Special Resource Material Developed by the Center
Title: Authoritarian vs. Authoritative Parenting (Information Resource)
Description: Assuming that a parent’s goal is to help offspring develop into healt
hy and well-functioning adults, the question of best parenting practices arises. Scholars have approached this in the context of parenting styles. The popular media have adopted terms such as helicopter parents, free range parents, tiger moms, uninvolved parents, abuse parents, and more.
Based on early work by Baumrind and also by Maccoby and Martin, four major parenting styles have been categorized -- neglectful, authorit
arian, permissive, and authoritative. Each style is distinguished along two continua -- demandingness and responsiveness. Responsiveness stresses the degree of regard given to a child's wants and needs (i.e., at one end, being extremely responsive to wants and needs and on the other end being comp
letely unresponsive). Demandingness stresses the degree to which boundaries are set and demands are made (i.e., ranging from setting firm boundaries
and making firm demands to setting no boundaries and making requests that are quickly withdrawn at the first sign of resistance).
Overlapping these is the type of overprotective parenting suggested
by the term helicopter parenting. In addition to the above, research ha
s studied proactive and reactive parenting.
Our focus here is on contrasting authoritarian and authoritative parenting and some implications for involving parents at a school. Access at: http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/pdfdocs/parent.pdf
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