In the era of my childhood, there was no such thing as “parenting”. There were parents, of course, but child-rearing was a fairly simple pursuit, not an active verb.
Mothers and fathers loved and cared for their children, fed and clothed them and occasionally asked if they had done their homework. If there were a few books around the house and they got good marks at school, then there was a fair chance their offspring would go to university and then they were on their own.
The only time my mother ever saw my college at Durham was when I graduated. Except for the occasional postcard, she never heard from me during term time. She didn’t have a clue that I nearly failed my first-year exams because any lectures before midday were a bit too early for me. I doubt she even asked how I was doing.
New discoveries in science - and the effect on parenting
Such benign neglect would seem very out of place now. Many of the generation attending university are the babies who, almost from birth, were ferried between Mini Mozart and Mandarin classes in cars plastered with Baby on Board bumper stickers. They grew up at a time when new discoveries about brain development were misinterpreted to mean that sooner always meant better for a baby – and there was not a moment to waste. As their toddlers grew into childhood and beyond, parents continued to orchestrate their lives at every turn to try and guarantee their future success in life, signing them up with tutors not because they were falling behind, but to get them ahead.
Now, however, as this first cohort of hyper-parented tots comes of age, a new book – currently in the top ten of The New York Times Family Bestsellers list – reveals some terrifying truths about how this excess of care has affected them.
How to Raise an Adult, by American academic and mother of two Julie Lythcott-Haims, argues that the more involved the parent, the less able the child at standing on its own two feet.
She questions why, when we have invested so much in their future, have we stopped growing responsible grown-ups, and started producing overgrown kids instead?
Parents still hover as their children attend university
It was after a decade serving as Dean of Freshmen at Stanford University that Lythcott-Haims began to notice a startling rise in the level of involvement of parents in their children’s lives. But instead of producing a new breed of brighter, more accomplished Wunderkind, she found freshers to be overqualified academically, yet under-equipped to deal with the day-to-day practicalities of the world. They might have understood the essentials of particle physics in the lecture theatre but they didn’t know how to boil an egg in their student digs. In the course of researching her book, Lythcott-Haims encountered more and more young adults who eschewed independence and seemed unable to look after themselves properly. She became convinced that parents were to blame.
Time was when the start of secondary school was the moment parents began to stand back and allow their children more independence. But now the helicopter parent, the one who played classical music to their baby in the womb, is still hovering close as their child graduates from university.
As Lythcott-Haims observes: “It was [becoming] harder to convince the parents of college students to take a back seat and let their son or daughter be the driver of their own college experience.”
Nor did these young people seem to want to grow up. “Each year, more students were grateful for a parent’s involvement, rather than wanting to try and handle matters on their own,” she writes.
A similar story is evolving in Britain. University open days are now aimed as much at parents as would-be students, with websites offering pages of advice for them on how to make the break. The University of South Wales has its own dedicated magazine, Parent Space, to help them through this difficult time.
According to one recent survey, 50 per cent of youngsters take their mum or dad along to open days, apparently without embarrassment, so they too can ask key questions about courses and accommodation.
And when they start their courses – carefully chosen, of course, by those helicopter parents to guarantee the most lucrative careers – the mums and dads find it hard to buzz off. Some are spotted still hanging around halls during freshers week. Then when term gets under way, they monitor events remotely. Tutors receive snippy emails from parents complaining about low essay marks. Principals get calls from parents living hundreds of miles away whinging about a broken radiator in their son/daughter’s room – when the caretaker is just around the corner.
We’re not yet at the point of introducing ''Letting Go’’ training sessions for parents as some American colleges have, or ''parting ceremonies’’ to reinforce heavy hints that it’s time to disappear, but perhaps we’re not far off.
So how has it all gone so badly wrong, when our intentions were so good?
A number of factors, it seems, have driven us to this excessive over-parenting. Competition for university places that previous generations assumed were their right is ever greater, especially from high-achieving students from other cultures, such as India and the Far East, where education is more valued and a family’s honour and future may depend on it.
In addition, while it was once (mostly) free to go to university, parents who are now forking out thousands a year feel entitled to get their money’s worth, whether by assessing the quality of tuition or rating halls of residence as they would a hotel on TripAdvisor.
Furthermore, continual pushing has become the norm because it is contagious. As soon as we see other parents shoving their kids forward, we feel compelled to do the same. With the best jobs dependent on stellar degrees from top universities, it feels as if there’s too much at stake to risk allowing our offspring to get on with it, God Forbid, all by themselves.
Along the way – as I point out in my book Taming the Tiger Parent – parents have forgotten the huge smile you see on a child’s face when they have done something all by themselves for the first time.
While we might think we are acting in their best interests we are, in fact, denying them the opportunity to look after themselves. Our children take this to mean we have no confidence in their abilities. Lythcott-Haims says we are sending the message that: ''Kids, you actually can’t do any of this without me.’’ In a recent survey in the Journal of Family Psychology, only 16 per cent of 18- to 25-year-olds said they felt they had reached adulthood. And their parents agreed! Study after study has found that when adults take over their children’s lives, the children feel more vulnerable, self-conscious and worried. Further down the line, they are more likely to be treated for anxiety and depression.
Source: The Telegraph
By Tanith Carey
