Certainly, most parents’ today have the desire to raise healthy, happy, successful, well-rounded, children with good character. Parents are following the vast amounts of ‘how-to” advice that society continues to generate, believe they are doing everything “right”, but do not seem to be achieving the desired outcome (Boteach 1). Parents are left with more questions than they began with, children continue to encompass the negative characteristics and the divide between what is desired and what is produced continues to grow. Therefore, this paper will examine the cultural, societal, parental, and communicative causes to why this is happening.
An overall explanation would be that it seems that the more we progress technologically and educationally, the more we digress socially and individually. American society has gone from families living in close proximity to one another, having weekly gatherings and a genuine bond, to families scattered across the country only coming together every other Thanksgiving or Christmas, and possibly a few weeks in the summer, with a mind-set of obligation instead of one of devotion. Family friendships that used to span generations have been replaced with chains of multiple lifestyle enclaves that simply do not provide roots for families today. And parenting that was once based on instinct, logic, and generational advice is now fueled by a need to find a “how-to” manual to provide the appropriate answers in a search to produce the perfect child.
To better understand how these cultural, societal, parental, and communicative elements have an effect on parenting children today, this paper will explore the messages parents create and communicate to their children in relation to want is actually being co...
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...t they are in contact with. In other words, parenting has evolved into something that is done for other parents, not for children.
American Children
In the article, The Demise of Child-Rearing, Lyric Wallwork Winik paints a picture of modern day American children:
In many respects, not since four- and five-year-old children were sent down into the mines or consigned to the factory floor has it been harder to be a child. Children are more medicated than ever. They are routinely exposed to sexual situations sooner, as well as to violence, illicit drugs, and alcohol. With the rise of sexual predators, they are for the most part no longer free to hop on their bikes and explore the suburban world; many are not allowed even to walk an urban or suburban block alone. Spontaneous play time has given way to scheduled play dates and organized pint-sized soccer leagues.
“Your children need your presence more than your presents.” While Jesse Jackson’s words may ring true for many parents, these words have actual theoretical evidence, which support different parenting styles that one can adopt when raising children. Many parents want the best for their children, but sometimes can go too far when they respond to their children’s needs and demands. However, one has to ask which style is appropriate in order to have a well-balance child, and if that is contingent upon the situation. Focusing on one particular theorist, this essay will summarize, analyze and provide a critique of Baumrind’s three styles of parenting on the basis of practical methodology and flexibility.
Beyond genetics, parents have an extremely significant impact on the emotional, moral, and social development of their children. This is understandable, as many children interact solely with their parents until they reach school-age. Parents have the ability to determine a child’s temperament, their social abilities, how well-behaved or in control of their emotions they are, how mature and ambitious the child will be, and so forth. (Sharpe) Furthermore, parents have both ideals for their children as well as ideals for themselves, and how they raise their children is deeply influenced by this.
This simple statement, made by James Garbarino in his book Raising Children in a Socially Toxic Environment, concisely and appropriately describes the current state of children and youth in America. Garbarino suggests that children today are being brought up in a socially toxic environment where violence, divorce, racism, addiction, educational failure, poor physical health, and adult emotional problems are just a few of the "toxic" social forces converging on children, robbing them of their innocence and dignity. Moreover, he argues, children who are faced with economic distress and poverty are particularly vulnerable. For them the risks are compounded, as they lack the defenses and supports needed to combat the toxicity surrounding them.
The dictionary definition of a child is a young human being, an immature person and offspring (Oxford, 1976). This idea is reflected in Mead’s statement ‘that children to adults are representative of something weak and helpless in need of protection, supervision, training, models, skills, beliefs and ‘character’’ (Montgomery et al, 2003, p vii). The emphasis is on the concept of the child by adults rather than the size or mentality raising the notion that a child, and therefore childhood, is not just a biological concept but also an ideological one (Falconer, 2009). This ideology makes an oxymoron of Children’s Literature according to Rose (Hunt, 2009a) as adults write, publish and purchase books with each set of adults having their own ideas about childh...
According to Stephanie Coontz relationships between parents and teenagers have become more troubled because society is failing to prepare young people for the demands of today's adulthood. Young people suffer from "rolelessness" as a result of the historical extend of adolescence, with puberty coming earlier and full adulthood coming later. The problem with rolelessness has become harder for the newer generations in my opinion, kids nowadays need that role model/mother-father figure because they are easily influenced by their surroundings. Rolelessness has become a risk among the young.
This report compares data form the 1960’s and 1970’s to data from more recent years. When comparing this data, it appears that we seem to have forgotten that children are the future of our society. We are having fewer children, not even enough to replace our dying population (Marquardt et al. 2012:84-86). While this does not seem like an issue now, it may well become one in a few generations as our population begins to drop too low. We also seem unconcerned with how our actions affect our children. The majority of people no
Garbarino, J. (1992). Children and families in the social environment, New York, NY: Walter De Gruyter Inc.
