Question

1. Use the dimensions of warmth and control to describe the four major types of parenting. Which style seems to promote the best development in children? Explain

2. Most people view puberty as a strictly biological event. Enlighten them by describing both physiological and environmental factors that influence the process of puberty.

Answer 1

1. Authoritative Parenting:

High demandingness, High responsivenss.

Authoritative parents have high expectations for achievement and maturity, but they are also warm and responsive. These parents set rules and enforce boundaries by having open discussion and using reasoning. They are affectionate and supportive and encourage independence. This parenting style is also known as Democratic Parenting Style.

Authoritarian Parenting:

High demandingness, Low reponsiveness.

Although authoritarian and authoritative parenting styles have similar names, they have several important differences in parenting beliefs. While both parental styles demand high standards, authoritarian parents demand blind obedience using reasons such as “because I said so“. These parents use stern discipline and often employ punishment to control children’s behavior. Authoritarian parents are unresponsive to their children’s needs and are generally not nurturing.

Permissive Parenting (Indulgent):

Low demandingness, High responsiveness

Permissive parents set very few rules and boundaries and they are reluctant to enforce rules. These parents are warm and indulgent but they do not like to say no or disappoint their children.

Neglectful Parenting (Uninvolved):

Low demandingness, Low responsiveness.

Neglectful parents do not set firm boundaries or high standards. They are indifferent to their children’s needs and uninvolved in their lives. These uninvolved parents tend to have mental issues themselves such as maternal depression, physical abuse or child neglect when they were kids.

-- We can say that Authoritative parenting style seems to promote the best development in children because, children of authoritative parents are appear happy and content, Are more independent, Achieve higher academic success, Develop good self-esteem, Interact with peers using competent social skills, Have better mental health- less depression, anxiety, suicide attempts, delinquency, alcohol and drug use, Exhibit less violent tendencies.

2. The age at which puberty begins can vary widely between individuals and between populations. Age of puberty is affected by both genetic factors and by environmental factors such as nutritional state or social circumstances. Timing may also be affected by environmental factors (exogenous hormones and environmental substances with hormone-like effects) and there is even evidence that life experiences may play a role as well.

Environmental factors:
If genetic factors account for half of the variation of pubertal timing, environment factors are clearly important as well. One of the earliest observed environmental effects is that puberty occurs later in children raised at higher altitudes. The most important of the environmental influences is clearly nutrition, but a number of others have been identified, all which affect timing of female puberty and menarche more clearly than male puberty.

Stress and social factors:
Some of the least understood environmental influences on timing of puberty are social and psychological. In comparison with the effects of genetics, nutrition, and general health, social influences are small, shifting timing by a few months rather than years. Mechanisms of these social effects are unknown, though a variety of physiological processes, including pheromones, have been suggested based on animal research.

The most important part of a child's psychosocial environment is the family, and most of the social influence research has investigated features of family structure and function in relation to earlier or later female puberty. Most of the studies have reported that menarche may occur a few months earlier in girls in high-stress households, whose fathers are absent during their early childhood, who have a stepfather in the home, who are subjected to prolonged sexual abuse in childhood, or who are adopted from a developing country at a young age. Conversely, menarche may be slightly later when a girl grows up in a large family with a biological father present.

More extreme degrees of environmental stress, such as wartime refugee status with threat to physical survival, have been found to be associated with delay of maturation, an effect that may be compounded by dietary inadequacy.

Most of these reported social effects are small and our understanding is incomplete. Most of these "effects" are statistical associations revealed by epidemiologic surveys. Statistical associations are not necessarily causal, and a variety of covariables and alternative explanations can be imagined. Effects of such small size can never be confirmed or refuted for any individual child. Furthermore, interpretations of the data are politically controversial because of the ease with which this type of research can be used for political advocacy. Accusations of bias based on political agenda sometimes accompany scientific criticism.

Another limitation of the social research is that nearly all of it has concerned girls, partly because female puberty requires greater physiologic resources and partly because it involves a unique event (menarche) that makes survey research into female puberty much simpler than male.