Parenting Techniques and Their Influences on Their Child’s Behavior and Habits Essay

Parenting techniques and beliefs are essential to the growth of any child. Parents instill habits, behaviors, and moral sense in to their children at an early age. Children benefit when parents engage themselves in to their child’s life. In saying that, parents also have to learn to adapt to what their child needs and teach them to assert themselves and become independent. Habits children pick up are usually either picked up from their parents or tolerated by their parents. It is the parent’s responsibility to assess what is right for their child and correct any bad habits they may learn along the way. Socioeconomic status is a huge factor in how a topic of parenting techniques can be studied. Any subject pertaining to parenting style and their influences can be linked to their social class. I will focus most of my discussion on the effects of overall parenting techniques and how socioeconomic factors and be linked to those techniques. Keywords: parenting styles, socioeconomic status, children Parenting Techniques and Their Influences on Their Child’s Behavior and Habits. Parenting techniques are a very important factor in the development of children. Children learn from an early age their moral senses, the behaviors and habits that are acceptable, and they develop an understanding on what role their actions can play in their life. Parenting along with socioeconomic status and culture are great determining factors in understanding how a child has learned from their parents and what to expect from that particular child. Parents evolve their parenting techniques as they learn how their child naturally behaves and as the child learns from what the parents have instilled. In the study conducted by Rubin, Nelson, Hastings, and Asendorpf (1999), the primary purpose was to investigate the relations between a child’s social inhibitions and the parent’s beliefs on how to best socialize their child. The study determined that both the mother and father tend to follow their child’s dispositional cues on how they should be socialized. The parents would adapt to how the child reacted in a social situation. For example, if the child exhibited shyness, they would alter how they went about socializing. In this study, I agree that parents do evolve with their children and with an agreed upon authoritative style of parenting, both the father and mother would act accordingly to what the study found. The study was a longitudinal study but only followed up once after the initial results; I believe the study would have been more effective had it been followed up until at the least early childhood. In terms of diversity, I feel this study could have been greatly improved upon. Differences may or may not occur between different cultures and races, but the researchers chose not to delve into any demographic exploration on the topic. The socioeconomic status of the parents could also have an effect on how they were able to socialize their child. If the family was from the working-class, they may not have time to socialize their children as effectively. Many factors could have made this study more effective in determining the socialization of the child and the parents’ influences. Children also take after their parents behaviors. Eating habits in children may be partly due to genetic dispositions but are greatly impacted by their environment and the behaviors they are being taught. Birch and Fisher’s (1998) main concern in their study was that childhood obesity was not just simply linked to genetic factors but also environmental factors. The risk of a child becoming obese with two obese parents is very high, opposed to having non-obese parents. This is due to the child following the bad eating habits of the parents. Genes and environment are highly correlated because they are both typically provided by parents. Obese parents would need to acknowledge that there might be an issue and act on it accordingly and instill good eating habits to their children. The researchers of this study also chose not to cover any demographic characteristics such as age or socioeconomic factors. A longitudinal study exhibiting ages when a child learns eating habits and gaining weight would improve the study. Socioeconomic status could also play a large role in what the child had available to eat. In many studies, it is said that many lower or working class families struggle with obesity due to the lack of funds to get healthier foods. Social status would also explain if the parents were not there to monitor what the child was eating. This would affect a lot of qualities in the study had it been chosen to be covered. Differences between race and social classes have been studied for many decades. In an article by Bodovski (2010), she stated that Lareau (2003) examined how socioeconomic status and race backgrounds influenced how parents raised their children and how the children benefited academically. The social class in which a family is raised shapes their values, behavior, and explains what they have available as resources. Middle-class and upper-middle-class families actively reinforce their involvement in their child’s learning and socialization. This social class has a wide array of opportunities to expose their children to including sports, art, dance, and many other extracurricular activities. Middle-class families also encourage their children to stand up for themselves through example and therefore the children learn cultural codes and behaviors that facilitate their achievement (Lareau, 2003). Lower-class and working-class families feel their primary responsibility to their children is taking care of their needs, such as housing, food, and clothing (Bodovski, 2010). These children usually socialize with other family members and their nearby community rather than participate in extracurricular activities. Typically, working-class families experience more hesitancies in asserting themselves and their children also learn these behaviors. Lareau (2003) did not find significant racial differences in parenting styles once social class differences between families were taken into consideration (Bodovski, 2010). This study was very well diversified. It focused predominately on socioeconomic status which is a large factor in how well a parent will have accessibility to resources for their children and it also explains how much time the children are around their parents. The study also features race and explained that there were no significant differences. Late-elementary school children were studied along with their parents, which I believe is a good age range to focus on for an effective study. These articles are just a few facets on how parents influence and teach their children. Overall, when looking at parenting techniques, it is always important to look at socioeconomic status and how the parents can adapt to their children’s needs.