Diana Baumrind (1967), concluded that parents present three distinct parenting styles – authoritative, authoritarian and permissive. Every form represents the level of control exercised by the parents over the child, and also an indication of children self-regulating agency, and sense of self. Children acquire social competencies and regulate their behaviour in response to their parent’s awareness of their needs to participate. For instance, Authoritarian parents set inflexible rules without justifying their decisions to their children (because I said so attitude) and exercise absolute control over them, punishing any deviation from the rules, regardless of child’s opinions and feelings. As a consequence to this condescending parenting style, children do not develop an ability to express feelings and, therefore, may detriment to their capacity to interact with peers (Fielder, 2008). They also show distinct social characteristics such as rebellious, less social competence and low self-esteem (Darling, 1999). On the other hand, authoritative parents, have established a reciprocal relationship with their children, setting clear rules, but at the same time evaluating them in relation to their feelings. Because parents foster a sense of participation and flexibility, children relating to this
A parent’s parenting styles are as diverse as the world we live in today. Nowadays, parents only want what is best for their children and their parenting styles plays a crucial role in the development of children which will in the long run, not only effect the child’s childhood years, but later prolong into their adult life as well.
Growing up, two group of people, parents, and grandparents, took the time and the energy to raise me. Both of them had different approaches when raising me. These approaches were different parenting styles. According to Baumrind, parenting style was the “[capturing] normal variations in parents’ attempts to control and socialize their children” (Darling, 1999). To put it simply, parenting style goal was to lecture, influence, and discipline a child. In general, there are four parenting styles with their own specific benefits and disadvantages. Furthermore, parenting style, granted the dynamic of the family was understood, can be identified in families.
Strickland, Charles. (1984). The Rise and fall of modern American childhood: Reflections on the history of childhood in the twentieth century. Atlanta, GA: Emory University, Department of History. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED248977)
Childhood is one of the first biological life cycles we encounter. The experience that we go through shape what we will become. Here in America, as we began to industrialize, we began to have a different view of what childhood should be than in other parts of the world. In Taiwan and in Indonesia athletic shoes are made by children who work in factories instead of going to school. About 215 million of the world’s children work typical long hours for low wages. People in America might find this disturbing because we think of childhood as the first 12 years of life a carefree time of learning and play. But according to historian Philippe Aries (1965) explains, the whole idea of childhood is fairly new. During the middle ages, children of 4 and
A parent is not only the loving mother who holds you close to her for nine months and then many years, or the dad who plays baseball with you and intimidates his daughter’s dates. It is someone who is there for you from the start, guiding you to the right path of knowledge and teaching you how to stay on the right path independently. A parent does not need to have any biological associations to the child in order to be a parent to them. A parent must have certain characteristics to be rightfully called a parent. For many years psychologists have defined ways to correctly support a child to adulthood for parents all over the world. Some people conclude their practice of parenting their children after the child reaches the age of 18, and some have the duty as a lifelong job. As years pass so do generations and media changes very constantly and plays a factor in how children act and respond to certain stimuli. There was a study done in 2009 and people in Poughkeepsie had answered a poll that revealed overall every age group finds it harder to raise a child in today’s day and age than it had been in previous generations, but the older the parent is, the longer the generation gap would be and that factors in the difficulty of understanding how media works with a child’s psychological set up. What a child watches on a television screen is what the child will imitate through behavior. However, parenting is not a book written by a doctor, parenting is having a family, and creating memories, also ensuring that your children live in a nourishing environment for their emotional, mental, and physical health. The accepted goal of a parent is to ensure that their child or children grow to be mature and able to both support themselves and a f...
Parenting, which is somewhat akin to teaching, should be regarded as one of the three cooperative arts. Thus conceived, it calls upon parents to assist their offspring in the process of growing up, doing so by observing carefully the steps the children themselves take in the process and doing what is necessary to facilitate their progress. Parenting departs from being a cooperative art, as teaching does also, when it tries to be the active and dominant factor in the process -- when parents or teachers think that what they do should be like the molding of passive, plastic matter.
American Society has always been described as being extremely focused on children, and their well-being. Almost every election there is a politician that stands up and gives a speech about how our kids are our future, how we need to protect and provide for our children, in order for them to succeed in life. Children are our future is repeated over and over again. “This idealized image seems, however, contradicted by various destructive aspects of child life in the United States such as widespread poverty, hunger, malnutrition, and exploitation” (Gil 637). The image about keeping our children safe isn’t as perfect or easy, as polit...