After discussing the mediating effect of cultural tradition on perceived objective reality and the need for a model that constructs paths from cultural factors to social behavior, this document describes a path model developed as a result of an investigation of two human resource development policy paradigms that were enforced alternately between 1949 and 1979 in the Peoples Republic of China. The role of the Confucian educational tradition is explored as the persistent independent factor that acted as an incentive for participation in education during the years of the study. Next, study findings regarding changes in educational participation during literacy campaigns and in the literacy rate of the school-age population over 30-year period are analyzed. The moderate policy direction, identified as similar to the Confucian educational ideology, is shown to have resulted in higher literacy attainment than that attained under the radical policy that is seen as contradictive to the Confucian educational tradition. Last, the importance of further path models that would show the relationship between cultural tradition and social demand for education is discussed. (CLA)