What are Parent-Child Relationships?
The parent-child relationship is a term that refers to the close, intimate relationship between a parent and their offspring. The term is often used when discussing the social, emotional, physical, intellectual, and psychological aspects of this relationship.
A parent-child relationship can be divided into two categories: healthy and unhealthy. A healthy parent-child relationship can be defined as a relationship where parents provide for their child’s physical, emotional, and developmental needs. An unhealthy parent-child relationship can be defined as an abusive or neglectful environment where children are not given proper care and attention from their parents.
The main characteristic of parent-child relationships is that they are unequal in authority. The parents have authority over the children, who are dependent on them for their essential needs, such as food and shelter. The children also have to obey their parents’ rules and follow their advice for their own safety.
Types of Parent-Child Relationship Issues
Avoidant relationships
This is one category of attachment that is not secure. Avoidant children have learned that depending on parents won’t get them that secure feeling they want, so they learn to take care of themselves.
- Avoidant children may seem too independent.
- They do not often ask for help, but they get frustrated easily.
- They may have difficulty playing with other children their age. They may be aggressive at times.
- Biting, hitting, pushing, and screaming are common for many children, but avoidant children do those things more than other children.
- Avoidant children usually do not build strong relationships with providers in their childcare setting.
- They don’t complain when the parents leave them, and they usually do not greet them when the parents return. They know that the parents have returned, but it is almost like they want to punish them by ignoring them.
- They seem to try to care for themselves.
Ambivalent relationships
Ambivalence (not being completely sure of something) is another way a child may be insecurely attached to his parents. Children who are ambivalent have learned that sometimes their needs are met, and sometimes they are not. They notice what behavior got their parents’ attention in the past and use it over and over. They are always looking for that feeling of security that they sometimes get.
- Ambivalent children are often very clingy.
- They tend to act younger than they really are and may seem over-emotional.
- When older preschoolers or early-elementary children want an adult’s attention, they might use baby talk or act like a baby.
- Ambivalent children often cry, get frustrated easily, and love to be the center of attention.
- They get upset if people aren’t paying attention to them and have a hard time doing things on their own.
- Ambivalent children seem to latch onto everyone for short periods of time.
- They have a very hard time letting parents go at the beginning of the day, and the crying may last a long time.
Disorganized relationships
Disorganized children don’t know what to expect from their parents. Children with relationships in the other categories have organized attachments. This means that they have all learned ways to get what they need, even if it is not the best way. This happens because a child learns to predict how his parent will react, whether it is positive or negative. They also learn that doing certain things will make their parents do certain things.
- Disorganized children will do things that seem to make no sense.
- Sometimes these children will speak really fast and will be hard to understand.
- Very young children might freeze in their footsteps for no apparent reason.
- Most disorganized children have a hard time understanding the feelings of other children.
- Disorganized children who are playing with dolls might act out scenes that are confusing and scary.
- Disorganized children may be very hard to understand. They may seem very different from day to day.
Signs and Symptoms of Parent-Child Relationship Issues
Over or under involvement
On one end, you have the uninvolved parent who is neglectful and fails to respond to their child’s needs beyond the basics of shelter, food, and clothing.
While not as damaging as a neglectful style, an over involved parent (aka helicopter parent) can also cause more harm than good by taking control of decisions and doing too much for their child, hindering them from learning by doing.
Little or no discipline
Children who have little or no discipline are left to fend for themselves, which can result in injuries and also creates a child who does not understand boundaries.
Strict or rigid discipline
Unlike parents who enforce little to no discipline, Frederick says parents who practice strict or rigid discipline (aka authoritarian parenting) do not allow their child to explore their world, which often leads to a child who becomes fearful and anxious or rebellious.
Withdrawing affection and attention
Ignoring a child is telling them that your love is conditional. Withdrawing affection because a child does not do what they are told causes similar harm.
These types of behaviors can cause a child to have low self-esteem and low confidence, which can result in a child not expressing their wants and needs.
Over time, this can lead to co-dependency, in which the child will adapt to how they feel a person wants them to act. Many times, this can lead to relationships that are abusive.
Shaming
Whether in public or private, children who are continually shamed can develop issues with perfection and a fear of failure. This can lead to depression or anxiety.
Causes of Parent-Child Relationship Issues
Attachment hunger
Emotional hunger in the later stages of life has its roots in childhood where a child is deprived of strong emotional connection at a young age. Parents with attachment issues end up controlling their kids in inconsistent ways leading to confusion in their little minds that later manifests as attachment hunger in their adult relationships.
