Are you a normal parent or a good one?

Our society has two kinds of norms–actual norms and perceived norms. And in order to know if you are a “normal” parent or a good one, you need to understand the difference. Understand that this post may challenge some of your assumptions and beliefs, so please keep an open mind and leave your honest observations.

What’s real

Norms are those values, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors shared by most people in a community or other group. A group can be anything from a whole city or town to a baseball team or a church attendance. Actual norms are what the group expects from its members and actually happens in real life. 

For example, if there is a standing belief in your community that a child’s well-being is paramount, then you may see the prioritization of funding for early childhood education programs as the actual norm. On a more individual level, you may see a parent having to leave work early for a child’s doctor’s appointment as understandable. 

Actual norms are what reveal the reasoning behind the everyday behavior of individuals that add up to an overall set of inherent values for the group. 

What you believe to be real

What about perceived norms? These are the beliefs that you hold about the others in your group and community but may not actually exist. 

For example, a study looked at a group of parents to see if they were monitoring their children. 86% of them were able to tell whether their adolescent children were coming home late. This is the actual norm. However, when this majority were asked if they think that the rest of the parents were watching their kids the same way, only 6% of them said yes–the perceived norm. The parents perceived that the behavior of monitoring their children was abnormal despite the fact that most of them were actually doing it.

Perceived norms can dictate individual behavior leading to the growth of these misconceptions about what is actually acceptable or normal behavior within a group or community. 

What’s makes it good

This assessment of perceived norms begs the question, in a society where child maltreatment is prevalent, is physical punishment for children a perceived norm? If it is, then does that make physical punishment acceptable because it is normal behavior? 

It’s an old philosophical question: “Well, if everyone were jumping off of a bridge, would you do it?” If you perceive that parenting is accomplished in this manner, it is understandable that you would follow down this path. What I challenge you to do instead–is take into consideration our higher human values for our children’s well-being. 

Just because a parent seeks guidance on how to discipline their child–it does not make you a “bad” parent. In fact, the opposite is true. If you are attempting to learn a better way to help your child grow and develop, you are a better parent than those that just doing the easy thing and allowing physical discipline to dictate how their child learns correct interpersonal behavior.

As a society, we must quash the norm that physical punishment is fine or even good for children because, at the end of the day, countless studies have shown that it’s harmful to their psychological health and causes more damage in the long term. Each individual must make the conscious decision to be a good parent, regardless of what being a “normal” parent looks like. 

References: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Child Abuse Prevention Goals: Promoting Positive Community Norms https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/efc-promoting-positive-community-norms.pdf