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DISCIPLINING CHILDREN: RESEARCH WITH PARENTS IN SCOTLAND

B. Discipline in context: perceptions of parenting and family life

Introduction

This section of the report does not focus directly on the issue of parental discipline, but locates this in the context of broader perceptions of parenting and family life. Although most of the data that follow are drawn from the qualitative work, it is worth beginning with a single, stark finding from the survey exercise. When asked whether they thought the pressures on parents today were greater or less than for their parents’ generation, roughly three-quarters (72%) of respondents replied that they thought the pressures were greater, a fifth (22%) that they were about the same and just 4% that they were less.

Figure B-1 Perceptions of pressures on parents today compared with own parents' generation
Unweighted base=692

While this should not necessarily be taken as meaning that parenting itself is seen as more difficult than in the past (though there is some evidence that many people do feel this), it does suggest that the context in which it takes place is seen as more complex and challenging. The following sub-sections explore why this might be the case and begin to highlight some of the potential implications of such beliefs in relation to physical discipline.

The emergent themes are:

• changes in the structure of family life
• meeting family expectations
• impact of pressures on parenting
• changes in the relationship between adults and children
• parental accountability and anxiety
• influences on parenting style

‘There’s no routine anymore’: changes in the structure of family life

There was a strong sense during the discussions for the research that the structures and boundaries of work, family, school and leisure were less clearly defined than in the past — with participants contrasting the hectic and fluid character of their daily lives with what they saw as a more ordered, predictable and routinized past. Whether imagined or not, participants invoked childhoods in which mothers stayed at home; fathers went out to work but came back at the same time every day; meals took place at set times, around a dining table with a single menu for all the family; and children took part in fewer external ‘activities’ but took greater pleasure in simple entertainments.

*It was a much more sort of regimented system for everyone. All your friends were the same. You all carried the same routine. For meals, out playing, the time you came in at nights.
Focus group, Dundee, Males, C2DE

While the following is, at one level, simply a description of change in dietary habits, it can also be read in this light: that is, as an example of a lost sense of familiarity and routine in family life.

*The one thing I remember was, coming home from school at lunchtime, and it was like a 3-course lunch. It was all cooked. It was like meat and potatoes, and a cooked pudding and everything. It’s not like that now. *Not in my house.
*It’s a sandwich. Take it or leave it. I don’t know.
Peer group, Dundee, Females, ABC1

Pressure of work was frequently mentioned in this context — partly in relation to the difficulty of arranging appropriate childcare in households in which both parents need or choose to work, but also in terms of the perception of a more general encroachment of work into the private or family sphere. Overall, then, while most parents tend to see themselves as better-off in material terms than earlier generations, they see much greater difficulty in maintaining an appropriate work-life balance, with obvious consequences for issues of parenting and discipline. We return to this theme later in the report.

* And you're working as well. For myself, when my mum was younger, she was just looking after the family. Whereas now you've got your work. So it's harder.
[…]

* When I worked during the day, over half my salary was for childcare. And it is tiring because I'm going back to work after I've had my baby and working till 10 o'clock at night and still getting up during the night. It is stressful. And that is when you lose it sometimes. If you've got a toddler ...
Peer group, Edinburgh, Females, C2DE

‘They want so much more now’: meeting family expectations

In addition to simple economic pressures, many participants identified a set of more subtle pressures arising from both their own and their children’s material expectations and demands. These clearly interact to some extent with work pressures, in that parents feel constrained to meet such expectations through work and, as a result, sometimes substitute material ‘treats’ for more personal forms of interaction.

*I think it has changed dramatically, I think children now are so much more spoiled and there are so much more material things that they are so much harder to please whereas when we were wee you were pleased with anything.
Focus group, Glasgow, Males, C2DE

* I think you try and compensate, because you are working. Like if you go to the supermarket, and there's wee toys on the shelf, you think "oh I'll just buy that" and it's like a little treat for them. Because you feel a bit guilty for working.
Peer group, Edinburgh, Females, C2DE

Impact of pressures on parenting

Of course, while there may be a broad consensus that pressures on contemporary parents are greater than in the past, this does not mean that such pressures are experienced uniformly across different groups, or even within individual households. The survey provides useful evidence, for example, of variation in the extent to which pressures of various kinds impact on parenting by social group and by gender.

Overall, parents are most likely to cite lack of time, work pressures and money worries as having either ‘a lot’ or ‘quite a lot’ of impact on how they bring up their children.

Table B - 1 How much impact different pressures have on the way respondents bring up their children (% respondents)

Unweighted base=692²

Broadly speaking, those in the more affluent social groups, ABC1³, are more likely to see work and time pressures as impacting on their parenting, while those in the less affluent groups, C2DE, are more likely to see money worries and lack of support as doing so. Within these groups, men are more likely to see work and time pressures as impacting on their parenting, while women are more likely to mention lack of support from their spouse or partner.

‘When your dad stood up, you knew it was time to back down’: changes in the relationship between adults and children

Parents also identified significant change in recent decades in the general relationship between children and adults. Most of those interviewed felt that children were now more assertive than in the past and less automatically accepting of adult authority. Some saw this as symptomatic of a general erosion of respect for authority and linked it to problems of youth crime, lack of discipline in schools and anti-social behaviour more generally.

* (Children are) far more outspoken.
* More opinions than we ever had.
* Yeah. In my day it was children should be seen and not heard. Now they get too much listened to if you ask me.
*Interviewer: Why do you think that is?
* I think you're pressurised to listen more to your children now. And be so tolerant. And put up with things that our parents never had to put up with.
Focus group, Inverness, Females, C2DE

Other parents welcomed what they saw as a more ‘equal’ style of communication between children and adults, seeing it as appropriate that ‘respect should be earned not expected’ and as evidence of children being treated as individuals in their own right.

