenson, 2004; Comer, 1985;Griffith, 1996, 1998; McNamara, Telzrow, &DeLamatre, 1999; Soodak & Erwin, 2000).

Comer and colleagues’ considerablework (e.g., Anson et al., 1991; Comer, 1985;Comer & Haynes, 1991) on improving theeducation of children in low-income and so-cially marginalized families suggested thatpositive school staff attitudes toward stu-dents’ families and communities are par-ticularly important to parental empower-ment and involvement. School commitmentto working effectively with families (e.g.,engaging parents in meaningful roles; offer-ing substantive, specific, and positive feed-back on the importance of parents’ contri-butions) was also identified as a criticalcomponent of effective school invitations.In an investigation of public elementaryschools serving ethnically and socioeco-nomically diverse families, Griffith (1998)found school climate essential in enhancinginvolvement. For example, parents whoconsistently characterized their children’sschools as empowering and welcoming re-


ported more involvement than did those inother schools. Others have reported similarfindings for Head Start parents (e.g., See-feldt et al., 1998) and Hispanic parents ofelementary, middle, and high school stu-dents (e.g., Lopez, Sanchez, & Hamilton,2000; Scribner et al., 1999).

Of particular note is the role of the schoolprincipal in developing, supporting, andmaintaining a fully welcoming school cli-mate. Griffith (2001), for example, reportedprincipal practices critical to a positiveschool climate: these included clear principalefforts to meet the needs of all school mem-bers (students, staff, parents), regular visitsto classrooms, and consistent public advo-cacy for school improvements. He noted thatthese practices appeared especially impor-tant in creating a positive climate in schoolsserving families from lower-socioeconomiccircumstances and those whose children areenrolled in English-as-a-second-languageprograms. Haynes, Emmons, and Woodruff(1998), Sanders and Harvey (2002), and Shel-don (2003) offered additional evidence thata principal’s practices, including those iden-tified by Griffith, are also linked to improve-ments in student learning, an ultimate goalof parental involvement in education.

Overall, school climate sets a strong con-textual foundation for involvement, andschool principals have a critical role in cre-ating and maintaining a positive, welcom-ing climate. These practices appear espe-cially important in schools serving familiesof children at higher risk for poor educa-tional outcomes.

Invitations from the Teacher

Just as qualities of the school climate in-fluence parents’ decisions about involve-ment, so too do individual teachers’ prac-tices of parental involvement. Epstein andcolleagues’ considerable work on teacherinvitations (e.g., Epstein, 1986, 1991; Epstein& Van Voorhis, 2001), for example, has sug-gested strongly that teacher attitudes aboutparents and teacher invitations to involve-ment play a significant role in parents’ de-

cisions to become involved. Dauber and Ep-stein (1993) reported that teacher invitationsand school programs to encourage involve-ment were the strongest predictors of home-and school-based involvement in the ele-mentary and middle schools they studied.Of particular note is the strong suggestionthat teacher invitations for parents’ involve-ment encourage more student time onhomework and improved student perfor-mance (Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001).

Teacher invitations are especially pow-erful because they are responsive to manyparents’ expressed wishes to know moreabout how to support children’s learning(e.g., Corno, 2000; Epstein, 1991; Epstein &Van Voorhis, 2001; Hoover-Dempsey, Bas-sler, & Burow, 1995). Teacher invitationsalso enhance parents’ sense of being wel-come to participate in school processes,knowledge of their children’s learning, andconfidence that their involvement effortsare useful and valued (e.g., Patrikakou &Weissberg, 2000; Soodak & Erwin, 2000). In-vitations also contribute to the developmentof trust in the parent-teacher relationship, aquality of effective parent-school partner-ships (Adams & Christenson, 1998, 2000).Although trust and empowerment in thepartnership require two-way communica-tion across time, invitations offer an effec-tive starting point for the creation of a part-nership.

Teacher invitations to involvement areeffective in supporting parental involve-ment across elementary, middle, and highschool and with varied school populations.For example, Kohl, Lengua, and McMahon(2002), reporting on a sample of high-riskelementary students, found strong positivelinks between consistent teacher contactswith parents and parents’ decisions aboutinvolvement. Critical components of theinvitation-involvement connection includedparents’ reports that they enjoyed talkingwith the teacher, were comfortable askingquestions, and believed that the teacher re-ally cared about their child and was inter-ested in their suggestions and ideas about


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the child’s learning. Closson, Wilkins, San-dler, and Hoover-Dempsey (2004) studiedparents of fourth through sixth graders andfound that teacher invitations were particu-larly strong predictors of involvementamong the Latino families in their sample.Simon (2004), who analyzed a national da-tabase on high school students, reportedsimilarly positive connections betweenteacher invitations and parent involvement.

Other investigators have focused onteacher invitations to parental involvementin student homework. As a group, the find-ings suggest that invitations—when specific,targeted, and within the range of activitiesthat parents can reasonably manage—pro-mote productive involvement. Balli and hercolleagues (Balli, Demo, & Wedman, 1998;Balli, Wedman, & Demo, 1999), for example,examined the effect of teacher invitations onparents’ involvement in middle schoolers’homework. Basing their approach on an in-teractive homework program (Teachers In-volve Parents in Schoolwork [TIPS]; Epstein,Salinas, & Jackson, 1995), the researchers hadmiddle school teachers invite parental in-volvement in one of two ways. Studentswhose parents received student prompts (re-quests for specific parental help or involve-ment) plus direct teacher requests for paren-tal involvement reported notably highercompletion rates than parents in the groupthat received student-prompts only (90% vs.51%). Both groups recorded significantlymore parental involvement than a controlgroup. Epstein and Van Voorhis (2001) re-ported similar findings for others using theTIPS interactive homework program.

Other studies have examined teacher in-vitations offered in parent workshop for-mats. Starkey and Klein (2000), for example,reported that invitations to involvementthrough a series of family math classes forHead Start parents were positively relatedto levels of parental involvement and stu-dent knowledge gains. Shaver and Walls(1998) examined the effect of teacher-led in-vitational workshops for elementary andmiddle school parents. Students of parents

who were involved in more of these work-shop sessions recorded stronger math andreading gains than students of less involvedparents (Pratt, Green, MacVicar, & Bountro-gianni [1992] and Shumow [1998] also offerexcellent examples of specific, program-matic invitations focused on parents’ home-work involvement).

