Parenting (2024)

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Parenting practices around the world share three major goals: ensuring children’s health and safety, preparing children for life as productive adults, and transmitting cultural values. A high-quality parent-child relationship is critical for healthy development.

Researchers have described different human parenting styles—ways in which parents interact with their children—with most classifications varying on the dimensions of emotional warmth and control.

Adapted from the Encyclopedia of Psychology and the APA Dictionary of Psychology

Resources from APA

Resolution on parents with disabilities

APA supports increased psychological research, intervention, advocacy, and policy to inform and guide decisions and to reduce disparities and biases faced by this population

Spotlight: Black parents’ communication of racial socialization messages

In an article in Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, Lorraine E. Scott and Fatima Varner explored how the parent–adolescent gender dyad (e.g., mothers of boys, fathers of girls) and the racial composition of familial contexts (i.e., neighborhood, school, workplace) influenced the relationship between parent and adolescent racial discrimination experiences and parental communication of racial socialization messages.

Stop telling your kids to be grateful. Show them how instead

Research shows reminding kids to say ‘thank you’ doesn’t work as well as taking time to help them cultivate gratitude

Spotlight: Children’s ethnic–racial identity and mothers’ cultural socialization are protective for young Latine children’s mental health

An article, published in Cultural Diversity & Ethnic Minority Psychology, found that positive ethnic identity and cultural socialization are protective, while economic hardship is a risk factor for internalizing behaviors in Mexican-origin children of adolescent mothers.

What APA is doing

Advocacy

Children, youth, and families

APA Services advocates for policies to prevent children’s exposure to violence and expand access to treatment and essential services for children who have experienced violence.

Offices

Children, youth, and families portfolio

The Children, Youth, and Families office aims to advance the creation, communication, and application of psychological knowledge on child development issues to benefit society and improve the lives of all children and their families.

Divisions

Society for Child and Family Policy and Practice

APA’s Division 37 is committed to the application of psychological knowledge to advocacy, social justice, service delivery, and public policies affecting children, youth, and families in a diverse and inclusive society.

Divisions

Society for Couple and Family Psychology

APA’s Division 43 provides a home for psychologists interested in families in their many forms. Clinical, scientific, educational, and public policy perspectives are well represented in the wide range of divisional activities.

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Last updated: July 2022Date created: 2008

American Psychological Association. (2022). Parenting. https://www.apa.org/topics/parenting