Clueless parents may expect too much…
Almost a third of US parents have totally unrealistic expectations when it comes to their baby’s physical, social and emotional growth – because they’re clueless when it comes to child development and behavior. So says research from the University of Rochester, which suggests that false parenting assumptions can not only impair parent-child interactions, but also rob kids of much-needed cognitive stimulation.
“There are numerous parenting books telling people what to expect when they’re pregnant,” said Heather Paradis, MD, a pediatric fellow at the University of Rochester Medical Center. “But once a baby is born, an astonishing number of parents are not only unsure of what to anticipate as their child develops, but are also uncertain of when, how or how much they are to help their babies reach various milestones, such as talking, grabbing, discerning right from wrong, or even potty training.”
Moms and dads often misinterpret behaviors – some parents expect too much of babies too soon and grow frustrated; others underestimate their child’s abilities, preventing them from learning on their own.
Paradis and her colleagues analyzed the average parenting knowledge among the parents of more than 10,000 9-month-old babies who were asked questions such as ‘should a 1-year-old child be able to tell between right from wrong?’ and ‘should a 1-year-old child be ready to begin toilet-training?’ Those who scored four or fewer correct answers were considered to have low-level knowledge of typical infant development. These knowledge scores were compared to videotaped analyses of the same families’ parent-child interactions while teaching a new task, and to the parents’ reports of how often they engaged their child in enrichment activities such as reading books, telling stories, or singing songs.
The analysis revealed that 31.2%of parents of infants had low-level knowledge of infant development, and that this low-level knowledge correlated with lower parental education level and income. Still, even when controlling for maternal age, education, income and mental state (for example, depression), low-level knowledge of infant development still significantly and independently predicted parents being both less likely to enjoy healthy interactions with their infants during learning tasks and less likely to engage their children in regular enrichment activities
“This is a wake-up call for pediatricians,” Dr Paradis says. “At office visits, we have a prime opportunity to intervene and help realign parents’ expectations for their infants, and in turn, promote healthy physical, social, and emotional development for these children. On the other hand, we still have more work cut out for us – additional research is needed to explore how these unrealistic expectations form in the first place.”