Invitations from teachers have thus beenoffered in a number of formats: specific in-vitations to a variety of activities, invitationsgrounded in use of interactive homeworkprograms, and invitations implemented inworkshops for parents. Findings in each areaunderscore the power of teacher invitationsacross a wide range of school populationsand grade levels.

Invitations from the Child

The literature also suggests that studentinvitations prompt parental involvement.Invitations from students are important be-cause they activate many parents’ wishes tobe responsive to their children’s develop-mental needs (e.g., Baumrind, 1971, 1991)and their desires for their children’s schoolsuccess (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995).The findings are consistent with develop-mental literature suggesting that children’sattributes influence parents’ socializationpractices, including parenting behaviors re-lated to schooling (e.g., Collins, Maccoby,Steinberg, Hetherington, & Bornstein, 2000;Grusec, 2002; Ng, Kenney-Benson, & Pom-erantz, 2004; Pomerantz & Eaton, 2001).

Children’s invitations to involvementmay be implicit; that is, they may emergefrom parents’ observations of the student’sexperience with learning and may not in-volve direct requests for help. For example,parents’ knowledge that a child is havingdifficulty often elicits increased involve-ment, as parents make themselves availableto help by monitoring schoolwork and of-fering direct teaching (e.g., Clark, 1993;Cooper, Lindsay, & Nye, 2000; Dauber &Epstein, 1993; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2001;Pomerantz & Eaton, 2001). Student experi-ences during homework may also yield im-


plicit invitations to parental involvement.For example, Xu and Corno (1998; see alsoXu & Corno, 2003) observed relativelyspontaneous parental responses to often un-spoken student needs (e.g., parents createdhomework routines to deal with studentfrustration over getting started with home-work).

Child invitations may also be explicit, ofcourse; these may include a broad range ofrequests for help with learning, help withsituations at school, or participation inschool events (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey et al.,1995). They may be spontaneous, emergingfrom something as simple as the student’senjoyment of the parent’s involvement orfrom the student’s difficulty with work. Asis true of implicit student invitations, thepower of explicit invitations appears todraw on parents’ general wishes to respondto children’s needs and their valuing of chil-dren’s developmental and educational suc-cess (e.g., Baumrind, 1991; Hoover-Demp-sey et al., 1995). Student invitations, ofcourse, may also be prompted by teachers;when requests are clear and ask for specificand manageable involvement, parents tendto respond positively (e.g., Balli et al., 1997,1998). Students who act on teacher requeststo seek parents’ involvement have also re-ported their own positive responses to theopportunity to share current learning withparents and suggest that these interactionssupport their learning success (Balli et al.,1998; Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001).

Student invitations may also beprompted by school efforts to increase therelevance of school learning to student andfamily lives. For example, Moll and hiscolleagues offered an excellent model ofteacher-student-parent engagement that en-ables the use of families’ “everyday con-cepts” as context for students’ learning invaried academic areas (e.g., Gonzalez, An-drade, Civil, & Moll, 2001, p. 128; Moll,Amanti, Neff, & Gonzalez, 1992). In a similareffort, Epstein and Van Voorhis (2001, p. 190;Epstein, 2001) described teacher invitationsto “homemade homework” as means of en-

gaging students and families in develop-ment of homework assignments drawing onnormal family activities (e.g., writing a letterto a grandparent) with associated parentknowledge and student interest.

Taken together, these findings for invi-tations suggest that they are powerful con-textual motivators of parental involvement.A welcoming school climate conveys gen-eral invitations through the message thatparents’ involvement is valued as a criticalcomponent of student learning and perfor-mance. Specific, well-crafted, and sensitiveteacher invitations to involvement appearto meet many parents’ expressed wishes forideas about how they can help their chil-dren learn. Specific invitations from chil-dren, prompted by child needs or teachersuggestions, appear to activate many par-ents’ wishes to be responsive to their chil-dren’s needs and supportive of their edu-cational success.

Parents’ Life Contexts

Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler’s model(1995, 1997 as modified; see Walker et al.,2005, in this issue) suggests that elements ofparents’ life context function as the thirdmajor motivator of their decisions about in-volvement. Elements of life context mostimportant to understanding parents’ in-volvement decisions are the knowledge,skills, time, and energy that they bring tothe possibilities of involvement. Before dis-cussing these, however, we offer observa-tions on a life-context variable often in-cluded in studies of parental involvement:family socioeconomic status.

Family Socioeconomic Status

Family socioeconomic status (SES) hasoften been examined in relation to parentalinvolvement. Although significant differ-ences in involvement practices among SESgroups have been reported (e.g., Griffith,1998; Grolnick et al., 1997; Lareau, 1987;Sheldon, 2002), other findings suggest thatSES is not routinely related to involvement(e.g., Grolnick et al., 1997; Simon, 2004).


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Even in studies reporting variations acrossSES groups, SES does not generally explainwhy parents become involved, nor does itexplain why parents in similar or identicalSES categories often vary substantially ininvolvement practices or effectiveness (e.g.,Clark, 1983; Delgado-Gaitan, 1992; Griffith,1998; Scott-Jones, 1987, 1995; Shaver &Walls, 1998; Xu & Corno, 2003).

We have suggested for some time(Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1995, 1997)that differences in involvement patterns of-ten associated with SES are more produc-tively examined in relation to variation inresources that often accompanies SES (e.g.,Desimone, 1999; Horvat, Weininger, & Lar-eau, 2003; Lareau, 1989). The advantage offocusing on resources is that teachers,schools, and families—each of whom canseldom hope to influence the broad statuscharacteristic of SES over the course of aschool year or longer—can take steps to ac-commodate variations in many associatedresources. Specifically, they can target andcreate involvement opportunities that areresponsive to differences in parental knowl-edge, skills, time, and energy.

