Overly protective parents might be leaving a lasting impact on their child’s personality, and not in a good way, a new study finds.
Children with over protective parents, dubbed “helicopter parents”, are likely to be dependent, neurotic and less open, a slew of personality traits that are generally thought of as undesirable.
A study in the US has found that university students whose parents closely monitored their children as teenagers and young adults were more likely to be anxious, lack self-confidence and feel unable to take on new responsibilities.
Girls were overwhelmingly over-parented with 13% being ‘helicoptered’ – a term coined by US university officials to describe the parental trait of swooping to the rescue during application discussions.
The study by Neil Montgomery, a psychologist at Keene State College in N.H, asked students how strongly they related to statements such as, “If two days go by without contact my parents would contact me.” Those who agreed strongly were considered to have over protective parents. Those who disagreed had more “free ranger” parents and generally appeared to be better adjusted and more open and relaxed.
“We have a person who is dependent, who is vulnerable, who is anxious, not open to new actions or ideas; is that going to make a successful college student? No not exactly,” said psychologist Neil Montgomery. “It’s really a horrible story at the end of the day,” he added.
Although the study was small and produced an association rather than a direct cause-effect link, Montgomery hopes it will help parents understand that taking parenting to extremes can hurt their child’s development.
Great so now i can ignore my kids and not feel bad about it!
My parent’s don’t let me go to my friends houses. i’ve never been to a friends house, and i don’t bother asking since i always see my sister and parents fighting if she wants to go to the mall alone with friends i’ve seen how bad it’s been for her and how stubborn they are. my aunts and uncles see it and always tell me that they feel sorry for me and that my parents are hurting us and if they try to tell my parents my parents get angry and stubborn and think that other parents jsut let there kid’s go out get drunk and get stolen just because they normally trust there kids. I’ve suffered so much from this that i’ve been utterly depressed to the poitn where i cry i’ve never expierienced life the closest i have to freedom is school home is so uncomfortable. I have no privacy and i never ever have space. And i see if your kids went towards drugs, sex, and all those bad things, why you would hold them back, but i am more mature then anyone i know and actually know how to take care of myself and want absoluetly nothing to do with that. Out of all the terrible people at school i see that get freedom, i’m the one punished to do nothing i’d be desperate for just one day of freedom would make me the happiest person alive. It’s hurting me so bad i’m always sick and anxious and depressed and terrible in social situations i just don’t know what to do.
it upset me to read your comment about your over protective parent.
it can hard being a kid sometimes.
I really think you should try and tell your parents how you feel. calmly and unemotionally. like you did in your comment, perhaps write them a letter. it may not mean that they will let you hang with your friends straight away but it is important that they know how you are feeling. no parent wants to see their kid suffer. its just sometimes us parenst do the wrong thing when we are trying to do the right thing.