LITTLE ROCK — What would you give to know the 10 most important things you can do to have close, loving relationships with your children and to increase your children’s ability to be happy, healthy and successful in life? How about just giving yourself time to read this column?
Over the past half century, studies have identified a range of parenting skills that create closer family relationships and result in happier, healthier, more capable kids. The next logical step was for someone to compare all those findings and rank the results.
Last year, Robert Epstein and Shannon Fox did exactly that. They conducted a study to identify and rank the top 10 parenting skills. Their findings, as reported in the November/December 2010 issue of Scientific American Mind, confirmed a few obvious, commonly held beliefs about parenting, such as the importance of showing your children love and affection. The findings also spotlighted a few surprises, such as the essential role of the parent’s ability to handle stress.
Here are the top 10 parenting skills as described in the Epstein/Fox study, listed from most to least important:
1. Love and affection. You support and accept the child, are physically affectionate and spend quality one-on-one time together. Parents who express love in age-appropriate ways throughout their children’s lives and who convey love to their children physically and verbally several times a day (through hugs, pats on the back, saying “I love you,” etc.) have the highest and best parenting outcomes.
“When love is never in question, children are much more understanding and tolerant when a parent needs to set limits,” Epstein writes. In every way, especially during the teen years, this leads to more harmonious relationships at home.
2. Stress management. You take steps to reduce stress for yourself and your child. You practice relaxation techniques. And you promote positive interpretations of events. This was the big surprise of the Epstein/Fox study. As Epstein noted, “When I am calm, my children are calm, and we avoid that deadly cycle of emotional escalation that can ruin relationships.”
3. Relationship skills. You maintain a healthy relationship with your spouse, significant other or co-parent. And you model effective relationship skills with other people.
Children do not like conflict, especially when it involves the two people they love most. Even in situations where parents live apart, it is crucial to resolve conflicts out of sight of the children, apologize to one another and forgive each other (both can be done in front ofthe kids), and speak kindly about the other parent.
4. Autonomy and independence. You treat your children with respect and encourage them to become self-sufficient and self-reliant. Supporting children to become independent and autonomous helps them to function at a high level.
5. Education and learning. You promote and model learning and provide educational opportunities for your child. Generally speaking, the more education a parent has, the better their parenting.
The best news: Parents are trainable, and parents who take parenting classes produce better outcomes with their children than parents who lack such training.
6. Life skills. You provide for your child, have a steady income and plan for the future.
7. Behavior management. You make extensive use of positive reinforcement. You punish only when other methods of managing behavior have failed.
8. Health. You model a healthy lifestyle and good habits, such as regular exercise and proper nutrition, for your child. Remember that what you say matters much less than what you actually do.
9. Religion. You support spiritual or religious development and participate in spiritual or religious activities.
10. Safety. You take precautions to protect your child and you’re aware of the child’s activities and friends.
This skill had an interesting corollary: While parental safety skills contribute to children’s good health, it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. Being overly concerned with safety produces poorer relationships with children and appears to make children less happy.
Write to Jennifer Hansen at Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, P.O. Box 7, Springdale, Ark. 72765. E-mail her at
Family, Pages 31 on 02/23/2011