Generation Z parents are extremely concerned with breaking the cycle of generational trauma while raising their own kids, according to a new survey.
In research conducted by Talker Research, on behalf of Kiddie Academy, 2,000 parents of children between the ages of zero and six revealed their parenting styles. The most common trends among all parents include prioritizing real-world consequences and forming strong and emotional bonds.
However, there was one trend that Gen Z is eyeing the most: cycle-breaking parenting. In fact, 41 percent of Gen Z parents are abiding by this trend, where parents prioritize healing that trauma. They also stop repeating patterns they experienced during their own upbringing.
This doesn’t mean that Gen Z avoids other parenting styles, depending on the time. When it comes to the once-popular approach for young parents, gentle parenting — where adults use empathy and boundaries to guide their children, instead of punishments — only 32 percent of Gen Z parents employ that.
In addition, 43 percent of Gen Z parents believe that gentle parenting works in some situations, while 38 percent say there’s a time and a place for it. Some of these young adults also believe that gentle parenting needs to be used with other parenting styles.
When it comes to deciding what parenting approach to use, 54 percent of Gen Z parents are focused on preparing the children for the real world. Meanwhile, 62 percent of millennial parents are thinking about how they can support their children mentally and emotionally when they’re choosing a parenting style.
Results found that among all parents of any age, 85 percent of them agreed that there’s no “one size fits all” approach to raising kids.
In the survey, parents were also given 20 seconds to explain how they’d answer real-life scenarios. For example, if a child knocked everything off a shelf in a store, 48 percent of parents said they would most likely help clean up the mess and explain to the child why their behavior was wrong.
However, 32 percent of parents would make their child clean up the mess on their own, while 31 percent said they’d apologize to store staff and other customers for their child’s behavior.
“Results revealed that following a stressful situation with their child and upon further reflection, parents would handle an average of 55 percent of those scenarios differently. This underscores the fact that no one parenting style is the end-all be-all, especially since 84 percent of parents say their styles have evolved as their child gets older,” Joy Turner, vice president of education for the Kiddie Academy brand, said in a statement.
There have been many different parenting trends rising in popularity this year. This includes FAFO (F*** Around and Find Out) parenting, which emphasizes consequences over permissive softness.
FAFO parenting operates on a simple premise: parents issue warnings and let kids face the natural or even contrived results if they disregard rules. And as long as the natural consequences of this approach don’t hurt the child or anyone else, this strategy can help even young kids learn independence.
During a previous interview with The Independent, psychologist Dr. Terri Mortensen said FAFO shares some traits with the well-known authoritative parenting style, but she doesn’t believe the two are the same.
“I find that there’s a lot of overly permissive, very anxious parenting that’s happening. When we protect kids from everything, they struggle with confidence and resilience and being able to function later on because they haven’t gone through things and been successful,” she said. “Therefore, they don’t have the confidence in themselves to be able to handle things and are always waiting for the safety net.”
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