8. Growing Up in a Family

Question 1

Discipline

Answer 1

• The set of strategies parents use to teach their children how to behave appropriately
  –> Effective if child stops engaging in inappropriate behaviour and engages in appropriate behaviour instead
  –> Ideally leads to internalization

Question 2

Internalization

Answer 2

• The process by which children learn and accept the reasons for desired behaviour
  –> i.e., Child abides by parent’s rules/norms even when the parent isn’t present

Question 3

Fostering Internalization

Answer 3

• Reasoning that focuses on the effects of a behaviour on someone else is best strategy for promoting internalization
  –> E.g. “pulling someone’s hair is wrong because it hurts the other person’s body”
  –> Teaches empathy
• Reasoning has to be combined with psychological pressure to foster internalization

Question 4

Sweet Spot of Psychological Pressure

Answer 4

• Too little –> Child disobeys and ignores message
• Too much –> Child is obedient but only because they feel forced to do it*Will only comply if there is a risk of being caught
• Just right –> Slightly raised voice and disapproving look is often enough

Question 5

Discipline Guidelines

Answer 5

• Set limits: Have clear and consistent rules a child can follow
• Give attention: Give attention and praise for good behaviour
• Ignore bad behaviour: As long as the behaviour is not dangerous, ignoring bad behaviour can be an effective way of stopping it
• Give consequences: Calmly explain consequences when the child misbehaves and follow through
• Time-outs: Useful when a specific rules is broken. Works best when:
  –> The child gets a warning that they will get a time-out if they don’t stop
  –> Caregiver provides a calm explanation of what they did wrong
  –> Caregiver removes the child from the situation for a pre-set amount of time

Question 6

Parenting Styles

Answer 6

• 2 dimensions of parenting:
  –> Discipline/control: Extent to which parents monitor and manage their children’s behaviour through rules and consequences
  –> Sensitivity/ support/warmth: Extent to which parents mirror their children and are responsive to them

Question 7

Authoritative Parents

Answer 7

• High in sensitivity/warmth and discipline
• Set clear standards and limits for their children and are firm and consistent about enforcement
  –> Explain reasoning behind rules
  –> But also allow autonomy within those limits
• Attentive and responsive to child’s needs and concerns and respect the child’s perspective

Question 8

Kid’s Behaviour Correlated with Authoritative Parenting

Answer 8

• Internalize adults’ expectations and behave accordingly
• Higher self-confidence and adaptive skills
• High social skills
  –> Tend to have many friends and are well-liked
• Do well academically

Question 9

Authoritarian Parents

Answer 9

• High in discipline, but low in sensitivity
• Cold and unresponsive to child’s needs
• Expect child to comply with parent’s desires without question
• Exercise power by using threats, punishments, psychological control

Question 10

Kids’ Behaviour Correlated with Authoritarian Parenting

Answer 10

• Creates hostility in children towards parents
• May be obedient in front of parent but tend to not internalize parent’s message
  –> More likely to rebel against parent’s rules, especially in adolescence
• Lower in self-confidence and generally higher levels of mental health problems
• Lower social competence
• More behavioural problems, like aggression and delinquency

Question 11

Permissive Parenting

Answer 11

• High in sensitivity, but low in discipline
• Responsive to child’s needs and wishes but are overly lenient
• Do not require child to regulate themselves or act in appropriate ways
  –> The child is the boss

Question 12

Kids’ Behaviour Correlated with Permissive Parenting

Answer 12

• Higher in impulsivity and tend to struggle with self-control
• Lower academic achievement
• More behavioural problems, like delinquency and aggression

Question 13

Uninvolved Parenting

Answer 13

• Low in discipline and sensitivity
• Disengaged from parenting
• Sometimes rejecting and neglectful
• Focused on their own needs instead of children’s needs

Question 14

Kids’ Behaviour Correlated with Uninvolved Parenting

Answer 14

• Struggle with self-worth and mental health problems
• Insecure attachment
• Low in social competence
• Low academic achievement
• More behavioural problems, like substance abuse and risky sexual behaviours in adolescence

