Chatter 13, Parents and Children Over the Life Course

1
Chatter 13, Parents and Children Over the Life
Course

• Parents in Modern America
• Authoritative Parenting
• Stages of Parenting
• Social Class and Parenting
• Racial/Ethnic Diversity and Parenting
• Newly Visible Parenting Environments
• Toward Better Parent-Child Relationships

2
Factors That Make Parenting Difficult

• Employers place work demands before parenting
  demands.
• Parenting requires learning new attitudes and
  techniques.
• Society is characterized by diverse and
  conflicting values.

3
Factors That Make Parenting Difficult

• Wmphasis on the malleability of children makes
  parents feel anxious and guilty.
• Child-rearing experts sometimes disagree among
  themselves.
• Parents are given full responsibility for raising
  successful or good children, but their authority
  is often put to question.

4
Factors That Make Parenting Difficult

• Many parents are responsible for working, raising
  children and caring for aging parents.
• Differing family forms can cause parents special
  difficulties because they are different form the
  idealized norm of the intact, nuclear family.

5
Parenting Styles

• Authoritarian - low on emotional nurturing but
  high on parental direction and control
• Laissez-faire - permissive, allows children to
  set their own limits
• Authoritative -combines emotional nurturing and
  parental direction

6
Spanking

• More than 90 of U.S. parents spank their
  children.
• Boys under the age of two are spanked most often.
• Spanking is linked to depression, suicide,
  alcohol or drug abuse, and physical aggression
  against parents and intimate partners.

7
Stages of Parenting

• Transition to parenthood
• Parents with babies
• Parents with preschoolers
• Parents with school-age children
• Parents with adolescents
• Parents with young adult children

8
New Parenting Environments

• Gay and Lesbian Parents
• Grandparent parents
• Foster Parents

9
Gay and Lesbian Parents

• Number of children of gay and lesbian parents
  ranges from 6 to 14 million.
• Polls show that 36 of American and 90 of gays
  and lesbians believe that gay couples should be
  able to adopt.

10
Factors in Good Parenting

• Adequate economic resources.
• Being involved in a childs life and school.
• Using supportive, rather than negative
  communication between partners in the family.
• Support from family and/or friends.