A novel boron nitride (BN) supported Pt catalyst showed a special catalytic behavior in the selective hydrogenation of alpha-, beta-unsaturated aldehyde compared with a traditional Pt/gamma-Al2O3 catalyst. The hydrogenation of crotonaldehyde was carried out using a mixture of H-2/crotonaldehyde molar ratio 59 at temperature range from 30 to 300 degrees C. Pt/BN gave near 100% selectivity of butyraldehyde in the temperature range of 30-100 degrees C while Pt/gamma-Al2O3 showed a favorable selectivity of crotyl alcohol. Butyraldehyde was the main product on Pt/BN because the C=C bond of crotonaldehyde was preferentially hydrogenated at low temperature due to the support effect. BN possess graphite-like structure as an inert support and may repel C=O end of crotonaldehyde during hydrogenation. The products distribution transited from kinetic to thermodynamic control with increasing temperature, and finally the hydrogenation became thermodynamically dominant at 250-300 degrees C.