The power of such an approach is un-derscored by brief consideration of re-sources often associated with SES; for ex-ample, a parent’s time and energy forinvolvement are influenced by the fact thatlower-SES parents’ work often involves in-flexible schedules and long or unpredict-able hours (Collignon, Men, & Tan, 2001;Garcia Coll et al., 2002; Griffith, 1998; Ma-chida, Taylor, & Kim, 2002; Weiss et al.,2003). Lower-SES parents’ school-relatedknowledge and skills are also often influ-enced by less schooling and lower access toextrafamilial or professional support sys-tems (Horvat et al., 2003). Time, energy,knowledge, and skills may be limited alsoby disparities in physical and mental healthoften associated with SES (e.g., greater sus-ceptibility to debilitating stress and depres-sion among lower-SES families: Grolnick etal., 1997, 2000; Kohl et al., 2002; Weiss et al.,2003). Finally, lower-SES families may find

access to involvement more difficult thando higher-SES families because schoolssometimes make assumptions that effec-tively make school-based resources for in-volvement less available to lower-SES fam-ilies. For example, tendencies to assumethat lower-SES families are not likely to beinvolved because they lack requisite ability,interest, skill, time, motivation, or knowl-edge (e.g., Collignon et al., 2001; Eccles &Harold, 1993; Gonzalez et al., 2001; Griffith,1998; Hoover-Dempsey, Walker, Jones, &Reed, 2002; Horvat et al., 2003; Moll et al.,1992; Pang & Watkins, 2000; Pena, 2000;Weiss et al., 2003) in effect deny parents ac-cess to the resources that schools are capa-ble of bringing to families’ involvement de-cisions (e.g., support for parents’ active roleconstruction, feedback offering support forpersonal sense of efficacy for helping thechild learn, focused and effective invita-tions to involvement, respect for and ac-commodation of variations in family re-sources).

We do not suggest that schools can re-spond effectively to all circumstances thatmay limit lower-SES families’ involvement.However, with many others (e.g., Comer,Haynes, Joyner, & Ben-Avie, 1996; Delgado-Gaitan, 2004; Epstein, 2001), we do suggestthat schools have considerable power to re-spond effectively to many of these circum-stances. We briefly review research on therole and function of parental knowledge,skill, time, and energy in parents’ involve-ment decisions below.

Parents’ Knowledge, Skills, Time, andEnergy

Parents’ perceptions of their personalskills appear to shape their thinking aboutthe kinds of involvement activities that maybe possible for them to undertake with areasonable likelihood of achieving success(Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1995). Hoover-Dempsey et al. (1995), for example, reportedthat elementary parents reflected on theirknowledge and skills when confronted withspecific demands of helping their children


with work. If they perceived their skills tobe adequate, they tended to be positiveabout engaging in the activity, a findingclearly consistent with parental tendenciesto value their children’s school success(Baumrind, 1991). If they believed theirskills were inadequate, parents tended toask others in the family to help, ask thechild to get more information at school, orseek additional help themselves (e.g., callthe teacher or knowledgeable family mem-ber or friend; see also Delgado-Gaitan,1992). It is in the latter area especially thatparents with fewer family resources mayexperience difficulty, because less knowl-edgeable support systems may offer fewersuggestions for addressing any given in-volvement issue.

In general, parents’ self-perceived skillsand knowledge appear to figure heavily inparents’ decisions about some kinds of in-volvement as their children progress from el-ementary through middle and high school.Parents’ help with homework particularlyseems to decline as children’s subject mattermoves closer to or supersedes parents’knowledge (e.g., Adams & Christenson,2000; Chen & Stevenson, 1989; Dauber & Ep-stein, 1993; Drummond & Stipek, 2004; Gar-cia Coll et al., 2002; Grolnick et al., 2000;Levin et al., 1997). The frequently observeddecline in parental involvement across thegrades is linked in part to parents’ percep-tions that their own knowledge base is notsufficient as their children move into morecomplex schoolwork; it is also related attimes to feedback that their methods of help-ing do not meet child or school expectations(e.g., Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995; Kay, Fitz-gerald, Paradee, & Mellencamp, 1994). Manyparents’ lower involvement in the highergrades is linked to issues other than personalknowledge and skills, however (e.g., par-ents’ sensitivity to developmental changes inchildren’s needs for autonomy [Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995; Kay et al., 1994; Simon,2004]; changes in school structure [biggerschools, fewer invitations to involvement:Eccles et al., 1993; Izzo et al., 1999]).

Parents’ perceptions of demands ontheir time and energy, too, particularly asrelated to work and other family responsi-bilities, are often related to their thinkingabout involvement in their children’s edu-cation (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995;Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1995; Lareau,1989). Parents whose employment involvesrelatively inflexible scheduling, parentswho work at more than one job, and parentswhose work is characterized by instabilityor heavy time demands tend to be less in-volved, especially at school, than parentswith more flexible jobs and more reasonablework hours (e.g., Garcia Coll et al., 2002;Griffith, 1998; Machida et al., 2002; Pena,2000; Weiss et al., 2003). Parents with mul-tiple child-care, elder-care, or related familyresponsibilities may also be less involved,again perhaps most notably at school. Ofparticular importance is the finding thatparents often seek opportunities for involve-ment that fit within the demands they rou-tinely experience (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey &Sandler, 1995; Trevino, 2004; Weeden, 2001)and are consistent with their beliefs aboutthe importance of involvement in their chil-dren’s education (role construction) and per-ceptions of their own efficacy for helping thechild learn.

Thus, the time, energy, skills, and knowl-edge that parents bring to the possibilities ofinvolvement influence their choices and ac-tivities related to their children’s education.These life-context variables may influenceparents’ personal motivators of involve-ment (role construction and efficacy); theymay also function more directly as re-sources that limit or enhance the range ofinvolvement options that parents believethey may choose.

These life-context resources are often setwithin another element of parents’ and stu-dents’ lives: family culture. Although pat-terns of resources may characterize variedcultural groups in the United States, familyculture per se is a construct warranting con-siderable attention as schools and familiesseek the benefits that effective parental in-


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volvement holds for students and teachers.In the section below, we consider some ofthe implications of family culture for un-derstanding parental involvement.

