The Good Childhood Inquiry – are we overprotecting our children?

The recent Unicef report stated that British children had the worst peer relationships in the EU – one in five teenagers today claims to have no close friend. Friendship, as the research shows, is paramount for a child’s well-being and development. As children grow companionship, intimacy and affection develop into loyalty and commitment in adolescence.

Many parents fear that a child playing out with friends (say in a park) without adult supervision may be abducted. Yet abductions are not common – when they do happen they become huge media stories because they are so rare. The Madeleine McCann case is testament to this. In fact your child is far more likely to be involved in a traffic accident (11646 aged under 14 in 2005-6 according to government figures). The whole point about parenting is

educating our offspring to live fulfilled and independent lives. We can’t expect them to be streetwise and able to look out for themselves at 14 if they have had no preparation. They need to explore, encounter and resolve problems for themselves and this will increase their confidence and self-esteem.

What we need to do as parents is monitor what each child is capable of. For example one ten year-old may be quite able to cross roads safely and buy items from a shop, while another wouldn’t notice even if a bus were coming along the road and would probably have lost the money before arriving at the shop!

We also need to show our children that we have confidence in them to act and behave wisely when they are unsupervised. And, of course, we need to be there for them if anything should go wrong and they need a hug and a shoulder to cry on.

If you are constantly worried about losing your child or something awful happening to him and so restrict his movements, you may make him resentful – and deceitful as he may go off and do whatever you have forbidden him to do and lie to cover his tracks.

To minimise your own anxiety, make sure you know whom your child is with, where they are, vaguely what they are planning to do and stipulate a time to be home by.

For many of us deciding the right time a child can do something independently is a matter of trial and error. To keep things in perspective, think about what you were allowed to do as a child – without coming to any harm!