It is very important for you to be consistent, firm and sometimes assertive in your interaction with your child. Sending mixed signals is a sure way to confuse your child into a state of apprehension that hampers their emotional development to a very large extent.
Quality vs. quantity
Whether you and your partner both work or one of you is a stay-at-home parent, it is important to make sure that the quality of interaction that you have with your child is enriching as well as nurturing.
Situations, where a parent tries to assuage their guilt of not spending enough time with their child by giving in to the child’s demands creates a guilt-ridden pattern of giving and take in the relationship. Similarly, when a parent spends too much time at home, they tend to feel exhausted from the relentless caregiving and end up angry or irritable with the child frequently.
Regardless of your situation, it is important to make sure that you send consistent messages to your child through your actions on what is or isn’t permissible and not change it based on other factors like parental fatigue or guilt
Conflict in the surroundings
Something that is bound to affect the closeness between you and your child is the amount of conflict that is prevalent in their surroundings. Bitter relationships with relatives in joint families, poverty, or instability in terms of a political scenario are bound to have effects on your child and thereby their relationship with you.
Not having a nurturing and supportive relationship with your partner can lead to your child feeling emotionally scarred due to frequent fights and emotional battles that they’re exposed to. However, adversity usually has two outcomes. Either it brings people closer or drives them apart.
While it is impossible to do away with conflicts, it is possible to avoid the emotional distress that they’re likely to cause your child by allowing your child to watch you solve these conflicts in a respectful manner, while keeping communication channels open. Over a period of time, this transparency in communicating and discussing conflicts will strengthen the bond that you have with your child.
Health of parent
The physical and mental health of a parent plays a huge role in how the parent-child relationship pans out in the long run. A parent battling a debilitating physical illness or a parent with postpartum depression tends to have a negative effect on the parent-child relationship.
However, trying to maintain normalcy as much as possible, even in the face of illness or trauma will help provide stability to your child in the short term. Open discussion about the same will help your child develop positive role modeling in handling such situations themselves and increase their respect for you as a parent.
Developmental delays in the child
Developmental delays in a child tend to create stress between the parent-child relationships. Some delays involve stressful solutions that may end up with the child resenting the wishes of the parent.
However, it is up to you to tide over such things by being as supportive and strong as possible. Many developmental delays even out over time and it takes courage, patience, and grit to remain calm in the face of such delays. However, the rich reward for the same is a sense of pride and closeness that develops between you and your child which makes it worth the pain.
Involvement of the father
The involvement of both parents is known to produce positive outcomes in the children’s relationship with their parents in the long run. It also has a positive effect on the emotional and physical well-being of the child as well as better academic performances later in life. Fathers who are involved in the early stages of dealing with children’s needs end up enjoying a certain closeness that extends into adult life.
Treatment of Parent-Child Relationship Issues
Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)
Parent-child interaction therapy (PCIT) is a behavior-based, family-oriented therapy designed to help improve the parent-child relationship through interaction. In this modality, child-directed interaction can help facilitate the development of effective parenting techniques and reductions in behavior issues and may also lead to a stronger familial relationship.
This approach is often effective for children who are at risk, who have experienced abuse, and/or who have conduct issues or other behavioral concerns. Parents who are seeking therapy to address these concerns in their children or to improve interactions with their children may find this a beneficial approach.
In PCIT, parents have the opportunity to learn new skills that can help them become better able to provide a caring, nurturing, and beneficial environment for their child. An ultimate goal of this approach is to help adapt negative behaviors into more positive behavior patterns.
What happens in PCIT?
A typical PCIT program involves two phases: relationship enhancement and discipline and compliance. At the start of the program the therapist will speak with the parents about the key principles and techniques for each phase. The therapist will then use a one-way mirror to observe as the parents play with their children, using the skills and techniques they were taught. The therapist also provides live coaching to the parents via an ear bug device. Targeted behaviors are tracked and graphed over time to highlight the progress being made by both parents and children.
The relationship enhancement phase of PCIT teaches parents how to minimize any negative characteristics within the relationship. It also guides them in developing new behaviors and communication skills that provide support and encouragement. The discipline and compliance phase of the approach emphasizes effective and safe disciplinary techniques that can then be used to help the child improve behavior by addressing and managing symptoms and issues leading to a negative behavior. Parents are encouraged to put these skills into practice until they are able to use them easily. Children who are exposed to PCIT can often learn how to adapt their behavior, and many families experience vast improvement in child behavior and the parent-child relationship.
