What are parenting styles?

Introduction

The research on parenting styles has examined patterns of child-rearing behavior exhibited by parents and corresponding behavior and personality characteristics found in their children. Parenting style can be categorized by two components: responsiveness, a parent’s response to the child’s needs and wishes, and demandingness or behavioral control, a parent’s approach to discipline and the level of demands placed on the child. Numerous researchers have found that parenting style influences the development of children.

Although parenting styles have been described in a variety of terms by different authors, the most commonly identified styles of parenting were labeled by developmental psychologist Diana Baumrind during the early 1960s. Through extensive observation, interviews, and psychological testing, she identified three different approaches to child rearing and discipline as authoritarian, permissive, and authoritative. According to Baumrind, parenting style is the pattern of normal variations in parents’ attempts to control and socialize their children. It represents the overall approach to child rearing rather than situation-specific practices by parents.

Each of the three parenting styles identified by Baumrind has been described in terms of high or low levels of emotional support and high or low levels of control or demandingness. Following Baumrind’s early research, a fourth style labeled as uninvolved or neglectful is often included.

Specific Styles of Parenting

The authoritarian style of parenting is a combination of low levels of emotional support and high levels of control. Authoritarian parents have a rigid set of absolute standards for child behavior that are strictly enforced through physical punishment. They expect instant and unquestioning obedience from their children. Respect for authority, work, and tradition is very important to authoritarian parents, and challenges to the parents’ authority or questioning of rules is simply not tolerated. These parents exert restrictive control over their children’s self-expression and independent behavior.

Parents with a permissive (or indulgent) style provide emotional support but exercise little control over their children. These parents are nonpunitive and make very little attempt to discipline their children or otherwise control their behavior. They place very few demands on their children for household chores and allow the children to make their own decisions about basic family policies such as television viewing and bedtime. Permissive parents are very responsive to their children and are accepting of their children’s impulses, desires, and activities. Rather than purposefully directing, shaping, or altering their children’s behaviors or decisions, they prefer to see themselves as resources that their children may consult if they wish.

The third style of parenting is referred to by Baumrind as authoritative. Authoritative (or democratic) parents set clear standards for mature and responsible behavior and expect their children to meet these standards. They firmly enforce rules but do not unduly restrict their children’s activities or self-expression. In fact, authoritative parents recognize their children’s individual rights, interests, and unique style and encourage them to think for themselves. These parents encourage verbal give-and-take regarding family rules, will listen to reasonable requests from their children, and are open to some degree of negotiation. When disciplining their children, authoritative parents rely on induction rather than coercion. Induction refers to the use of reasoning to explain and enforce parental expectations.

The uninvolved or neglectful style is a fourth possible parenting approach used by a significant minority. Some view this style as an extension of permissive parenting, but it lacks the high degree of involvement and represents instead a low level of both emotional support and control. Parents who are uninvolved tend to minimize the time and energy devoted to parenting. They know very little about their children’s activities, show little interest in their children’s experiences, and rarely talk to their children or consider their opinions when making decisions.

Dimensions of Parenting Behavior

The prototypical styles of child rearing can be clearly distinguished from one another on the basis of two dimensions of parenting behavior: demandingness and responsiveness. Demandingness can be defined as the degree to which parents use control to demand that their children meet their high expectations with regard to mature, responsible behavior. Parental responsiveness refers to the degree of warmth, acceptance, and noncoerciveness evident in the parents’ interactions with their children. The authoritarian parenting style has been described as high in demandingness and low in responsiveness. In contrast, the permissive parenting style is thought to be low in demandingness and high in responsiveness. The authoritative parenting style is high in the dimensions of both demandingness and responsiveness. The least effective parenting style, the uninvolved, is low in both demandingness and responsiveness. Parents with this style combine the emotional aloofness of authoritarian parenting with the disciplinary parenting of permissive parenting.

A further distinction can be made between the aspects of demandingness emphasized by authoritarian and authoritative parents. The demandingness displayed by authoritative parents is high in the use of firm control with their children; that is, they firmly and consistently enforce rules but do not extensively or intrusively direct their children’s activities. On the other hand, authoritarian parents, also high in demandingness, tend to rely more on restrictive control, which involves the extensive use of rules that cover most aspects of their children’s lives and severely restrict their autonomy to develop skills on their own.

