Introduction
The Developmental psychologists have long been interested in how parents affect their children’s development. Thus, finding the cause and effect linked between specific actions of parents and later the behavior of children is challenging. In this article, the authoritative style practiced by the authors’ parents, and we get to see how it affects him as a person and what his results were as per his development given by the style of parenting. Through authoritarian parenting is a parenting style that is characterized by high demand and low responsiveness. Therefore, parents with an authoritarian style have high expectations for their children, but they provide very little feedback and nurturance. With authoritarian style, mistakes tend to punished brutally. Therefore parents become themselves by the way they were raised. Therefore no one needs to blame or resent their parents for raising their children the way they did because that’s all they knew at the time they were raising their children.
Parents have demonstrated their capacity for caring and effectiveness despite the stressful and challenging experiences (Chen, 2014). Therefore on the self-reflection of parenting, one can be able to keep track of what is happening in the family, recognize, ones place in the larger picture, plan for the future, sometimes even plan on how to start again. The other style demonstrated by the article is the corporal style of parenting. Corporal style of parenting mainly involves corporal punishments, which were physical punitive measures of parents. In this style, most children become devastated, especially by their consequences. Some of the effects the child’s face include bordering on child abuse.
Authoritative parent
The author goes ahead and explains that the parenting styles of both his mother and father were authoritative and uninvolved. Initially, the author’s parents were responsive and demanding initially (Chen, 2014). The dad grew up in Mexico, and his parents also raised him in an authoritarian style household with corporal punishment as a way of disciplining their children. Unfortunately, their grandmother was a dictator in the family, and the authors’ dad brought the same mentality into our household. Authoritative parenting is optimal. This affected the authors’ development in that when he was about five or six years, and he cried about something that had happened to him either at school, the dad sent him to his room and told him to come out of the room when he was done crying. The author often went to his office a lot since he cried a lot as well. Therefore, when the author grew older, he majorly associated his emotions of sadness as a bad thing, and he tried everything to suppress them. He went ahead and engaged himself in unhealthy coping skills.
Children mostly raised by authoritative parents are most likely to become more independent, self-reliant, socially accepted, academically successful, and well behaved. Most of these children are less likely to report depression, and anxiety, and less likely to report depression, and anxiety, and less engaged in antisocial behavior such as abuse of drugs (Dawes, 2015). thus, authoritarian parents demand a sort of blind obedience from their children. Authoritative parents take a different, yet more moderate approach that emphasized the setting of high standards, as well as becoming nurturing, and responsive. Showing respect for their children and being independent as rational beings is also essential. The authoritative parents expect maturity and cooperation from their children. However, much authoritative parenting is devastating; the same parents are responsive, nurturing, and involved. But one trait about this kind of parent doesn’t let their kids get away with bad behavior. Authoritative parents take a firm stand, expecting their kids also to behave responsibly (Dawes, 2015). Think of an authoritarian parent as a drill sergeant. The drill sergeant tries to get away through threats and coercion. The contrast is the authoritative parents’ aims at the inspiration through cooperation by positively fostering their feelings by teaching kids the reasons for the rules. However, researchers from Spain have reported a constant association between authoritative style and the development of depressive symptoms. Authoritative parenting, as research may be necessary during the adolescence period, especially after teenagers, face limits while simultaneously needing support, acceptance, and supervision.
A sample study has drawn as part of a longitudinal study of mental health functioning during adolescence to young adult transition. Research done funded by a National Institute of Mental Health grant to Gore, an association of William T. Grant foundation grant to Aseltine and Liem; the sample included 1325 participants: 1143 high school seniors from nine public schools in the greater Boston area, and 182 students that were part of the same cohort. These students dropped out of high school between grades 9-12. Participants were surveyed in person, and the results of this survey were that most children affected by the authoritative style. The children mostly went through depression and hard times that led them into dropping out (.Gafor, 2014) t Using three scales development, Steinberg and his colleagues assessed the authentic parenting style. The methods include acceptance-involvement, strictness-supervision, and autonomy granting. The primary goal of this study was to investigate the relations between the authoritative parenting style and depression, self-development, peer support, and depressive symptoms emerging in adulthood through which young adult depression develops.
