How you respond to and
discipline your children greatly affects how they develop, both
cognitively and socially. A child’s development process is influenced by
a mixture of all the stimuli he comes into contact with, such as people
and situations. Since parents are normally a fixed presence in a
child’s life, they tend to have the most significant impact on whether
his development is positive or negative.
Authoritarian
Parents
that practice authoritarian parenting demand total cooperation from
their children and have no tolerance for questions or breaking rules.
This parenting style expects high degrees of maturity from the child
with low levels of parent-child communication. Children disciplined by
authoritarian parents stay out of trouble and make good grades, but
their social development is negatively affected due to not being
encouraged to have opinions, being shy and constantly worrying about
disappointing their parents.
Authoritative
The
authoritative parenting style, more than any other, aids in ensuring
healthy development, because children are taught to follow rules, ask
questions and have their own opinions. Research conducted by Betsy
Garrison and colleagues for Louisiana State University on how parenting
styles influence cognitive ability found authoritative parenting in both
fathers and mothers to be positively correlated with cognitive
development in children. Social development also benefits from this
parenting style, because communication is welcomed and children feel
more comfortable with peers and in other social situations.
Indulgent
Indulgent,
or permissive, parents focus more on being their child’s friend than a
disciplinary figure. There is an extensive amount of parent-child
communication, but very low levels of maturity and demands required of
the child. Children raised by indulgent parents have higher self-esteem,
better social skills and lower levels of depression, which aids in
positive social development. The decreased maturity and independence
associated with parental indulgence harms a child’s emotional
development because he is not required to grow in these areas.
Uninvolved
Parents
who are ambivalent to their child’s wants and needs are considered
uninvolved parents. Often, this parenting style is associated with
neglect and abuse. While there are no demands or rules to follow for the
child, there is also no communication and no encouragement from the
parent. When parents are psychologically or physically unavailable to
their children, all elements of development are negatively affected.
Social development is stunted because the child is never taught how to
act around people and, therefore, feels awkward in social situations.
Because of the lack of emotional and psychological connections between
the parent and child, cognitive development also suffers.
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