Consequences for Child Development

In her research on child-rearing practices, Baumrind not only identified patterns of parenting styles but also identified characteristics of children reared by these parents. She found that parents’ approaches to child rearing have important implications in terms of the degree of autonomy and responsible social behavior exhibited by children. The children of authoritative parents, in comparison to other peers, were found to be more self-reliant, self-controlled, content, and explorative. They were also energetic, friendly, curious, cooperative; they got along well with peers, and they exhibited high self-esteem. Furthermore, these children exhibited more mature moral judgments than their peers and were better able to control their own aggressive impulses and channel them into more appropriate, prosocial behaviors.

In contrast, authoritarian parenting is associated with children who are unhappy, socially withdrawn, distrustful, and moody. In addition, they tend to lack spontaneity and be overly dependent on adults for directions and decision making. Finally, these children are more likely to be rejected by their peers and suffer from low self-esteem. Parents who rely on a permissive style of child rearing tend to have children who are immature, lacking in impulse control, less exploratory, more dependent, and aggressive.

Children with uninvolved parents, labeled by some researchers as “disengaged” parents, may experience the most negative consequences. Although researched less than the other three styles, parents with this style are rarely there for their children in terms of either discipline or support. The largest differences in competence in general are found between children with unengaged parents and their peers with more involved parents. Children with disengaged parents are frequently absent from school, earn lower grades, and are less motivated to perform well in the classroom. When these children become adolescents, they tend to overconform to the pressures of the peer group because there is very little pressure at home to conform to parents’ values and expectations. Those adolescents who have parents low in both demandingness and responsiveness (indifferent parents) are more likely to become engaged in delinquent behavior, as well as in early experimentation with drugs, alcohol, and sex.

Baumrind’s original goal in her research was to identify the specific aspects of child-rearing practices that are instrumental in producing optimal competence in children. She described competence as a combination of social responsibility and independence. A socially responsible child is friendly and altruistic toward peers and cooperative with adults. In contrast, a socially irresponsible child would behave in a hostile and selfish fashion toward other children and be resistive with adults. Independence in a child is characterized by assertiveness, leadership, and confident, purposeful activity. Children low in independence are described as suggestible, submissive followers engaged in disorganized and aimless activity. Children who were high in both social responsibility and independence were considered to be optimally competent. Competent children are mostly likely to be able to resolve social conflicts in a way that is both effective and fair as well as being sensitive and compassionate to the needs of others.

During the last half of the 1990s, many researchers published their studies on the relationship between parenting style and adolescent development. Originally, studies were conducted with preschool and elementary school children, but equal attention was not given to later development. The results from studies with adolescents have consistently shown the superiority of authoritative parenting over the other styles.

Gender Differences

Not surprisingly, when the factor of children’s competence was examined and matched with parenting style, Baumrind found that children from authoritative homes were much more competent than their peers. In particular, she found that girls with authoritative parents were more likely to exhibit assertive, purposeful, and achievement-oriented behavior. Boys from authoritative homes were more likely to be friendly and cooperative in comparison to other boys their age. Lower levels of competence were observed in children coming from authoritarian and permissive households. Boys with authoritarian parents were low in social responsibility and tended to be hostile and resistive, whereas girls tended to be lower in independence and assertiveness. Permissive parenting was associated with low levels of social assertiveness in girls and low achievement orientation in both sexes.

It is clear from this research that parenting styles affect boys and girls in different ways. Differences in parenting styles appear to have a stronger impact on the development of social responsibility in boys than in girls, most likely because there is normally less variability between girls on this attribute. According to the literature on gender roles, cooperation and compassion toward others is an attribute most frequently associated with females, regardless of how they were reared. Similarly, child-rearing practices have a consistent and stronger impact on the development of independence and social assertiveness in girls than in boys. The characteristics of dominance, assertiveness, and leadership associated with the attribute of independence are more often found in males, regardless of their upbringing. In a sense, what authoritative parenting appears to do is strengthen the otherwise less developed component of competence in each sex and lead to a more balanced combination of both social responsibility and independence. Sandra Bem, a leading researcher in the area of sex roles, has used the term androgynous to refer to individuals who are high in positive characteristics typically associated with both males and females. There is much research to indicate that androgynous individuals are more likely to be competent and psychologically well adjusted in adulthood.

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