*I think I have a better relationship with my children when it comes to discipline, than my parents did. You know, it was kind of, you know, you obeyed. […] Whereas now, I think, if you’re giving your child a punishment, you tend to tell them why they’re getting the punishment and, I think, you just have a better relationship. You know, it’s not such a "them and us" as I felt. With your parents, it was kind of like, you know, respect your parents, but I think now, you’ve just got a better relationship with your children.
Peer group, Dundee, Females, ABC1

Even among this group of parents, however, there was often an anxiety that their children would not listen to them or that they found it hard to impose any form of discipline.

* We got a smack sometimes but she never went about belting us all the time. I remember having this healthy respect and I don't think mine have got it.
* Mine don't
[…]

* When I was younger, if adults said something and it didn't matter if it was your mum and dad or not, you listened to them - unless you were really cheeky and then ran away from them. The youngsters now will face up to their parents and any other adult. There's no respect for any adult like there used to be. Peer group, Borders, Mixed, C2DE
*It’s like saying to them, if you do that again I will smack you, if you do that again I really will smack you, now stop doing that! How many times do you say it till you do it? It was like when as a child your Dad stood up then you knew it was time to back down, so I think a lot of the time you threaten them but you don’t mean it and they know it.
Peer group, Glasgow, Mixed, ABC1

Against this backdrop of perceptions of greater pressures within family life and the erosion of ‘You're constantly scared that big brother's watching you’: parental accountability and anxiety

traditional respect for adult authority, it is perhaps not surprising that many parents are anxious about their abilities and fearful of situations in which their children are seen to be ‘out of control’. Whereas parenting was once something ‘you just did’, perhaps with the help of your family and friends, recent decades have seen it turn into a much more reflexive activity, with a huge increase in sources of information and advice, ranging from health and educational practitioners to women’s magazines and daytime TV. (As we shall see below, however, parents can be aware of this ‘professionalisation’ of their role, yet still hold on to a belief that parenting is more about experience than education.)

At the same time, a range of policy initiatives (such as the current proposals to explore ways of stopping benefit payments to parents of truants) have focused attention on parental accountability . Parents talked of their concern, not simply in relation to the behaviour of their children in particular situations in the present, but in relation to the future, in terms of how their children will ‘turn out’. In this context, there was evidence from the interviews that many parents feel anxious about ‘getting things wrong’ and about being scrutinised by others, especially when dealing with issues of discipline in public places.

* There are so many groups now for children like Childline and Children First. And you're constantly scared that, if you do anything wrong to your child […]. You're constantly scared that in 10 years, it's going to phone Childline and you're going to be arrested for giving it too many sweeties. Nothing our parents went through. Now there's so much emphasis on proper parenting. The way the government thinks we should do it. There's not many children that go into crime. Or children of abusive parents when they grow up, they become abusive parents,

because of what their parents did. You're constantly scared that big brother's watching you. Watching you with your children in the park. In the shops.
Paired depth (couple), Inverness, C2DE

As this tension between parenting as a public and private practice is a long-established one, any reconfiguration of the relationship between families and the state (of the kind implicit in the proposed legislation) is, not surprisingly, a potential source of contention and controversy.

‘Nobody can tell you how to be a parent’: influences on parenting style

In this context, it may be worth examining what parents consider to be the key influences on their own style of parenting. Survey participants were asked how much they would say they had learned from a variety of sources about useful ways to deal with their child’s behaviour. As Table B-2 shows, they were most likely to cite their own experience of being a parent and then their own experience of being a child as strong influences in this respect — though, as some of the qualitative discussions made clear, the effect of their own childhood experience could take both positive and negative forms.

Table B - 2 How much learned from different sources about useful ways to handle child’s behaviour (% respondents)

Unweighted base=692

When asked who they would be most likely to talk to if they needed advice about their child’s behaviour, survey respondents were most likely to mention their own partner (78% of those who were living with a partner), followed by their own mother (29%)⁴ and friends (23%). ‘Outside’ help is sought relatively more often in relation to younger children: around a quarter (28%) of those with a child under five would seek advice from a health visitor (37% would talk to their mother about a young child). Considerably fewer of those with a school-age child would consult a teacher (15%).

Two points are, then, worth emphasising here. First, one’s own parents - mothers in particular - are a central reference point for most parents’ accounts of how they bring up their children. Secondly, parents do not typically see their children’s behaviour as a matter for outside expertise (unlike, for example, ill-health) and are likely to deal with such issues either entirely without reference to others or by talking only to close friends or family. In such a context, resistance from parents to the idea of government ‘telling us how to do our job’ is not surprising.

Key points

• It is important to situate the issue of discipline within the context of broader perceptions of parenting and family life.
• Contemporary parents clearly feel that they face significantly greater pressures than earlier generations. In this context, research participants cited the difficulty of maintaining an appropriate work-life balance, the loss of routine in family life and the pressure of their own and their children’s material expectations.
• It was also widely held that there has been a significant change in the general relationship between children and adults, with the former becoming more assertive and less accepting of adult authority in general. Although many parents welcomed this shift, there was a view that it has made it more difficult to discipline children effectively.
• Against this backdrop, there is evidence of increased parental anxiety about their abilities and of a sense of being held to account for the behaviour of their children.
• That said, most parents remain resistant to the idea that their children’s behaviour is a matter for outside expertise and are likely to deal with such issues with reference only to close friends or family.

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