Parenting Styles and Child Development

Parenting Styles and Child Development

Jason N. White

What are we supposed to do? All of us spend our young lives educating ourselves in reading, writing, and arithmetic. As well, many of us spend our young adulthood in college learning to become doctors and lawyers. Yet, the most long lasting, and in many ways, most rewarding job some will ever have is raising strong, intelligent, and well-mannered children. As always, this is easier said than done.

Generally, a parent wants their kids to be better than they were. As parents, we try hard not to make the mistakes our parents made. Before they are even born we have dreams of what they will do and who they will become. Couple with those dreams, parents have to make life-changing decisions before birth such as working or staying home, public school or home school, and permissive versus strict parenting. Of all the decisions made, the last will have the most critical impact on a child. Our attitudes toward raising children, the overall pattern of interactions, are what shape a child's behavior in their early years.

In 1967, a researcher of Human Development, Diana Baumrind, developed a theory that provided a broad insight into parenting style by categorizing it in three ways. However, according to Nancy Darling, PhD, MS, there are two points to consider when understanding Baumrind's theory. One, parenting style is meant only to describe normal variations in parenting. Variations such as neglect or abuse are not considered within Baumrind's theory. Two, the theory of parenting style revolves around issues of control. There are many variations between parents on how, and to what extent, they exert control over their children; however, "it is assumed that the primary role of all parents is to influence, teach, and control their children."(Darling, 1999) Variations will be discussed in more depth later.

There are also two important elements to parenting styles. Baumrind terms these parental responsiveness and parental demandingness. Parental responsiveness is focused on parental support and warmth, to what extent that support is given, with intent to "foster individuality, self-regulation, and self-assertion" (Baumrind, 1991, p.62). all the while remaining compliant to the child's special needs. Parental demandingness is simply behavioral control, or the parent's "disciplinary efforts".

Originally, Baumrind had segregated parenting style into three basic categories: permissive, or indulgent, authoritarian, and authoritative. However, recently this has been revised to include uninvolved parents. These parents are low in both elements, responsiveness and demandingness; though, outside of any extreme cases, Darling states that these parents fall within the normal parameters. Being that Baumrind's theory precludes that the parents must be involved to fall within the categories, I cannot see the need for the last category, therefore it will not be discussed here.

Briefly, I will discuss each of Baumrind's categories. Though these are important to understand, their effect on children are very important to note. First, indulgent parents "are more responsive than they are demanding. They are nontraditional and lenient, do not require mature behavior, allow considerable self-regulation, and avoid confrontation" (Baumrind, 1991, p.62). Because these children are under regulated, due to the parent's avoidance to confrontation, they are rebellious and defiant when desires are challenged. They give up more readily when challenged. It is suggested that these children are prone to antisocial behavior.

Authoritarian parents are "obedience- and status-oriented, and expect their orders to be obeyed without explanation" (Baumrind, 1991, p.62). A typical response from a parent of this type is, "because I said so." These children generally do well in school and are not likely to indulge in antisocial behavior. The price for that is poor reaction to frustration. Boys will be likely to become hostile and girls will simply give up. Many times these children are anxious and withdrawn. With a parent that controls by fear without explanation, it's easy to see how a child can become frustrated.

The last, authoritative parents "monitor and impart clear standards for their children's conduct. They are assertive, but not intrusive and restrictive. Their disciplinary methods are supportive, rather than punitive. They want their children to be assertive as well as socially responsible, and self-regulated as well as cooperative" (Baumrind, 1991, p.62). Both demanding yet responsive, these parent's children tend to fare better throughout childhood.

Many adults are reluctant to give children any credit when it comes to reasoning ability and understanding the logic behind a parent's reaction. Because of this, they either refuse to explain, like the authoritarian, or simply avoid reacting at all, like the permissive. If the child sees control that is fair and reasonable, they are more likely to internalize it and comply. Parents who are consistent with their standards while being caring provide the child with a model of emotional self-regulation, emotional understanding, and social understanding. A parent who provides warmth and rationale make better use of disapproval because they have been caring utilizing praise when the child strives to meet expectations. Parents should make demands to fit the child's ability to take responsibility for their actions. Doing this the child learns that they are competent and can do things for themselves. This fosters high self-esteem and emotional maturity.

"How about children's styles?"(Goodman, 2001) A very interesting question. Certainly there is more to parenting than simply the parent and how they choose to raise their child. Parenting involves communication which means that the child's response to parenting is only one half of the equation. According to Doctors Goodman and Gurian, parenting is a dynamic, interactive situation, and children also have styles and temperaments that in turn affect their parent's styles and elicit different responses.

Temperament is a child's preferred style of responding that is apparent as early as infancy. Researchers have defined three broad styles of temperament. There are easy children who are calm and happy and do not upset easily. Difficult children are fussy and easily upset. Generally a difficult child has strong reactions to new situations. Slow to warm up children are relatively inactive and fussy. They may react negatively to new situations, but become more positive with experience.

Despite