Authoritarian style
According to the author, his mom grew up in both an authoritative style household from her mother and an authoritarian style from her father. The authors’ grandfather from his mother’s sides used a corporal style of discipline. Therefore, the mother brought both the authoritative style and corporal punishment into their household. This affected the growth development of the author since, in most cases, he never entirely understood by things were the way they were, and also the emotions of the author were not allowed to be held out. In most cases, when an impactful or shameful thing happened in their immediate family it was swept under the rug most of the time (García, 2014) Their family enforced the idea that emotions other than happiness were terrible. It was essential to resist engaging in them. The issue led the author to develop an eating disorder and again a depressive disorder when he was 17 years old, due to how the author’s parents raised him. The author vowed that if he had children, he would teach them that all emotions are welcome and would be processed in their household. He also promised to show them that sadness is normal, and it is essential to learn to sit with those uncomfortable feelings until they surpassed (Hecker, 2014).
Physical punishment is associated with aggression increase in a child, antisocial behavior, lower intellectual achievement, more mediocre quality of parent-child relationships, mental health problems such as depression, and diminished moral internalization. Most parents use corporal punishment in their children’s use out of control models, especially in handling situations that consider the power of observational learning and influence to their parents that tend to have on their children (Hoffmann, 2014). Parents can use these stressful situations to teach children how to calmly and effectively change behavior. Teaching children acceptable behavior, including how to make good choices to be able to exercise self-control, is an essential part of a child’s growth and development. But many parents rely on physical punishments to accomplish these goals. However, these parents do not intend to harm their children with a corporal penalty, instead, they believe it is a useful discipline strategy. The issue is that, generally, corporal punishment is more harmful to a child than being helpful (Hoffmann, 2014). Sometimes corporal punishments make behavior problems worse. Corporal punishment damage the relationship between children and their parents or caregivers. Corporal punishment erodes that relationship and makes behavior management more difficult. Association with mental illness is also a major problem brought about by corporal discipline.
According to authors, Binger and Gerhardt, it is essential to express one’s feelings by using T statements, especially when it is done through speaking to children. Disciplining children shouldn’t be about controlling children; instead, it should be more about teaching children to control themselves. As a result, it should be the best way to strategize and enable children to learn from their mistakes through the cultivation of better decisions through skill making. Therefore, these skills will allow the children to make better choices in the future. Thus instead of corporal punishment, a parent should consider alternative and more effective discipline strategies.
References
Chen, W. W. (2014). The relationship between perceived parenting style, filial piety, and life satisfaction in Hong Kong. Journal of family psychology, 28(3), 308.
Dawes, A., De Sas Kropiwnicki, Z., Kafaar, Z., & Richter, L. (2015). Corporal punishment of children: A South African national survey.
Gafor, A. (2014). Construction and Validation of the Scale of Parenting Style. Online Submission, 2(4), 315-323.
García, F., & Gracia, E. (2014). The indulgent parenting style and developmental outcomes in South European and Latin American countries. In Parenting across cultures (pp. 419-433). Springer, Dordrecht.
Hecker, T., Hermenau, K., Isele, D., & Elbert, T. (2014). Corporal punishment and children’s externalizing problems: A cross-sectional study of Tanzanian primary school-aged children. Child abuse & neglect, 38(5), 884-892.
Hoffmann, J. P., & Bahr, S. J. (2014). Parenting style, religiosity, peer alcohol use, and adolescent heavy drinking. Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 75(2), 222-227.
Kakinami, L., Barnett, T. A., Séguin, L., & Paradis, G. (2015). Parenting style and obesity risk in children. Preventive medicine, 75, 18-22.
O’Reilly, J., & Peterson, C. C. (2014). Theory of mind at home: Linking authoritative and authoritarian parenting styles to children’s social understanding. Early child development and care, 184(12), 1934-1947.