Harsh Parenting

1152 Words3 Pages

The extent to which a parent negatively disciplines a child for wrongful behavior may lead to a cascade of psychological problems later on in life. Such problems could include problems in learning, romantic relationships, suppression of immoral tendencies, and overall physical health. It seems intuitive that when a young adolescent is exposed to harsh and restrictive parents, certain negative outcomes would ensue causing that adolescent to grow psychologically into a teen or adult with interesting behaviors. One interesting outcome of harsh parenting is the effect it has on an individual’s ego. An individual’s ego is a person’s sense of self-esteem, which can easily be altered in most people by exogenous factors, such as parenting. When parents are extremely strict and harsh on their children, this would cause that child to try and suppress not only bad actions, but also bad thoughts. In college aged children with harsh parents, the attempt to suppress immoral thoughts has a rebound effect, causing that child to think even more about that negative or immoral thought, thus depleting that child’s ego (Sheikh, 2013). Furthermore, harsher parents had a more devastating effect on a child’s ego while lenient parenting seemed to have no effect on ego (Sheikh, 2013). Therefore, it makes sense that a child’s honest attempt to stay away from not only tabooed actions, but also the thoughts that lead to those very actions results in a rebound effect causing that child to feel worse about themselves. An example could be when a speaker in front of an audience says “Nobody think of an elephant”, in which case everyone in the audience is thinking of an elephant. Another interesting outcome of harsh and inconsistent parenting is the e... ... middle of paper ... ... a better relationship with their best friend. Antisocial behavior can also develop as a result of harsh parenting. In a study done by Jaffee (2012), studies on monozygotic twins showed that the twin exposed to harsher discipline developed more conduct problems. Also, the study found that in normal siblings, the sibling that is physically beat more will result in more externalizing behavior. So, siblings who got received harsh physical or verbal parenting showed a higher degree of externalizing behavior. This study then concluded that harsh parenting directly affected anti-social behavior in adolescents. Combining many of the consequences of harsh parenting mentioned above such as low ego, poor academic performance, poor romantic relationships, and depression and substance abuse, it only makes sense that anti-social behavior would also prove to be a result.

Open Document