The four types of parenting styles

Parenting styles play an important role in shaping children’s emotional, social, and cognitive development. Diana Baumrind is known for categorizing three styles, authoritarian, permissive, and authoritative, with a fourth style, neglectful, added later by researchers Eleanor Maccoby and John Martin. Each style reflects how parents typically respond to their children's needs, behavior, temperament, and emotions. Parents of this generation don’t typically associate their parenting style with any of these four styles (does anyone admit to a neglectful parenting style?) but many people identify themselves as gentle parents, explicitly not gentle parents, sturdy parents, and even free range parents. I think that these new types of parenting styles still fit into the same categories and can lead to the same positive or negative outcomes. 

The Four Traditional Types of Parenting

1. Authoritarian Parenting is characterized by strict rules, high expectations, and little room for flexibility. Parents who follow this style prioritize obedience and discipline, often with little explanation given for rules or punishments. This type of parenting demands high structure but offer very low nurture. The authoritarian approach relies on controlling behavior and can involve harsh discipline or threats of punishment. While authoritarian parents may believe they are fostering respect and responsibility, this style can lead to children who are anxious, less confident, and less likely to engage in open communication. It often fosters a power imbalance, where children are expected to obey without question, stifling their ability to practice self expression at home, causing them to practice self expression (including through negative behaviors in other arenas like school). These parents often find that they have compliance when children are younger but run into trouble when children get older, bigger, and have more control over what they can and cannot do. 

2. Permissive Parenting tends to be lenient and indulgent, with parents placing few demands or expectations on their children. These parents place little structure in their family and provide high nurture. They tend to avoid confrontation and may overindulge their children with attention, toys, or privileges. While permissive parenting can create a warm and loving environment, it often lacks the necessary structure, limits, and boundaries to help children develop self-discipline, respect for boundaries, responsibility, and accountability. Permissive parents might be reluctant to set limits, which can lead to children becoming entitled, rebellious, or lacking self-control. While permissive parents may have good intentions, their lack of consistency can confuse children and hinder their ability to navigate the challenges of life. 

3. Authoritative Parenting is often considered the ideal and most effective approach. Parents who adopt this style are responsive to their children’s emotional and developmental needs, while also setting clear and consistent expectations. They run a home with high structure and high nurture. High expectation but also high compassion. Authoritative parents encourage independence and self-regulation but also provide structure and boundaries. These parents engage in open communication, listen to their children, and explain the reasoning behind rules. This creates a balanced environment of warmth and discipline that promotes a child’s confidence, emotional intelligence, and social skills. Research has consistently shown that children raised by authoritative parents tend to perform well academically, have high self-esteem, and develop strong problem-solving skills.

4. Neglectful Parenting is the most harmful style, characterized by a lack of responsiveness, care, and involvement in a child's life. Neglectful parents may be emotionally or physically absent, either due to personal issues, indifference, or inability to meet their child’s needs. These parents provide little structure and little nurture within the parent child relationship. Children raised in neglectful environments often experience feelings of abandonment, insecurity, and emotional neglect. This style can lead to a range of emotional and behavioral problems, as children may feel unloved, neglected, and unsupported. A lack of structure, warmth, and engagement can make it difficult for children to develop healthy relationships or trust in others.

   
   

The New Age of Parenting Styles

1. Gentle Parenting In theory, gentle parenting is an approach that emphasizes empathy, respect, and understanding. It aligns most closely with authoritative parenting, but it brings additional elements of emotional attunement and non-punitive discipline. In practice, I’ve seen and read about parents who claim to use a “gentle parenting approach” who do great work related to reflecting and validating feelings (a very important skill I discuss with all parents I work with) but struggle to provide clear and consistent boundaries and rules. Doing so often brings up parental anxieties such as not wanting their kids to feel the negative feelings they had towards their own parents or not wanting to continue a neglectful or abusive intergenerational cycle. The problem with this is that parents often swing too far and find themselves in a permissive relationship with their children, indulging every hurt feeling, stifling autonomy and self advocacy, and allowing such things as blatant hitting of their own parents in the name of not being too punitive. Gentle parenting can fall into the authoritative style when done well but I often see a slippery slope into a low structure/high nurture permissive home until parents get fed up with the negative behaviors of their kids and find themselves not liking their kids or themselves much. 

   
   

2. Explicitly not gentle parenting This style of parenting appears to be a response to the poorly executed gentle parenting approach. Parents rightfully don’t want to be the parent who gets slapped in the face at the mere threat that they might not buy their child candy today at the store or feel keen on being yelled at for so long that they eventually cave (because if gentle parents aren’t careful, they will cave, and then their child just knows they just have to scream long enough until they can get what they want). This seems to swing again, too far, beyond  permissive and authoritative and right into authoritarian. These parents desire to explore more old school punishments like timeouts and spankings. Time outs, for example,  do not teach skills or what to do instead, only that 1) my parent doesn’t have the capacity to deal with my negative emotions in a time when children do not have the capacity to deal with their negative feelings without support either, and 2) what not to do next time… with little guidance or practice around what to do instead. Spankings, at their core, just teach children that hitting is an acceptable way to resolve issues (wonder why they keep getting in trouble for hitting other kids at school?) and that people who love you hit/hurt you. 

   
   

3. Sturdy Parenting  is the type of parenting that Dr. Becky Kennedy advocates for. She makes it very clear that she is not a gentle parent. I see it as the theoretical basis of gentle parenting with a very intentional emphasis on skills development (for kids and parents) and clear and firm boundaries. This does require parents to be emotionally intelligent, introspective, and acknowledge that they may be part of the equation that needs to change during high conflict phases.  

   
   

   Sturdy parenting focuses on building a child’s emotional strength, teaching them how to handle challenges, and providing the support needed to overcome adversity. A sturdy parent is less likely to give in to tantrums or allow inappropriate behavior, but they also provide a nurturing atmosphere where children feel loved and understood. Sturdy parents don’t rely on fear or harsh discipline to enforce rules, but instead teach children through natural and logical  consequences of their actions and the importance of accountability. This approach is particularly helpful in guiding children through life’s challenges, helping them develop the resilience needed to navigate difficult situations with confidence.

   
   

4. Free Range Parenting is a movement away from the helicopter/ anxious parenting that many of us experienced growing up. It is the attempt to return children to the “wild,” that being a place where children have autonomy, and their parents’ confidence that they can exert it, to figure things out themselves or amongst themselves. It stands in opposition to the notion that children need a referee for every soccer game, a teacher overseeing every squabble on the playground, and a parent watching every GPS dot of their child on the map. This parenting approach can seem neglectful to some as it is in such stark contrast to many other parenting styles these days. However, when done well, it seems to fall within an authoritative range with the goal of the child figuring their own issues out first before the parent steps in. This style may provide less structure than a sturdy parent but certainly imposes boundaries and appropriate expectations while also providing nurture when appropriate. A parent who allows their child to be free range is well aware of the safety of their neighborhood and likely has watchful eyes throughout the neighborhood just as our grandparents did when our parents were growing up. 

Your parenting style 

Where do you fall on the more traditional and modern spectrums? Is that where you want to be? Without seeking intervention, we typically parent either the way we were parented or explicitly and intentionally opposite of the way we were parented. However, no matter your intentions for your own parenting journey, we often parent the way we were parented when we are in moments of high stress because that is the only roadmap we have. Reach out if you’d like to explore parent coaching or consultation and remember to be kind to yourself, you’ve been doing the best you can with the information you have.