Family Culture

With several others (e.g., Delgado-Gaitan, 2004; Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001;Garcia Coll et al., 2000; Lawson, 2003; Oka-gaki, 2001), we are deeply convinced thatschools must respect and respond to familyculture and family circumstances in orderto access the full power of parental supportfor student learning. Specifically, we sug-gest that schools must frame their efforts tosupport parents’ personal motivations forinvolvement, their actions to invite involve-ment, and their responses to families’ life-context issues within a broad understand-ing of family culture. This is perhapsparticularly important in seeking the en-hanced school outcomes often associatedwith parental involvement among familieswho are first- or second-generation immi-grants or families who are marginalizedwith reference to mainstream U.S. society.Families in these circumstances often expe-rience the resource limitations associatedwith lower SES (e.g., limited parental edu-cation, multiple jobs and family responsi-bilities: Collignon et al., 2001; Garcia Coll etal., 2002; Griffith, 1998), as well as difficul-ties associated with language barriers, lim-ited understanding of school expectationsand policies, clashes between family valuesor priorities and mainstream U.S. values,varied but sometimes debilitating percep-tions of school-initiated barriers to involve-ment, and perceptions of very limitedpower to change ineffective school practices(e.g., Chrispeels & Rivero, 2001; Collignonet al., 2001; Garcia Coll et al., 2002; Gonzalez& Chrispeels, 2004; Griffith, 1998; Lawson,2003; Lopez, 2001; Okagaki & Frensch, 1998;Pena, 2000; Reese, Balzano, Gallimore, &Goldenberg, 1995).

We argue that many parents, acrosscultural backgrounds and family circum-stances, can be and are effectively involved

in supporting students’ school learning.Many seen by schools as uninvolved are infact involved, but in ways that schools donot notice or recognize (e.g., Lawson, 2003;Lopez, Scribner, & Mahitivanichcha, 2001;Pena, 2000; Trevino, 2004). Steps that inviteadditional and more effective, collaborativeinvolvement may include many practices be-yond those many schools currently under-take (e.g., as noted earlier, use of families’“everyday concepts” or “homemade home-work” as context for student learning [Ep-stein & Van Voorhis, 2001, p. 190; Gonzalezet al., 2001, p. 128]; provision for home vis-iting by teachers and child care for otherchildren during school events; use of [com-pensated] evening and weekend time forparent-teacher conferences). However, theirimplementation appears critical to the sup-port of all parents’ effective involvement inchildren’s education, teachers’ ability to ac-cess the resources that families offer theirchildren’s school success, and students’ abil-ity to learn most effectively.

Suggestions for School and TeacherPractice

In this section we offer suggestions forschool and teacher practices grounded inthe constructs and literature we have re-viewed. The strategies are divided into twomajor categories. The first focuses on strat-egies to enhance school capacities for invit-ing parental involvement; these includesteps schools may take to increase schoolinvitations, teacher invitations, and respon-siveness to family life-context issues. Thesecond includes strategies schools may en-act to enhance parents’ capacities to be ef-fectively involved. We offer a table sum-marizing a full range of strategies in eachsection and briefly discuss a small sampleof the suggestions with reference to sup-porting literature.

Increasing Schools’ Capacities forInviting Parental Involvement

Strategies to increase schools’ capacitiesfor involving parents emphasize creating


school conditions that enable dynamic, in-teractive school outreach and responsive-ness to families and community. We offerseveral such strategies derived from the lit-erature reviewed above in Table 1 and dis-cuss two in more detail below: principalleadership in creating a positive school cli-mate, and empowering teachers for in-volvement.

Principal leadership in creating a wel-coming school climate. The creation of aninviting climate for parental involvement isgrounded in strong principal leadership.Griffith’s (2001) findings, for example, em-phasized that school administrators set thetone for parental involvement and programimplementation; others have underscoredthe principal’s role in empowering teachersand parents for effective involvement (Soo-dak et al., 2002). The literature suggestsoverall that the more committed, visible,and active principals are in supporting par-ent-teacher relationships, the more likelyschools are to develop strong programs ofparent and community involvement.

One major goal and an outcome of awelcoming school climate is the creation oftrust among members of the school com-munity. Parents’ trust in teachers influencestheir responses to involvement invitations,and parental perceptions that schools aresafe, empowering, and trustworthy havebeen consistently associated with greaterparental involvement (e.g., Adams &Christenson, 1998; Griffith, 1998; Lareau &Horvat, 1999; Lawson, 2003). School prac-tices that support parents’ trust in schoolsinclude establishing and maintaining re-spectful and collaborative attitudes towardfamilies (e.g., Griffith, 1998; Lareau, 1989;Lawson, 2003) and frequent opportunitiesfor two-way communications between par-ents and teachers (e.g., Adams & Christen-son, 1998; Bandura, 1997; Sanders & Har-vey, 2002; Scribner et al., 1999). Theprincipal’s role in creating school-familytrust in relation to a welcoming school cli-mate is especially important because sus-tainable improvements in school, family,

and community relationships require con-tinuous, active, and well-informed leader-ship that emphasizes meeting parent,teacher, and student needs over time (Grif-fith, 2001; Haynes et al., 1998).

Empowering teachers for parental in-volvement. Just as a principal’s leadershipis a key contributor to schools’ involvementpractices, so too are school actions that em-power teachers for effective involvement.Many teachers hold generally positive atti-tudes about involving families in students’education (e.g., Lawson, 2003), but few re-ceive training in how to develop collabo-rative, family-responsive involvement prac-tices (Graue & Brown, 2003; Morris &Taylor, 1998). School in-service support forteachers’ development of parental involve-ment skills thus is an important strategy forenhancing the incidence and effectivenessof involvement.

One key contributor to effective teacherinvitations is teachers’ sense of efficacy forinvolving parents (Garcia, 2004; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1992; Pang & Watkins, 2000),which can be enhanced by dynamic, school-based in-service programs. Particularly ef-fective are in-service programs offering ex-periences related to involvement practices,including open discussion of positive andnegative experiences with involvement,sharing suggestions for improved parentalinvolvement, collaboration with colleaguesin developing and implementing school-spe-cific involvement plans, and ongoing groupevaluation and improvement of involve-ment practices (Hoover-Dempsey et al.,2001).