Question 15

Helicopter/Carpenter Parenting

Answer 15

• Overbearing and overprotective due to the close attention they pay to all of their child’s problems and successes
• Solve kids problems for them
  –> Parent is implicitly sending the message that the child is unable to overcome their struggles on their own
• Seems to have become the cultural norm in North America across different social classes
• Correlations in kids:
  –> Increased anxiety and depression
  –> Decreased self-efficacy and self-regulation
  –> Poorer academic performance

Question 16

Gentle Parenting

Answer 16

• Poorly defined but generally refers to parents who are high in warmth and focus on helping a child regulate their own emotions
• For discipline, focus on validating emotions, “natural consequences” of behaviour, and stay away from punitive measures
  –> Generally view ignoring bad behaviour and time-outs as bad practices
• Most likely similar to permissive parenting but not enough research yet to know about the effects of gentle parenting

Question 17

Parenting of Moms vs. Dads

Answer 17

• Moms:
  –> Spend on average, even those that work, 1.5 hours more with their children than dads
  –> More likely to provide physical care and emotional support to children
• Dads:
  –> More likely to play with children than moms
• Parenting by moms and parenting by dads are equally important and affect children in similar ways:
  –> Sensitivity from both is important for children’s mental health

Question 18

Parenting Across Cultures

Answer 18

• Many similarities:
  –> All parents teach about good and bad behaviour very often and are least likely to use love withdrawal
• Also some differences
  –> Italian parents are most likely to yell or scold
  –> Kenyan parents are most likely to threaten or use punishment, but least likely to take away privileges

Question 19

Are there cultural differences in the effects of parenting practices on children?

Answer 19

• Research comparing European American vs. Chinese parenting shows that:
  –> Chinese/Chinese American parents are more likely to use authoritarian parenting style
  –> Authoritarian parenting has fewer negative consequences for Chinese/Chinese American children
  –> Positive association between authoritative parenting and positive outcomes in children for both European Americans and Chinese children but this association is weakerfor Chinese children
• Suggests that authoritative parenting is best across cultures, but authoritarian parenting is less harmful in cultures where it is the norm

Question 20

Spanking: Is it really bad?

Answer 20

• 60% of children worldwide experience regular physical punishment
  –> Rates are higher in countries where authoritarian parenting is the norm
• BUT, meta-analysis of studies across 50 years shows that the more children are spanked, the:
  –> Less they internalize parents’ rules
  –> More aggressive they are
  –> More problematic relationship with parents
  –> More mental health problems they have
  –> Lower their self-esteem
• These negative outcomes are found across cultural groups
• Yes, research shows that spanking is bad
• United Nations: spanking is a form of violence against children that violates human right to be protected from violence

Question 21

Kids Also Influence Parenting

Answer 21

• Parent-child interactions tend to be bidirectional
  –> Each influences and reinforces the other’s behaviour
  –> Can create both positive and negative cycle

Question 22

Role of Shared Genes

Answer 22

• Parents’ and children’s behaviour can also both be caused by the genes they share

Question 23

Implications

Answer 23

• A correlation between parenting and a child’s behaviour could be due to parenting practices, the child’s behaviour AND/OR shared genes
  –> Does not imply causation between parenting and children’s outcomes
• Parenting practices are not solely responsible for children’s outcomes

Question 24

Importance of Longitudinal Research

Answer 24

• Only way of definitively showing bidirectional relationship between children’s behaviour and parenting practices

Question 25

First-Time Parents are Older

Answer 25

• Average age of first-time moms in Canada is increasing:
  –> 1973: 24 years old
  –> 2016: 29 years old
• “Older” first-time parents (vs. younger parents) tend to have:
  –> More education and higher income
  –> Fewer children
  –> Less likely to get divorced in first 10 years
  –> More authoritative parenting

Question 26

Same-Sex Parents

Answer 26

• More same-sex couples are becoming parents in Canada:
  –> 2001: 8.6% of same-sex couples raising children
  –> 2016: 12% of same-sex couples raising children
• Children raised by same-sex parents are no different that children raised by different-sex parents:
  –> Similar mental health, social competence, sexual orientation, and academic achievement
  –> Shows that parenting style matters, not parents’ sexual orientation

