It's the idea that basically your entire life is decided on how you do on your school exams. Universities here are much harder to get into compared to the West and will such a massive amount of people the job market is over-the-top crazy on your placement. So with this, the Chinese don't have actual social lives growing up (this is why so many university graduates seem to have the maturity level of middle school children). It is spend all your free time studying or you'll wish you had as you go to work as the poop collector.

I don't believe that strictness is the right word. Chinese children accept that, that is what life is about. The same way we did when we were children.

I think Chinese parents in the west are much harder on their kids than Chinese parents here in China...

If my mother had ever seen me acting like children routinely act here, she'd have beat me into the ground and rightfully so.

I come from a Chinese parent. I don't think my parent was strict. What they hope is that their 3 children don't do drugs and lazy. We all end up with a computer engineer /web design position.

There are different types of parents all over...

Know from the family...
A four years old child has to learn Chinese, math and English...

My sister-in-law does nothing, my nephew just plays around all the time, don't even care about learning any thing, cannot count from 1 to 50 yet, he is five...

I also feel gender plays a role, girls get pushed more than the boys I've noticed.

Chinese parents ......strict with their children? Is this a joke?

I've never seen parents who spoil their children more than Chinese parents and grand-parents do, thus the name of "Little emperor" to qualify Chinese children.

In terms of parents-children related education....parents almost never teach any good behavior to their children (except the "momo shou"), they never teach them how to put things in a trash, hardly teach children not to step on frogs or other animals, they just feed them with any kind of food like we feed a goose for Christmas.....I walk every day with my child in the park and I can tell you how amazing it is to see a Chinese child with either his/her parents, grand-parents or ayi.

In terms of child-school related education....parents there are actually very strict. They put a lot pressure on their children (so does the school and the teachers in order to get their promotion and pocket money-hong bao). They almost never allow the children to go to play or practice a sport (except to show off that they have money, then the child can practice one hour of tennis or golf). They often ask their children to follow some evening class or week-end class.

To sum up, Chinese children grow up thinking the world is theirs and they can do whatever they want, they keep having this attitude all through their life, and at the same time they remain trap in a system that tells them that they are free providing that they obey the governement, the communist party and the parents and that if they fail, it's not because of the system, it's because of themselves.