Schools may also empower teachers forinvolvement by making parental involve-ment a routine part of staff thinking andplanning. Regular school attention to in-volvement is enhanced by a welcomingschool climate (e.g., Sanders & Epstein,2000), in large part because an invitingschool climate increases parental presencein the school, which in turn generates moreopportunities for parent-teacher conversa-tion. Attention to involvement may also be

Table 1. Strategies to Increase Schools’ Capacities for Inviting Parental Involvement

Create an inviting, welcoming school climate• Create visual displays in school entry areas and hallways reflective of all families in the school (photos,

artifacts, pictures, history); focus on creating a strong sense that “this is our school; we belong here.”• Attend to the critical role of central factors in the creation of positive school climate: principal leadership;

long-term commitment to improving and maintaining positive school climate; creation of trust throughmutually respectful, responsive, and communicative teacher-parent relationships

• Develop strong, positive office-staff skills with a consumer orientation; create habitual attitudes of respecttoward parents, students, and visitors

• Create multiple comfortable spaces for parents in the school, supportive of parent-teacher conversationsand parent networking

• Hire parents or seek parent volunteers who can provide other parents with information on how the schoolworks, translations as needed, advocacy as needed, a friendly presence

Empower teachers for parental involvement; create dynamic, systematic, and consistent school attention toimproving family-school relationships:

• Develop routine school practices focused on discussion and development of positive, trusting parent-school relationships; make family-school relationships and interactions a part of the school’s daily life andculture, e.g.:• Systematically seek parent ideas, perspectives, opinions, questions about school and family roles in stu-

dent learning• Allocate regular faculty meeting time to discuss parental involvement, involvement practices that have

been successful in the school, information from other sources on new ideas• Develop and maintain an active school file of teacher and parent ideas on what is helpful and effective

in inviting parental involvement; raise public awareness of family-school relations in the school; allowdevelopment of a school-specific resource bank to support teacher skills and capacities for improvedparent-teacher relations

• Develop dynamic in-service programs that support teacher efficacy for involving parents and school ca-pacities for effective partnership with families; programs should:• Offer teachers opportunities to collaborate with and learn from colleagues and parents• Create opportunities for practice and revision of strategies suggested• Enable school development of involvement plans responsive to teacher, family, and community needs

Learn about parents’ goals, perspectives on child’s learning, family circumstances, culture:• Offer suggestions for support of child’s learning consistent with parents’ circumstances• Focus on developing two-way family-school communication (asking questions, listening well to re-

sponses)• Seek parents’ perspectives on the child and child’s learning; seek parent suggestions and follow through

on them• Adapt current involvement approaches as needed to enhance the fit between invitations and family cir-

cumstances; craft new strategies to enhance opportunities for communicationJoin with existing parent-teacher-family structures to enhance involvement:

• Use after-school programs to increase family-school communication: include after-school staff in in-housecommunications, faculty meetings, professional development opportunities

• Use current parent groups (e.g., PTA/PTO) to invite all families’ participation; work with parent leadersto ensure open access; encourage varied activities of interest to diverse family groups within the school

• In middle and high schools, create advisory structures that allow parents to check in with one adviser forgeneral information on child progress, program planning, etc.

• Seek district and community support for creation of new structures to support family-school interactionsand communication (e.g., parent resource room, telephone and e-mail access in classrooms, staff positiondedicated to parent-school relationships, school-based family center)

Offer full range of involvement opportunities, including standard approaches (e.g., parent-teacher confer-ences, student performances) and new opportunities unique to school and community (e.g., first-day-of-school celebrations, parent workshops, social/networking events):

• Offer specific invitations to specific events and volunteer opportunities at school; schedule activities attimes that meet the needs of families with inflexible work schedules

• Advertise involvement opportunities clearly, attractively, repeatedly, using methods targeted to interestsand needs of school families

Invite teachers, parents, principal, and staff to student-centered events at school:• Increase opportunities for informal parent-teacher-staff communications and interactions• Use these events to seek parent comments and suggestions for involvement• Use the events as venues for distributing brief, attractively formatted information in appropriate lan-

guages on issues in parental involvement (e.g., developmentally appropriate, easy-to-implement sugges-tions for supporting student learning; information on effects of parental involvement; information onschool policies and upcoming events)


enhanced by regular discussion of identi-fied issues, resources, plans, and ideas thatwork during faculty and department meet-ings.

Enhancing Parents’ Capacities to beInvolved Effectively

Strategies to enhance parents’ capacitiesfor being involved focus on explicit schoolsupport for parents’ active role construc-tion, positive sense of efficacy, and positiveperceptions of school and teacher invita-tions to involvement. In general, schoolstrategies intended to enhance parents’ ca-pacities for involvement are most effectivewhen built on a strong foundation of schooland teacher capacity for involvement, asnoted above. A sample of the strategiessummarized in Table 2 is discussed below.

Communicate that all parents have arole in children’s school success. When par-ents know, as a function of their own ex-periences and their interactions with theschool, that their involvement is expectedand valued, they are more motivated to as-sume an active role in helping their childrensucceed in school (e.g., Hoover-Dempsey &Sandler, 1997; Lawson, 2003; Sanders & Ep-stein, 2000). This motivation should bepaired with ready access to appropriate andspecific invitations to parents.

Schools and teachers convey the value ofparents’ active support of child learningwhen they invite involvement, support skillsthat enable effective involvement, and re-spect life-context variables that may influ-ence parents’ abilities to be involved. Well-developed invitations targeted to all parentsmust include a full range of involvementsuggestions (including suggestions for par-ents whose own education and skills maylead them to conclude that their influence isminimal, especially as their children moveinto higher grades). School invitations thatoffer empowering information (e.g., “Hereare specific things you can do”) are particu-larly critical in supporting more active roleconstruction (e.g., Chrispeels & Rivero, 2001;Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001; Gonzalez &

Chrispeels, 2004; Hoover-Dempsey & San-dler, 1997; Simon, 2004); they also support apositive sense of efficacy about the value ofone’s involvement for children’s school suc-cess (Bandura, 1997; Shumow & Lomax,2002). Schools should use multiple ap-proaches to offering invitations (e.g., writteninvitations in appropriate languages senthome with students; information abouthome- and school-based involvement op-portunities distributed at orientation ses-sions, mailed home, or perhaps advertised inlocal media; follow-up invitations and re-quests by phone, e-mail, or home visits:Hoover-Dempsey & Walker, 2002).

