Is Extreme Parenting Effective?

Is Extreme Parenting Effective?

Does strict control of a child's life lead to greater success or can it be counterproductive?

Balancing Freedom With Discipline

Updated January 16, 2011, 11:42 AM

Yan Sun, a native of Sichuan, has lived in the United States since 1985 and been a professor of political science at the City University of New York since 1992. She has published two books as well as numerous academic papers about China.

Teaching in a college with a sizable population of Jewish, Indian and other ethnic groups, I can identify attitudinal traits that can only be loosely termed “Chinese.” The idea that Chinese mothers have some special or "superior" parenting style is at best a misconception, and at worse, nonsense.

What can get lost with too much parental guidance are individuality, creativity and leadership skills.

But if we want some sort of explanation, we can look to the Chinese culture for some clue. In China, the strong emphasis on striving in education comes from a long history of Confucian teachings and a tradition of grooming the best and brightest for the formidable imperial exams.

In contemporary times, strict and result-oriented parenting also has to do with anxieties created by a ubiquitous testing environment. In China, it is exacerbated by the one-child policy. The gaokao (college entrance exam), for example, has even been known to push students to suicide. Concerns over academic competition and professional opportunities have fueled demand for education and skill attainment by Chinese parents for their children.

There are decided benefits to a rigorous parenting style. Persistent drilling of skills can help children acquire proficiency in certain areas. Offering direction about career paths can help lead students toward more employable fields. But increasingly, Chinese and Asian Americans are paying attention to the downsides of this type of parenting. What often gets lost are individuality, creativity and leadership skills.

We worry about the paucity of Nobel laureates in the sciences in China, despite outstanding international test scores from Chinese students. We lament the gap between Chinese/Asian Americans’ academic achievements and the relatively few who reach top management ranks in the United States.

Chinese parents everywhere are changing. My family is a case in point. We find a combination of demanding and encouraging styles the ideal model. We never had a piano in our home because we did not understand why every Asian kid seems to play the piano. We let our kids choose their extracurricular activities, although the math team takes precedence over sports teams, which in turn comes before saxophone lessons. We may be disappointed that our older son may not major in physics, but at our suggestion, he wants to combine his economics major with mathematics. And yes, they should strive for A’s, but they will not be taken to task for lower grades as long as they make earnest efforts.

Topics: China, Culture, children, mothers

Debaters

• Balancing Freedom With Discipline

  Yan Sun, professor, City University of New York

• When Parents Feel Out of Control

  Karen Karbo, novelist and memoirist

• What Mencius’s Mother Sought

  C. Cindy Fan, associate dean of social sciences, U.C.L.A.

• When the Goal Is Successful Kids

  Hara Estroff Marano, author, "A Nation of Wimps"

• Defining Success for Myself

  Jennifer Cheng, blogger, Every Six Minutes

• The Power of Conviction

  David Anderegg, professor of psychology

• The Opposite of Extreme

  Elizabeth Hartley-Brewer, child development specialist

• We Are What We Know

  Meredith F. Small, professor of anthropology