Question 27

Children’s Age and Divorce

Answer 27

• 35% -42% of marriages end in divorce
  –> Peak in divorce in 1987 at 50%
• Age affects how children adjust to divorce
  –> Younger kids (Grade 1-5) show more internalizing (depression + anxiety) and more externalizing symptoms(impulsivity + disobedience + aggression)
  –> Older(Grade 6 -10) showed poorer academic performance
• Suggests which areas parents should target to help their kids through a divorce

Question 28

Negative Effects of Divorce Don’t Last

Answer 28

• But, negative effects of divorce on children tend to not last long
  –> Differences in well-being of adults whose parents divorced in childhood vs. adults whose parents stayed married are very small

Question 29

Not All Divorces are the Same

Answer 29

• Children have a harder time adjusting to divorce and do worse if:
  –> Multiple changes
  
  • e.g. divorce + new home + new neighbourhood + new school + remarriage
    –> Ongoing conflict between parents/ stepparents
    *Puts child in the middle and in the role of mediator
    *Children do better if parents and stepparents are able to be civil and communicate directly with each other
• Children have an easier time adjusting to divorce if parents show high levels of sensitivity/warmth

Question 30

Divorce Can be a Good Thing

Answer 30

• Divorce can be a good thing if parents were engaged in a lot of conflict before getting divorced
  –> Kids’ psychological well-being improves after divorce if parents had a lot of conflict

Question 31

Siblings

Answer 31

• Can be friends and support each other or can be competition for resources like toys and parental attention
• Quality of sibling relationship matters
• Negative sibling relationships predict:
  –> More depression
  –> More social withdrawal
  –> More problem behaviours

Question 32

Predictors of Positive Sibling Relationship

Answer 32

1. Siblings treated equally by parents
   - More likely to get along with authoritative parenting
   - If favouring happens, the least favoured child’s well-being suffers
   - Differential treatment less detrimental if the least favoured child:
   *Views it as justified
   *Is older sibling
   *Growing up in a collectivistic culture
2. Parents get along with each other
   - Modelling a positive relationship with family member
   - If parents are engaged in a lot of conflict, parental attention may become a scarce resource that siblings feel the need to compete for

Question 33

Similarities Between Siblings

Answer 33

• Genetic influences
  –> Similarities in temperament due to shared genes
• Shared environment: the factors that both siblings experience
  –> Growing up in the same family with the same parenting style and same household rules
  –> Growing up in the same neighbourhood
  –> Going to the same school

Question 34

Differences Between Sibling

Answer 34

• Siblings tend to be more different than similar
• Genetic influences
  –> Differences in temperament
  –> Contributes to siblings interpreting the same parenting in different ways
• Non-shared environment: the unique environmental influences experiences by each individual sibling
  –> Differences in parental treatment despite similar intentions
  –> Differences in family context
  E.g. timing of divorce, level of family involvement
  –> Birth orderPeer group
  –> Attending different schools or different activities

Question 35

The Myth of Birth Order Personality

Answer 35

• Research consistently shows no meaningful effects of birth order on personality and intelligence
• Why does the myth persist?
  –> Confirmation bias
  –> Birth order is confounded with age

Question 36

The Role of SES

Answer 36

• Low SES (vs. average SES) negatively affects children’s development:
  –> Lower academic achievement
  –> More behaviour problems
  –> More depression and anxiety
• Why?
  –> Material hardships
  –> Negative effect of low SES on parenting:
  *Amount of time parents can spend with their child
  *Creates stress which can lead to poor parental mental health, harsh parenting, and marital conflict

Question 37

The Costs of Wealth

Answer 37

• Adolescents in high SES (vs. average SES) families show elevated rates of:
  –> Increased drug and alcohol use
  –> More depression and anxiety
• Rate of negative outcomes is comparable to low SES peers
• Why?
  –> Parents spending more time at work which means that kids are less likely to be monitored
  –> High pressure to achieve and excel

Question 38

Implications

Answer 38

• Similarities in adjustment outcomes for low and high SES children
  –> Suggests more than one pathway to detrimental outcomes
• Middle SES is best in terms of child development?