Offer specific suggestions about whatparents can do. Specific suggestions fromteachers, support program personnel, andparent leaders about how to help and whatto do when helping also offer considerablesupport for parents’ active role constructionand positive sense of efficacy (Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995; Gonzalez & Chris-peels, 2004; Patrikakou & Weissberg, 2000).Suggestions may include relatively simpleideas for parent activities that help studentsfocus attention during homework (e.g.,Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2001) or use of ap-proaches to homework that elicit parent-student interaction (e.g., TIPS: Epstein &Van Voorhis, 2001). Suggestions may high-light more complex efforts to support stu-dent understanding of homework concepts(Pratt et al., 1992) or suggestions to helpparents balance direct involvement withsupport for developmentally appropriatestudent autonomy (Ng et al., 2004).

Invitations and suggestions grounded inclear respect for parents’ life contexts arealso important (Griffith, 1998; Okagaki,2001). These may include plans for identi-fying family strengths, preferences, and re-sources (e.g., Christenson, 2004; Collingnonet al., 2001; Machida et al., 2002; Scribner etal., 1999), offering all information to parentsin appropriate languages, or adapting as-signments (e.g., Garcia Coll et al., 2002;Okagaki, 2001; Pena, 2000). If families havelimited understanding of the educational

Table 2. Strategies to Enhance Parents’ Capacities for Effective Involvement

Communicate clearly that all parents have an important role to play in children’s school success:• Create explicit, positive school assumptions about the importance of parents’ contributions to student suc-

cess• Emphasize that all parents, regardless of education level, can support students’ school success• Note that even when student learning tasks surpass parents’ knowledge, parents’ interest in child’s

schooling, encouragement, reinforcement for learning, and modeling continue to support student learningand school success

• In all communications (including those below), offer information in multiple formats (e.g., written infor-mation that is clear, succinct, in appropriate languages; meetings at school or in community centers; byphone); give clear ideas about where to get more or repeated information

Give parents specific information about what they can do to be involved:• Offer information about what parents do when they are involved, emphasizing the wide range of activi-

ties different families employ (e.g., talking about the value of education, discussing the school day, com-municating with teachers, coming to school, offering positive reinforcement for learning effort and accom-plishment, attending child’s school events, creating home practices that support students’ schoolwork)

• Listen to parents’ ideas about involvement and offer encouragement for those likely to be helpful with theparticular child or developmental/grade level

• Give parents suggestions for helping their children targeted to current assignments and learning goals• Offer time-limited suggestions and learning assignments that require or encourage parent-student interac-

tion; where possible, target suggestions to parents’ knowledge, skills, time, and energy• Draw on published programs of interactive homework (e.g., TIPS: Epstein et al., 1995) in making home-

work assignments• Draw on families’ “funds of knowledge” (e.g., Moll et al., 1992) in creating home learning tasks; create

assignments for “homemade homework” that focus on family routines and tasks (Epstein & Van Voorhis,2001)

• Seek support for parent workshops that offer training and practice in how to help children learnGive parents specific information about the general effects of involvement on student learning:

• Offer information about the behavioral effects of parental involvement (e.g., students spend more time onschool tasks, are more attentive in class, pay increased attention to homework and related assignments, dobetter in school)

• Offer information about the attitudinal effects of parental involvement (e.g., students have more positiveattitudes about learning, have a stronger sense of personal ability to learn, are more likely to believe thatlearning outcomes are related to their effort and work)

• Ask parents for feedback on their perceptions of their involvement activities’ influence on their child (e.g.,influence on child’s behavior, attitudes, learning content, or processes in assignments)

Give parents specific information on how their involvement activities influence learning:• Encouragement supports student motivation for schoolwork• Communication about the value and importance of education models parents’ commitment to schooling• Positive reinforcement gives information about expected learning behaviors and outcomes• Creating home practices that support student homework encourages more focused attention to learning

tasksGive parents specific information about curriculum and learning goals:

• Offer information (by grade or course level) on learning goals for a specific period; this enables parents toknow what is expected of their children and offers a context for understanding links between learningtasks and learning goals

• Allow time for parent-teacher interactions that clarify learning goals (by phone, in meetings, in confer-ences); hear parents’ concerns, ideas, and goals for children

Offer parents positive feedback on the effects of their involvement:• Focus on individual parent activities and steps in student progress• Create multiple opportunities for success (begin with small steps, offer clear notes and comments of

thanks for parental help; express clearly that parents’ activities are making a difference for the student)Create and support parent and parent-teacher networks in the school:

• Seek and share information on school, grade-level learning goals• Share ideas about parent involvement activities that have worked• Interact in ways that support the development of trust among parents and school staff


system (e.g., the meaning of grades, policiesregarding retention, preparing for college),related information in appropriate formatscan be helpful (e.g., Chrispeels & Rivero,2001; Okagaki, 2001; Sanders & Epstein,2000). Schools may also increase the effec-tiveness of invitations by offering work-shops designed to increase parents’ under-standing of learning goals across curriculumareas (e.g., Gonzalez & Chrispeels, 2004;Shaver & Walls, 1998; Starkey & Klein, 2000).

Future Research

Consideration of the literature above sug-gests several next steps for continued re-search. We offer a sample of suggestionsbelow, focused primarily on increased un-derstanding of constructs that influenceparents’ decisions about involvement.

Understanding of role construction andits function in motivating parental involve-ment would benefit from more longitudinalinvestigation of its development across aschool year or sequential years. Most workon role construction to date has been cross-sectional. This approach has yielded usefulinformation on links between role construc-tion and involvement practices but has notoffered empirically grounded informationon its development over time. Theoretically,role construction develops as a function ofparents’ experiences related to their ownschooling, observations of other parents’ in-volvement, and experiences and interac-tions with school personnel related to theirchildren’s schooling. Focused examinationof parents’ role construction across variedschool populations as related to school in-vitations, teacher invitations, and parentparticipation in programs designed tostrengthen role construction (e.g., Chris-peels & Rivero, 2001) would offer valuableinformation about conditions under whichrole construction may be actively supportedby school, parent, and community action.Examining naturally occurring changes inrole construction using longitudinal or co-hort sequential designs would offer addi-tional information on how these changes

are related to developmental changes inchildren and structural changes in schoolorganization.

