Parenting
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Parenting comprises all the tasks involved in raising a child to an independent adult. Parenting begins even before the child is born or adopted and may last until the death of the parent or child. Parenting is a part of the relationship within a family.
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Aspects of parenting
- Physical care:
- reliably providing shelter, furniture, medical care, physical safety, and food
- Social development and emotional support:
- love, entertainment, physical touch
- social skills, etiquette
- moral and spiritual development
- norms and contributions to the child's religion.
- Financial support:
Culture
Parenting practices are highly dependent on culture. For example, in Canada and the USA children live at home until late adolescence or early adulthood, and during this time are expected to leave home for college or work to support themselves. In some Asian countries, such as China, children live at home until they are married, a practice that is also common in European countries such as Greece, Portugal and Russia.
Other cross cultural differences are evident in decisions pertaining to circumcision. The parents' decision to have a child circumcised is more common in some societies than others. In the United States, where many male babies are routinely circumcised, parents make that decision independently, and obstetric and pediatric professionals will usually follow the parents' decision. In Jewish and Muslim communities, circumcision is part of most interpretations of religious doctrine.
Discipline
Parenting may involve praise but also punishment. Some parents no longer consider spanking a valuable punishment. The term "child training" implies a specific type of parenting that focuses on holistic understanding of the child. The "Taking Children Seriously" philosophy sees both praise and punishment as manipulative and harmful to the child and seeks other way to reach agreement with them. The term "attachment parenting" seeks to create strong emotional bonds and avoid physical punishment, with discipline being accommodated by interactions with a child's emotional needs.
- Discipline:
- Time-out
- Spanking
- Taking Children Seriously (TCS) philosophy
- Parental supervision
Pregnancy and the early years
During pregnancy the unborn child is affected by many decisions his or her parents make, particularly choices linked to their lifestyle. The health and diet decisions of the mother can have either a positive or negative impact on the child.
During infancy
Specific care includes:
- providing food and drinks, and in the case of small children, the process of feeding or helping with that;
- providing a toilet and facilities for washing, and in the case of small children, the washing itself or helping with that, and providing diapers or helping using the toilet;
- providing clothing, and in the case of small children, putting the clothes on and taking them off or helping with that;
- Infant care:
School years
- Education:
- preschool education
- arranging for a school to provide formal education,
- finishing school
Assistance
Parents may receive assistance from a variety of individuals and organizations. Employers may offer specific benefits or programs for parents.
Observers
Benjamin Spock was an authority on parenting to a generation of North American parents. A current authority is T. Berry Brazelton, the founder of the Child Development Unit at Children's Hospital, Boston, and Professor of Pediatrics Emeritus at Harvard Medical School.
Parenting assessment
There are several parent self-report measures that have been developed for use by clinicans and researchers to assess parenting, such as the Parenting Stress Index (PSI; Abidin, 1995) and Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory (AAPI; Bavolek, 1984). Parenting measures can also be observational, such as the Parent-Child Interaction Assessment-II (PCIA-II; Holigrocki, Kaminski, & Frieswyk, 1999).
See:
Abidin, R. (1995). Parenting Stress Index: Professional Manual. 3rd Ed. Lutz, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc.
Bavolek, S. J. (1984). Handbook for the Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory. Eau Claire, Wisconsin: Family Development Associates, Inc.
Holigrocki, R. J, Kaminski, P. L., & Frieswyk, S. H. (1999). Introduction to the Parent-Child Interaction Assessment. Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, 63(3), 413-428.
See also
- Maternal bond and paternal bond
- List of child related articles
- Child abuse
- Elder abuse
- Family and consumer science
- Homemaking
- Maslow's hierarchy of needs
- Attachment parenting
- Empty nest syndrome
- Parental alienation
External links
- Baby Names Box (http://www.babynamebox.com)- A site developed with families and parents in mind
- BBC's parenting web site (http://www.bbc.co.uk/parenting/)
- Attachment parenting blog (http://www.apparenting.com/)
- BBC h2g2 Guide to Life, the Universe and Everything: Families (http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/C21)
- Parenting Style and Its Correlates (http://www.ericdigests.org/1999-4/parenting.htm)
- Parenting and Career Development (http://www.ericdigests.org/2001-1/career.html)
- The Changing Face of Parenting Education (http://www.ericdigests.org/1996-1/face.htm)
- If an Adolescent Begins To Fail in School, What Can Parents and Teachers Do? (http://www.ericdigests.org/1998-2/fail.htm)
- Parent Child Interaction Assessment-II (PCIA-II) (http://facstaff.uindy.edu/~rholigrocki/pcia.htm)
- Shared Parenting Works (http://www.sharedparentingworks.org//)pl:Rodzice