What is your Parenting Style?

Way back in my childhood when my parents declined me for anything, i used to think i will never do same with my children and will give them whatever they will ask for. But now when i am parent myself, i realize how right my parents were at their place. And, its because of them that i am what i am. Usually, we dont see any problem till we are confronted with problems like children throwing temper tantrums, seeking attention all the time, stubborn, arrogant, and at such times you wonder where you went wrong or what happened with your parenting style.

One generally gets advice on how to rear a child from different sources like from friends, relatives or through books. Now, psychologists have come to differentiate the parenting style, advocate that small children can be molded the way you want and managing child behavior depends entirely on the parenting style. It depends on your style whether you are:

# Authoritarian

# Rejecting/ neglecting

Authoritarian parents tend to give orders (bossy and wants complete authority) and don’t like to get ‘no’ in return. They are ‘action orienting ‘and has the limit approach while dealing with child. This style could be helpful in the long run if parents involve child in the decision making process and let them know why they are doing so and what the basic logic behind it is. Communication should be “two-way” process than only a healthy relationship could develop.

Permissive style parents consider “love” as the wholly solely factor which could be used in raising a child which is also not correct. They are too lenient in their approach, don’t think from mind but give preference to heart, not mature and are not too demanding.

Than is the democratic style which is the best, it has got the right mixture of love and fixing limits for the child as the parents are neither too lenient nor too strict. They know maintaining healthy relationship is important for the healthy growth of the child. Fix certain clear standards for child’s behavior.

Rejecting or neglecting style, where the parents either don’t care about child much or are indifferent to what they do and don’t do. Here the chances of child becoming rebel, developing inferiority complexity, adapting parents inappropriate behavior, using abusive language, getting involved in vandalism, fights etc. increases. It’s seen that most children of such parent’s become juvenile delinquents due to their parent’s attitude towards them.

Parenting style should be a mixture of all above categories and they should know which style suits where according to situation. Most importantly, parents are the ideal for children and thus in future they will adopt the same style which their parents had, so it’s kind of vicious circle….passing of same style from one generation to another. The important step in rearing child is to develop the loving bond without which no parenting style will work.