There is sound theoretical and empiricalsupport for the function of efficacy as a mo-tivator of behavior in many domains of life;there is also strong evidence that efficacy inany given domain is influenced by masteryexperiences, vicarious experiences, verbalpersuasion, and physiological or affectivearousal pertinent to the domain (Bandura,1997). Consistent with this information,parents’ sense of efficacy for helping chil-dren succeed in school has been related tovariations in involvement, and its strengthhas been related to variations in relevantmastery, vicarious, and persuasion experi-ences (e.g., Grolnick et al., 1997; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1992; Sheldon, 2002; Shu-mow & Lomax, 2002). Understanding ofefficacy as a motivator of parental involve-ment would be enhanced by attention to theeffects of parents’ experiences with the foursources of efficacy (e.g., Is verbal persuasionalone likely to increase efficacy for helpingchildren succeed in school? Is direct mas-tery experience necessary for increases inparent efficacy? If so, what kinds of expe-riences are most effective?). Also usefulwould be examination of the consequencesof well-designed experimental manipula-tions of the four sources of efficacy. Resultsshould offer schools and parents guidanceon how parents’ efficacy for helping chil-dren succeed might best be supportedacross the school years and varied schoolcommunities.

Several investigators have reported thatschool and teacher invitations are closely re-lated to parents’ decisions about involve-ment (e.g., Closson et al., 2004; Dauber &Epstein, 1993; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995;Kohl et al., 2002; Simon, 2004). However,questions about schools’ and teachers’framing of invitations and questions aboutparents’ perceptions of invitations and re-sponse options would benefit from moresystematic analysis of parent and teacherperspectives on invitations to involvement.


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For example, Lareau and Horvat (1999) re-ported that parents and teachers often holddifferent perceptions of invitations (e.g., theteachers they studied believed their invita-tions were effective in engaging parent sup-port of student achievement, but parents re-ported that the invitations simply soughtparent approval of teacher judgments).Continued research should seek teacherand parent evaluations of varied aspects ofinvitations with an eye toward increasingtheir effectiveness in supporting studentlearning (e.g., for teachers, How effectiveare your invitations in eliciting specific par-ent support for student learning? for par-ents, Are the invited activities feasible?). Ex-amination of the effects of invitations onparental role construction and efficacy mayalso offer valuable information. Grolnick etal. (1997) suggested, for example, thatteacher invitations have their strongest ef-fects when parents hold a more active roleconstruction and stronger efficacy. Assum-ing that the finding is replicable, researchassessing the attributes of invitations mosteffective for parents with varying levels ofrole construction or efficacy would offer im-portant guidelines for refining and target-ing invitations.

Looking more broadly at implicationsof the research reviewed for enhancing pa-rental involvement, three further sugges-tions emerge. First, much of the research onparental involvement has examined fre-quency and types of involvement behav-iors. Although these are important initialindicators of involvement, they do not al-low answers to more theoretically andpragmatically interesting questions aboutquality of involvement and student-parentinteraction during or related to involve-ment. These would be well addressed bycloser examination of elements of parentalinvolvement and attention not only towhat parents are doing but how they aredoing it across a range of involvement ac-tivities (e.g., What qualities of parent andchild affect are associated with a parent’sinvolvement activities? [for examples, see

Pomerantz & Eaton, 2004; Scott-Jones,1987]).

Second, much research on parental in-volvement to date has relied on single-source reports of involvement activities,most often the parent (see Grolnick et al.,2000). Parent reports are clearly warrantedbecause the person whose behavior is thefocus of interest is often in the best positionto know what he or she is doing; similarly,student reports are warranted because stu-dent perceptions of the involvement actionsoften shape students’ responses to involve-ment (e.g., Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994;Steinberg et al., 1989). The use of multiplesources and measures would allow trian-gulation of essential perspectives on in-volvement (e.g., parent self-reports, studentreports, observer reports) and would allowmore precise determination of its influenceon student outcomes. Similarly, the consis-tent use of multiple reporters across vari-ables included in studies (e.g., parents andstudents as reporters of involvement; par-ents, students, and teachers as reporters ofoutcomes of interest) would help avoid dif-ficulties associated with interpretation ofdata when only a single source is used.

Third, a major reason for studying whyparents become involved is to obtain a moreaccurate and useful understanding of whatparents do, having chosen to be involved,and how what they do influences studentoutcomes (e.g., Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994;Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2001). Thus, the re-search base on parental involvement wouldbe enhanced considerably by closer andmore detailed analyses of the mechanismsthrough which parents’ involvement influ-ences student outcomes. For example, ratherthan resting in the finding that involvementis related to varied student outcomes, re-searchers could design studies that examinehow parents’ involvement activities create acontext for learning that has a discernableinfluence on student attitudes about self andlearning, student learning behaviors, or stu-dent learning products. Such studies shouldallow examination of what goes on between


parent and child during involvement andclose study of critical developmental andeducational outcomes believed to be asso-ciated with involvement (e.g., student at-tributes that support learning such as self-regulation skills and academic self-efficacy,and student educational outcomes such asgrades and achievement test scores).

Finally, we note that strategies for in-creasing involvement summarized in Tables1 and 2 also offer broad hypotheses thatmay be defined in more specific terms andtested in research. Thus, implementation ofany suggestion included there may be tar-geted to one or more major motivators ofparental involvement and the effect of theintervention (i.e., enactment of the strategywithin a given school or set of schools) onthe identified motivator assessed. Such re-search would require:

• selection and operationalization of oneor more strategies (e.g., “developstrong, positive office-staff skills witha consumer orientation; create habit-ual attitudes of respect toward par-ents, students, and visitors” [Table 1]);

• identification of involvement motiva-tors to be targeted by the strategy (e.g.,parent perceptions of school climate,parent reports of general school invi-tations to involvement);

• development of a plan or interventionto implement the strategy (e.g., train-ing and practice in relevant proce-dures for office staff);

• implementation of the strategy inschool(s), with ongoing documenta-tion of implementation;

• assessment of target and corollaryvariables among participants (e.g.,participating staff members’ attitudesand behaviors toward parents, stu-dents, and visitors) and intended ben-eficiaries of the strategy (e.g., parent,student, and visitor perceptions ofschool climate; parent reports of gen-eral school invitations to involvement;parent reports of role construction;parent and teacher reports of parents’school-based involvement).

