What’s Your Parenting Style?
Curious what style of parent you are and what parenting behaviors make a difference?
This self-assessment asks you questions about your perceptions, frustrations, and concerns, during stressful or highly emotional situations with your child, (including your adult child with ADHD or other neurodivergent conditions).
Please note: This is a quiz and is not based on any statistical analyses. The interpretation of these statements may vary depending on cultural context and personal experiences. This quiz is based on the principles advocated by psychologists John and Julie Gottman and Laura Markham.
While parenting styles are complex and individual responses may not precisely align with a single category, this quiz can provide a broad understanding of your parenting approach and identify behaviors that may benefit your child. Check all that apply.
Compare your four scores. The higher you scored in any one area, the more you tend toward that style of parenting. Then look back at the descriptions in this article which explains each parenting style and how each affects your children.
If, after reading about the different styles of parenting, you identify aspects of your relationship with your child that you’d like to modify, you’ll benefit from ADHD Parent Coaching.
Contact me for an ADHD Strategy Assessment session and we’ll get started on some realistic strategies right away!
The Disregarding Parent treats what kids are going through and what they are feeling as trivial. When Disregarding Parents downplay events going on with their child, they may ignore or avoid their child’s feelings. There can be a tendency to resist problem-solving, hoping that with time things will pass.
The repercussions of this parenting style are that children learn their feelings are wrong, and they blame themselves. For a child who lives with neurodiversity, it can become more difficult to regulate their emotions when parents shrug off events going on them. It’s common for children of this parenting style to develop low self-esteem.
The Condemning Parent is like the Disregarding Parent, but more critical, judgmental, and negative. A condemning parent may stress compliance with rules of conduct and say that their kids must be controlled. This style of parenting believes that children must be tough to survive.
Like the Disregarding Parent, the results of this parenting style are that children learn their feelings are wrong, and they can have difficulty regulating their emotions. They may also internalize shame and act out when they cannot meet unrealistic parental expectations.
The Permissive Parent accepts all emotions but does not set limits, offering little guidance on appropriate behavior. A Permissive Parent believes that the best thing to do is to roll with a difficult situation, get the feelings out, and let live and let live.
The results of the Permissive Parenting approach are that the kids of this parenting style do not learn to solve problems or to regulate their emotions. Neurodivergent kids who live in a permissive home can have trouble concentrating, forming friendships, and getting along with others, because most behavior in the home was tolerated.
The Coach Approach: The Coach Approach to parenting uses emotional and stressful situations as an opportunity for learning and connection. A parent using the Coach Approach will validate their child’s feelings, empathize with their child, offer guidance on regulating emotions, set limits regarding acceptable expression of emotions, and work with their child on problem-solving when their child is ready.
When using the Coach Approach to parenting, children learn to trust their feelings, better regulate their emotions, and solve problems. Self-esteem improves, and so do their relationships outside the home.
The Coach Approach to parenting doesn’t come easily. It’s tough work, that starts with parental self-awareness.
Need more information on how to put tools in place for the Coach Approach to parenting? Read more here.
Or, contact me for an ADHD Strategy Assessment and we can set up a game plan now.