Although the list is basic and suggestiveonly, it describes a process that might be ap-

plied to any of several efforts to increase theincidence and effectiveness of parental in-volvement through systematic implemen-tation of theoretically and empiricallygrounded interventions.

Conclusion

Overall, the literature reviewed suggeststhat parents’ decisions about becoming in-volved in their children’s education are in-fluenced by role construction for involve-ment, sense of efficacy for helping the childsucceed in school, perception of invitationsto involvement (from school, teacher, andstudent), and life-context variables (skillsand knowledge, time and energy); in addi-tion, the research suggests that involvementis influenced by school responsiveness tolife-context variables.

One of the most important findings inthis literature is that parents’ decisionsabout involvement are influenced byschools. Specifically, the research suggeststhat schools may take steps to enhance par-ents’ active role construction and sense ofefficacy for helping children learn; enactpractices that support school, teacher, andstudent invitations to involvement; andadapt involvement requests and sugges-tions to the circumstances of parents’ lifecontexts. Because motivators of involve-ment are influenced by elements of the so-cial context, school actions (or inactions) in-fluence parents’ involvement whether ornot schools intend to influence involvement(i.e., just as school action may enhance par-ents’ involvement motivation, school inac-tion or negative action may diminish moti-vation for many parents).

Across the findings and suggestionshere are themes of empowerment for allparticipants in children’s schooling and allconcerned with respecting and enhancingparents’ contributions to children’s schoolsuccess. With particular reference to our fo-cus here on parents, there are thus strongsuggestions that school attention to parents’personal motivations for involvement, con-textual motivations for involvement, and


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family life-context variables pertinent to in-volvement can support personal motivationand positive influence on student outcomes.These broad empowerment goals for par-ents include learning that personal behavioris related to desired outcomes (e.g., mychild’s success is related to my behavior);personal action enables achievement of de-sired outcomes (e.g., my involvement helpsmy child succeed in school); personal deci-sions emerge from personal choice (e.g., Ican make the decision to be effectively in-volved); and personal effectiveness is con-nected to personal relationships (e.g., I canlearn about effective involvement from oth-ers; I can contribute to others’ knowledge ofeffective involvement).

In concluding, it is important to notethat we have taken a primarily psycholog-ical perspective in this review and in oursuggestions for practice and research. Wehave done so with great respect for otherdisciplinary perspectives (e.g., educational,sociological, anthropological) because wewant to learn more about what parents dowith their children that contributes to chil-dren’s learning and educational success.Consistent with this goal, we have focusedhere on personal and contextual constructsthat may explain why parents become in-volved; consistent with our full theoreticalmodel (Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler, 1995,2005), we are equally interested in and con-tinue to explore how parents’ involvementactivities influence student outcomes.

We note also that in pursuing these goalswe have focused on parents who are in-volved, in whatever degree, in their chil-dren’s education. Our broader interests, ofcourse, include all parents, because parentsare an integral, usually primary, part of thesocial context that influences their chil-dren’s educational outcomes. In fact, wesuggest that the model itself offers strongsupport for theory- and research-based in-terventions designed to test approaches toencouraging parents who have not been in-volved in their children’s education to be-come so. However, to learn more about our

interest in parents’ motivations for involve-ment and the mechanisms that might ex-plain their influence on students, we beganwith parents who were involved. This limitsthe generalizability of review findings, butour hope is that identification of principlesand mechanisms characterizing the moti-vations of currently involved parents willenable enhancement of all parents’ moti-vations for involvement.

Overall, when schools take steps to mo-tivate parental involvement, they supportparents’ effectiveness in helping their chil-dren learn. Similarly, when school systemsattempt to promote teacher and principalcontributions to effective parental involve-ment, they support schools’ effectiveness ineducating children. The public mandate forthe effective education of all citizens wouldseem to require nothing less than strongschool and community efforts to enable themany contributions that parents can maketo their children’s educational success.

Notes

We gratefully acknowledge support for thiswork from the Institute for Education Sciences(formerly Office of Educational Research and In-novation), U.S. Department of Education (ParentalInvolvement: A Path to Enhanced Achievement, 2001–2004, no. RR305T010673-02). Many thanks also toJames Dallaire and Kate Raser of the PeabodyFamily-School Partnership Lab at Vanderbilt Uni-versity. We may be contacted at Department ofPsychology and Human Development, PeabodyCollege Box 512, 230 Appleton Place, VanderbiltUniversity, Nashville, TN 37203; e-mail: [email protected].

1. In this review, we focus on constructs mo-tivating parental involvement that are includedin the model. As Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler(1997) noted, a number of other factors related tothese constructs may also motivate parents’ in-volvement (e.g., child-rearing beliefs, attribu-tions about the causes of school success, theoriesof intelligence). Research in still other arenas hassuggested the importance of other variables toparents’ involvement motivation and effective-ness, for example, parents’ educational aspira-tions and expectations for their children (e.g., En-twisle & Alexander, 1990; Jeynes, 2003; McCaslin


& Murdock, 1991; Seginer, 1983), parents’ mentalhealth (e.g., Kohl et al., 2002), and the presenceof stressful events and social support in parents’lives (e.g., Gronick et al., 1997; Izzo, Weiss, Shan-ahan, & Rodriguez-Brown, 2000). We acknowl-edge and appreciate that such variables likelycontribute to parents’ involvement decisions andeffectiveness but have chosen to this point in ourwork to focus on constructs that (a) offer amongthe theoretically strongest examples of psycho-logical, contextual, and life context contributorsto parental involvement and (b) are reasonablysubject to influence by parent, teacher, school,and community action.

2. The model would suggest, for example,that such parents likely hold very active role con-struction, and strong efficacy for helping thechild succeed in school, and are characterized bylife context variables that allow and propelstrong involvement. Although the model alsosuggests that perceptions of invitations from theteacher, child, and school are often central tomany parents’ decisions about involvement, par-ents who tend to be heavily involved may feelundaunted by low levels of contextual invita-tions from teacher, school, or child.

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Why Do Parents Abstract Become Involved? Research Findings ... Research... · Howard M. Sandler Darlene Whetsel Christa L. Green Andrew S. Wilkins Kristen Closson Vanderbilt University

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